Long Weekend in Iowa

I have been in Iowa since thursday afternoon as a guest racer with Priority Health. I drove out with Sven Howard and we met up later with Scott Stewart. The race schedule is an 80mile RR on Friday, Snake Alley Crit on Saturday, Melon City Crit on Sunday and Quad Cities on Monday. The road race course was pretty simple and nothing too dificult except the wind and heat. It is been so hot and humid it has been dificult to adjust to it. In the road race all of us missed our feeds and were in trouble. I gave Sven my third bottle i caried with me but it just wasn't enough. I was out of water with about 30miles to go, and Sven and Scott were out with about 20miles to go. Chris Wherry and another Toyota rider drilled it over a steep little climb with a good cross wind. I was tagged right on the back of it when it went and thought Sven was a few riders in front of me. As i started to close the gap to the break i was finally able to see who was up the road and i realized Sven was not in the group. I looked behind me and Sven was just off the front of the group trying to close the gap to me. I sat up to wait for him to try and sling him accross to the field. Unfortunalty the field swollowed us up and the break was gone. Scott then started to be really active to try and get in a chase group, i stayed out of trouble with Sven to try and lead him out in the finish. As we came into the finish it was really hectic, i had scott and sven on my wheel but i was so dehydrated i was cramping everywhere, i finally was able to punch it through a gap and get Scott and Sven up to the front onto ABD's leadout train. I blew up and Sven and was off. Unfortunalty he was also dehydrated and didn't have much kick left in his legs. We ended up being shut out of the race. We raced well and were extremely attentive and took care of each other. More to come from Snake Alley...

Kennsington Road Race

Kennsington Road Race is a race that i have only done twice and both times have had poor performances there. This year i felt really strong and raced strong, but something about the way i race this race doesn't work out well for me. First of all, i learned a big leason about the way i race road races. I am way too active too early in the race. Looking back Brent Bookwalter was easily the strongest rider in the field, he is talented and very strong and a much better rider than i am. He was in the 3 strong moves durring the race. I raced too aggresively and was in 6 or 7 moves which is just way too much to have any type of gas left. i wanted to make a split and get away with a good break, but it just didn't happen for me. I was able to help get Rob in the chase group by bringing him and a few others accross to Brent Bookwalter. I have definalty learned a good leason and in long road races have to be more patient. Lesson hopefully learned. next week i will be in Iowa with Priority Health as a guest racer. I will be helping out and hopefully contriubte to a good victory. We have 4 hard days of racing in a row.

Collegiate Nats

This past weekend i traveled to Lawerence Kansas with for Collegiate Cycling Nationals. The weekend consisted of an 88mile hilly and windy road race on saturday and a 70min crit in downtown lawrence on sunday. The road race started out fairly mild, I watched as Brandon Gavic and Mike Busa went off the front and stayed away for almost 1 of 3 laps. I kept myself at the front and attentive for the breaks to start to go away. I was watching a few key guys that i knew were strong pro riders. I was in a few strong breaks through out the day but ended up missing the key break. Now understand this is a huge field almost 170riders so staying in the top section of the field can be a tough thing to do, i really believe my time in Belgium came into great usefullness to help my large pack riding skills. After the winning break was gone and it was clear we would not be catcing them, i started to position myself for the finish up the climb. As we crossed the dam i started to move slowly on the right side of the road. I wanted to start the climb in the top ten and then follow some strong wheels to the top before setting up a sprint. With about a half mile before the beginning of the climb i was about 15riders from the front when a Penn State and Univ. of Illinois rider locked bars and went down in front of me at over 30mph. I hit them square on and fell hard on my right side. My race was over. I got back on my bike and road to the top with a fair amount of pain in my hand, ribs and shoulder. I started the crit the next day a little sore and stiff, but still ready to race. The race started off pretty fast with some hard attacks from the gun. I followed a move by Hans Arensen of IU and the 2 of us ended up off the front with Hans for over 25min. My mistake was making a move this hard this early in the race. I wasn't quite warmed up and it hurt pretty bad. The anouncer said we were averaging over 30mph laps. After we got caught i settled in near the back to try and recover. Unfortunatly a crash happened in turn 3 in front of me and i ended up chasing and chasing and chasing. With only a few minutes to go and still chasing off the back and feeling like crip i bagged the race. i was pretty disapointed to DNF my first race of the year but you can't always have great days. Next up is Kennsington RR here in michigan.

