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Well, I haven't been keeping up my blog much.  I ought to be tho, since I'm starting to be able to mix things up.  I'll give it a shot at catching up a bit from when I last wrote.  I'm definitely not writing as much because I'm trying to be wayyyy more political about what I write since it apparently offends people.  I also have been adding to these unpublished venting posts which will likely never see the light (darkness?) of the internet.  The big thing is that I'm trying to get along with a lot of people who have different, opinionated and seemingly habitual learned approaches to bike racing.  And I find myself disagreeing with that a lot, and it can sometimes come off quite sharply.  I want to be a good member of the community, however I am most definitely not sacrificing my philosophy on racing.

Anyways, I'll talk racing now and hope I don't offend too much.

Cherry Pie

That was a long breakaway I got into at mile 12 of a 75 mile race.  Probably good too because I was skipping numerous pulls and then got dropped badly from the break and then the peleton itself.  I can chalk up one DFL for the season, heh.  My fitness was not there yet.  That's for sure.  The team got a pretty good result with our 40+ year olds taking 2nd and 5th.

IVRR

Nasty weather/sun kinda day.  Break got away really early and nobody from our team got in it.  On the backstretch our team decided to paceline like we were going to catch it or something, but none of us really had the desire or fitness to accomplish such a thing.

I was moving backwards while climbing Michigan Hill.  On the 2nd to last lap I bridged up to a chase group and worked with them until I got dropped and rode in no-mans-land just to get caught by 2 guys at 200m.  Still got 13th and every other Portland rider from my team except Sherm who had a cold DNF'ed.

Santa Cruz

I had two wonderful rides thru Redwood forests and got to see the California Giant Strawberry Factory.

King's Valley

Got the beer prime for the 2nd year in a row this time in a solo attack.  I got chewed out for having a $7,000 bike with the squeakiest chain in the peleton.  The break got away and Casey got in it.  The pack was satisfied with going in borderline zone 1 levels so the break stuck.  I and a few others were bored out of our minds.

Walla Walla

ok, no, I'll write a full post about Walla Walla.  Look for that later.

I have actually been racing

This whole having lots of teammates thing is a big adjustment for me let me tell ya.  I have gone from receiving maybe two emails a week related to my team racing to perhaps an average of 5 per day.  I've gone from having no teammates racing with me at most races to racing with 9 or more other teammates at some races.

It's a little different.  People are a little different and I don't think I'm really known to have lots of charisma and bonding, yet I do have a lot of passion for racing and sometimes, perhaps often times find myself not having the same approach to training and racing as other people do.  However, I really hope to continue and experience a year on a big team to really have a good feel for what that is like.  And also to develop my social skills so that perhaps I become slightly more charismatic and able to get along with more people than not.  

For whatever reason, competition brings out a whole different side of me which is quite different from my otherwise quiet demeanor in most situations.  And I think that dichotomy throws off - perhaps puts off - some or perhaps a lot of people.  I've been writing on this blog for 4 years now, but I've been holding my tongue or rather not publishing a few critiquing blog posts and flustered emails.  I know I've been inspired by one of my favorite bike racing bloggers, PruDog who I would say is not one to hold back on his blog posts.  There's something about communicating on the internet that just leads to writing things you may never say in person to someone (or maybe I don't know him well enough).

So without further ado, race reports:

The Dirty #1

Oddly enough, I was feeling really good for this race.  Last year I was getting dropped in my first few races.  When all was said and done, I was not the most happiest joyful person in the world to learn that with 33% of the field being our team, our team's best result was 8th.  The next day I sent a very detailed email explaining what went wrong and what could be improved.  Some didn't like it, some did, most didn't, I really don't know, but I now am encouraged to not send emails like that.

Sequim/Mason Lake #1

Sequim's rain shadow just couldn't hold it for those last 2 laps.  HSP kicked everyone's butt.  They had also had at least 10 teammates, but got 1st, 2nd, 5th and 8th.  Slightly better results, but with all due respect former pro's and very motivated racers.  I didn't do well in the field sprint because I still don't have the field sprinting technique down.

Mason Lake was all right and I found myself sitting in more often than usual.  I'm still deciding whether that is a good or bad thing.  I'm leaning towards bad, I think PruDog would agree.  It came to a field sprint again and again I didn't do well.

Oh, an important thing to note - while Brant and I were up in Washington getting our asses handed to us by HSP, the rest of our Oregon contingent pulled out the W in the 123 race at the Dirty #2.  Guess they showed me who knew something about bike racing, or were they proving something after receiving that very detailed email?  One thing is for sure, Dean attacked a lot.

