Tuesday, April 17, 2007

Jacksonville

1st NRC race of the year and it was a doozy. I flew from the bus down to Jacksonville and hooked up with my old teammate and friend Kevin on Friday night. Our race was not until Sat night so we had some down time on Saturday. We enjoyed the nice weather and went for a ride and bummed around town for a bit. I hooked up with my teammates Hekman and Harper before the race as they drove down from Rock Hill. We were all looking forward to racing together for the 1st time this year. Just my luck about 30 mins before the race a storm moves in and it starts pouring.... race in the rain, at night.. brilliant. I have struggled for some reason for the past couple years in the rain so I was a bit nervous before the start. I got myself psyched and figured I was either gonna crash out or do well... those were my only options... so I came out swinging and rode the top 10 for the 1st 10 laps or so as the chaos got worse and worse behind us. The course was insane with one of the straight aways having oncoming traffic on the other side of the cones(nice, NRC baby!). And the race was just about as crazy... crashes all over and gaps opening all the time. I was able to stay upright and only got caught in one crash.. but that crash split the field and when I got thrown back in I was in the 2nd group somehow.... we still had a long time to go so I wasn't too worried. I was feeling pretty decent and gave the sprinting legs a go winning a prime about halfway through the race and helping Harper win another (cha ching!). 2 different groups ended up lapping... 3 guys 1st and then another 3 guys which included my teammate Hekman.. As he was lapping we were catching back onto the 1st group bringing everything back together except for the 6 that lapped. At this point there was only about 50 riders left from the original 120. I did what I could for Hekman for the next 10 laps and turned him loose... My legs gave out on me and we watched Hek come home finishing 6th.. Great result for him and the team... I was super happy with the way the race went. We only had 3 guys and were pretty animated. I struggled a bit with the heat and the heavy air, but I think for the 1st big race I came out pretty good. Sunday we did a real boring 100 mile road race in 3.5 hours... It was super windy and super fast. I pretty much chilled out and stayed out of trouble in the crosswinds and after 8 guys slipped away I tried to give it a go in the field sprint. Hekman jumped with me in tow, but we misjudged the finish and went WAY to early. Needless to say my legs weren't there anyway as I was cramping from having no feeds in that crazy heat and I got my doors blown off me.... Overall it was a great weekend and I think my fitness is on the up and up.... Hopefully this weekend help me polish up for the US Crit series that starts in 2 weeks... really looking forward to it... till then! m@

2 comments:

FstrBlly said...

Dude- is that urban camo?

Marco Aledia said...

You know it! bringin it back...