Cone Azaila, what a race

WOW, All i can say, is that was damn hard. The gravel sections where so much worse than last year. The field was significantly stronger than last year and a lot larger than previous years as well. The big name missing from the race was Jake Rytlweski. I believe jake had graduation this weekend and couldn't make it. Anyways, back to the race. As usual the battle to be at the front into the gravel sections was on. I did a good job of being at the front and usuing as little energy as possible to make it onto the gravel in the top 5. The first lap onto the gravel was by far the craziest. Guys were puncturing left and right and it must have been caos. My teammate Rob was unfortunatly one of the victims. Luckily Rob is an animal and chased for 2 laps and caught back on. I spent the day waiting for attrition to take it's toll on the field, but the problem was the race was way too easy in between the hard gravel sections. It have riders too much time to recover and were still strong enough to stick to wheels when we attacked on the gravel roads. Graham, Sven and I were by far the most active all day, launching attacks and mixing things up. On the 4th lap, we laid down a strong attack and a breakaway group was formed. Unfortunatly it was too big and West Michigan Coastal was just shutting it down and not working. They had a guy up the road in the leading break, but they also had like 4 guys in our group of 9. In my mind, i'm thinking, if i had 5guys in a group of 12, then i would work my ass off because the chances of filling the top ten with my whole team is too damn good to just sit on and say, we have one guy up the road. I think tha was a big mistake on their part. So anyways, the break was too big and too many guys were sitting on, so the Howard boys and i started attacking the break. We eventually got caught and it came back together. I ended up missing the best move of the day with 2laps to go, i was sitting 4th wheel going accross the gravel when Graham attacked and Stan Andries followed, i was on Stan's teammates wheel and he did a good job of sitting up and blocking and not allowing me to get around him. By time i was able to squeeze by without crashing into the ditch or really getting physical with him, they had a pretty good gap and i couldn't close it without pulling the group up to them. So i sat back in and waited for a better oppurtunity to try and go accross. The opportunity never came and i found myself with rob in the field racing for 6th place. Rob was fairly fresh and asked if i would lead him out for the sprint. I went to the front with about 3k to go and kept late attackers from getting too much of a lead and punched it with about 1k to go. Rob wa able to follow some good wheels and managed 8th on the day. I raced as hard as i could, and i guess without a little more luck it was the best i could do for the day. The course was so rough, it wiggled loose my crank arm on the first lap but managed to stay on for the whole race. It didn't really affect my race, but it was definatley in my mind when i stood up though. I managed again to get no flats. I have made it 2 years in a row now with no flat tires. I think the secret is the Specialized All Condition Armadillos. Anyways, Thanks for reading. I leave for Collegiate Nationals Wed and will be there until Sunday.

Great wed night training ride

I had a great ride today on the Kalamazoo Bike Club Wed night training ride. This ride always proves to be fast and aggressive. It has been pretty instrumental in my training over the past few years. This wed after we had reached the furthest point and began the trip back, i pushed the pace and a group of 3 of us found ourselves alone off the front. Jeff Hamilton, Jeremy Woolcock and I. We continued to push a steady fast pace until we realized we were a long ways off the front. Jeremy was very impressive, i have never seen him ride that well and he is really stepping up to another level. He was pretty trashed by the end, but he hung in there and I am proud of him. He still has a few more levels to go, but he is making the steps one at a time. The good news, i am not that tired or sore considering how hard we went. Tomorrow i have a 4hr easy training ride which will be nice. All this hard training will hopefully get me tuned up for nationals. But first, Cone Azalia :-}

A new observation

Since i am fairly new to doing TT, i have made an interesting discovery about my position because i have seen the first pictures of my self in action. I believe that my hand position is a bit too high. The distance from my head to my hands is too much. When looking at me on the bike, my leg extension seems fine and feels great, i have a lot of power on the bike, but i definalty can be more aero. The hard part is because of my build and having very long legs and a short torso, it is hard to get low enough and keep my thighs from hitting my chest. The age old TT question now comes in, how low can i go and still maintain my power. We will have to see.

Kicking the Sick before Cone

This week i've been fighting a nasty bug which has included losing my voice completely and coughing non stop for 3days. The weather has been nice and rainy, so training has been a blast. At least it's not really cold out. I am looking forward to this race and have a lot of motivation going into it with a strong team anda good group of guys to try and win this race with. i really would like to take this victory home. i really enjoy this race and nothing would make me happier than to win this race. It will be hard to win this race with the caliber of racers there and it will be dificult to beat Jake Rytlweski. I hope he is a little tired from his long week at Shenandoah. Only time will tell. Wish me luck for this sunday.

Ann Arbor Crit pictures