Oh that polished tarmac feeling. I know it well.

Twilight Series #4
Boca RR

Big group coming down to the line+single lane sprint= yeah you can figure that one out.

The pace going up the hills was slow and the group stayed together. Coming into the finish with a group of about 30 and everyone thinking they can take the win. Mark T went up the outside with chad in tow. I was starting to sit up since it looked like a disaster waiting to happen. Bubba cut across scott ferguson's wheel to jump onto chad as they go by and Scott winds up sideways in the road and goes down. Nowhere to go but straight into them. Tuck, Roll, Cuss and done. Rashing on both hips and shoulders but nothing bad. Small crack in the helmet so its junk.
Hope Scott and Shawn heal quick since they got it much worse than I.

3rd crash of the season. 1 was all me and the other 2 were just shit luck.

What a jackass. oh THIS is the bell lap. Gottcha.

Modesto Crit:
Hot. Hot. Hot. Hot.
It was in the upper 90's for the start and over 100 at the end. The course was actually a pretty cool L shape in downtown Modesto. About 15 minutes into the race the pace was rather slow and as they rang the first prime bell a guy picked up the pace(not sprint)going for the prime. I rolled around him and told him to keep it going. He was gassed after the effort and I was off the front. Now this is usually a good thing but with the heat it was much sooner than I wanted to be. I put my head down and drilled it for about 10 minutes and got up to about 30 seconds on the field but could feel the heat enveloping me. I saw a couple guys working to bridge so I sat up to wait for them. The selection established with about 15 guys, I sat in and tried to keep cool and felt fresh toward the end. I picked my wheel and fired off the one good sprint I had left for the finish only to hear the bell ring. Shit. 1 lap to go. I tried to hold the gap I had but got caught and settled for 11th. What a jackass.

Twilight Series #3 Fernley circuit race

This course is usually nothing but a sufferfest for me with a steep hill that zaps the steam out of me every lap. Unfortunately the draw of racing on a closed course with perfect pavement and a ripper downhill turn is too much to resist.

This time it was a little different than usual, for the first time the wind was rather mild out in Fernley. All the normal super studs lined up including 4 of team Clover. I tried a couple attacks early on but nothing was happening and eventually sat in and tried to hang on to the tail of the group as it whittled down lap after lap each time up the hill. With 2 to go the lead group was down to about 12 and Bubba takes a flyer off the front. With 3 teammates(and arguably the 3 strongest remaining in the front group) left in the pack no one really wanted to chase. As we approached the hill for the last time Bubba was only a handful of seconds up on the group but I lacked the legs to bridge to him. I struggled to keep contact and found myself chasing back on most of the time. About a mile from the finish Micah and Norman jumped from the group and I sat. clover started to real them in a little and they had about 5-10 seconds on the group coming into the final straight. I got on Mark's wheel and then started my sprint from way to far back but was able to hold it long enough to catch the two up the road and hold it to the line for 2nd. Bubba took a well deserved first for staying away for almost two laps.

1st Bubba
2nd Me
3rd Chad
4th Micah
5th Mark
Looking back at whats left of the group to see who is going to come around me

Realizing nobody is.

No races and nice weather = ride yourself into the ground

Without anything on the schedule, mostly thanks to my procrastination registering(or trying to) for Berkeley Hills RR, I had free rein to ride myself into the ground this week. Saturday was a nice 6.5 hours, followed by a nice roll around Sunday morning watching Megan run her first race, a half marathon(12th in her category, nice!) and a couple more hours later. Monday brought another couple hours of intensity and then the Tuesday night worlds for yet another smasher. Finish it off with a couple hours last night with intensity and you get a TSS of just under 1400 for the week. Legs feel like junk today but in a good way.

This weekend looks like a couple more longer days followed by some major suffering getting dropped at Boca on tuesday and then recovering for Modesto RR/crit.

Here's hoping the warmer weather is actually here to stay. No only if we could get rid of these stupid earthquakes.