Joshua Tarrant

I created this blog to keep track of my racing exploits. I am currently racing with a great elite team out of Michigan (Team Lathrup/Giant)formerly Ford/Giant Cycling team. This makes it easy for my family to read about my races and see pictures of me in action. Thank you very much for positive comments and for reading

Friday, June 16, 2006

Dexter Crit

This is one of the coolest crits in michigan, the course is extremely technical and a true tough mans course. The race started very fast thanks to Rob's clip in and attack method. I countered his lap 1 move and ended up away for about 6 laps by myslef just suffering, but i managed to win a prime ( a pair of rollers.....Sweet!!). I was brought back and spent about 4 laps in the field before i attacked again and that was the start of the winning break. Me Jeff Hamilton and Tucker Olander. We were later joined by my teammates Tom Archer and Brian Adams along with Danny Klein, and a West Michigan Coastal rider. The break was very unorganized and was pretty much a series of attacks and counter attacks but the course was hard enough that we stayed away. Brian had me sit on while him and Tom tried to control the group and keep my out of trouble. My stomache was a mess from eating lunch too close to the race start. I thought i was going to throw up a few time during the race. With 4 laps to go, Brian and Tom got dropped and I was left to try and win by myslef. Tucker and Danny Klein were both being aggressive and they were the ones i was expecting to make the move the last time up the hill. To my suprise Jeff did a very uncharacteristic move and initiated the attack. I think he waited until i was looking back to check on the other 2 when he jumped. Jeff is very fast and powerful and i knew that it would take a lot to catch him. As soon as I noticed he had jumped i followed, but his gap was pretty large, i was able to close most of it down, by the top of the hill. He still had about a 3 bike length lead on me and the decent through the chicane was such that it was impossible to make up any ground. When we hit the finishing stretch for the sprint ( about 80meters) I gave it all i had, but only closed down maybe a 1 and a half bike lengths and got second. Jeff pulled a great move and a well deserved victory. Congrats. After the hard finish my stomache couldn't take anymore and lost my lunch there on the side of the road. I think i almost made Tom lose his, because he had to leave. As a team we did pretty well, winning all the primes but 1 and finishing up 2nd, 6th, and 7th. Not too bad considering Tom and Brian are still not on great form yet. Look for some good placings at Allen Park this saturday.

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