KSR P12.

Day 1 - 75 miles? rolling course built for speed. Pretty easy to pack surf. Hung out near the back for most of it and avoided trouble. There was some serious sketch in the last 3k but only one real crash with about 700m to go, and fortunately it was on an uphill stretch so nobody was really badly hurt I don't think.

Day 2 - 74 miles, ends with a ~20-25min climb. Was pretty rad. The first climb comes after only a handful of miles and dudes really, really wanted to get away but I can't recall anything being let go. Then we went ripping down through some really fun and fast descents, and things were still really aggressive. When things flattened out ~15 guys got away and I realized the GC, KOM, and Sprint bros were in it along with most of the pro teams being represented so I bridged up to it and had an "omg i did the right thing?!" moment. Unfortunately there were like 5 guys that would not work, 5 guys that would work wayyyyy too hard, and 5 guys that were doing it right, so it only lasted 10-15 miles or so. We hit the KOM climb at a pretty relaxed pace with the field making contact near the bottom and I maintained my position near the front. Just after cresting the KOM another breakaway formed catching people off guard. I hesitated for a second or two too long, then launched a bridge attack and got 3/4 of the way across and realized I was dragging a couple of guys with me so I tried to make them work, but when I flicked my elbow nobody came around, and then we all looked at each other and neutralized each other out of the move, which was dumb. That breakaway stuck, and I had used all of my good matches in the first half of the race. That's probably the only thing I'm annoyed about from the whole weekend, I should've just sucked it up and done all the work to get across to it, but that's life! [MENTION=360087]dz_nuzz[/MENTION] is a wizard and got OTF without pretty much anyone seeing him do it and he pretty much solo'd in no man's land until the base of the finishing climb. Things stayed pretty relaxed until a dirt road section with 5min climb followed by a 40-50mph descent. The climb wasn't so bad, I hit a pretty big hole on the descent and somehow did not flat. It turns out I cracked my rear wheel and a pretty big section of the drive side of the rim had buckled, but it held together until the finish.

Anyway I rolled with the pack until the base of the finishing climb but due to early race shenanigans had not much left in the tank, and wound up doing tempo up it, which felt like death.

Stage 3 was the ITT. It is 10.5mi, a fast and false flat uphill course. I used clip on bars like a scrub. Power wise it was what I was aiming for though I rode it a bit conservative because I blew myself up the last 2 years. Time wise...I am not aero. It is time to get a real TT rig. I did put out 40 more watts than last year though, so at least I am doing something right!

So overall my result was kind of ****, but I don't think it reflects how my weekend really went. It was a really good learning experience overall and it seems like I am close to breaking through the mental blocks I've been dealing with forever. I definitely had a "holy **** I can do this stuff?!" moment when I bridged up to the early break, and that is something I have needed for confident racing at this level. Next time I won't hesitate when the later break rolls!