Sequim/Mason Lake #2

My girlfriend Laurel came up with me which was awfully nice of her.  I felt like I had a little bit of a governor on my upper end fitness, but I hung in there.  My crash avoidance skills were pretty good as 2 crashes happened right in front of me.  The first crash was on the 3rd lap and I was able to avoid that and catch on easily.  The 2nd crash was at 400 to go and somehow I ended up standing upright without a scratch on the new bike in the middle of maybe a dozen other riders on the ground.  I had to step over at least 3 people to get out of that.

Over at Mason Lake, I was prepared for the worst as the radar looked like about 3/4 of an inch of rain was about to dump on us as we started (it didn't).  I wore my rain jacket as my jersey which Bedford astutely noted for it's excellent parachute-like quality with my race numbers.  The amount of pros at the race had me sort of starstruck (I get giddy inside when Morgan Schmitt remembers my name).

My move of the race was at the end of lap 1 when I figured I might as well get this party started by doing a break and waiting for the inevitable pro bridging up to me.  Sure enough Steve Fisher came along with a HSP rider in tow, but then we were caught just before the first hill after corner 1.  I got dropped, but I caught back on.  I got dropped numerous other times that following lap and then I got dropped for good on lap 3.  I made it my goal to complete 5 laps without getting lapped by the Cat 3 breakaway group.

I'm still running through all the factors that caused this embarrassing situation.  I think it had less to do with the parachute-like outfit and my top candidates are not getting my new bike fit after it being built, not having my carbon wheels, having a spoke about to fall out of the front wheel I did have, too many blueberries for dinner the previous evening, and a sleep debt of approximately 1,000 hours over these past 4 years of racing.  But I'm just writing it off as a bad day like I had last year at Heiser Farms where I got lapped.  At Mason Lake I didn't get lapped by about 7 minutes when Rathe came by and did a victory salute consisting of making his race number as visible as possible from under his rain jacket.

done, publish, try to sleep, bye.

Team Racing

Not much happened last week due to it being a rest week. I did volunteer over at Swan Island, but then headed down to Roseburg to my cousin's birthday/graduation party that happened the next day.

PIR

Over at PIR, it was a lot of chasing and getting in breaks. I felt kind of strong, but not spectacular, or it could be that everybody else's fitness is improving since it is actually nice to ride outside in the Pacific Northwest this time of year. With a few laps to go, birthday boy Eddie came over and told me that on the final lap I should try to breakaway on the backstretch and then leave the sprinting up to him and Rocky. I put down a massive sprint and pretty much died right after the sharp left on the backstretch and could only hope something good happened to the mass of riders that filled most of the racetrack ahead. It looked like they had decent position and in the end Rocky got 2nd. Nice.

Franz Bakery

I have been anticipating this race most of the year. Last year's race made me get super depressed since I crashed on the final turn when I may have just needed to finish in 2nd to win the overall points in the race after being in a breakaway for most of the race. This time around, it was a much hotter day with seriously Texas style heat with the high of the day reaching 102 degrees. I really should have made my drinks much less sugary for the race and not used a recovery powder, but whatever.

The race started and I got up to the front and kind of waited a bit. Rocky got some early points with Bedford, Liberles and Spahr all trying to get away every once in a while. Then, Austin from Team O and a Veloce guy got a decent gap about halfway through. I knew any break on this course was a threat, so I bridged up. It was tough heat and we had an uneven effort level in the break with Austin being really fresh and the Veloce rider not so much, but he was taking lap points nonetheless. With about 10 to go, another Team O guy bridged up to us and I swear it was Bedford, but he said it wasn't him after the race. I might have been hallucinating. But whoever it was, it was definitely a Team O guy because they attacked and then countered with the other guy upon being brought back. Eventually one of them got away and the other Team O guy and the Veloce guy got absorbed by the pack. I probably didn't try my best to stay out there and really should have given more effort to catch Austin, so I got absorbed with about 4 to go. I then worked to counter Bedford, Liberles and Spahr again for the next few laps. Then with 1 to go, Eddie went up and gave Rocky a perfect leadout up the hill and then Rocky closed with a flawless sprint up the final hill and around the corner for 2nd place. I was happy to be consoled with a team podium finish, but perhaps when I'm by myself I know that if I fail in the break it is all over for me so I may be more motivated that way.



Well, the season is kind of winding down now. Next week I'm going to be racing a lot. PIR, Portland Twilight, OBRA Crit and I want to do the OBRA TT as well. Then after that it's the Giro di Portland. The weekend after that is Longview which I may or may not do, and then it's time to go out big in Eugene. I can see the light at the end of the racing season and I am getting a little antsy with my dating life and am considering actually pursuing women again. But I'm waiting to see if I'm going to secure a winter job assignment in Austin, TX for the winter before I get serious about that.

And one final thing, I promise you readers I will do a post this coming week about my awesome race bike since I probably have to because I am going to take the risk of riding it in these upcoming crits this weekend.