poo poo crit

Well, I'm back. This past weekend was the River Gorge Crit. I was able to carpool there with my good friends Robbie Kidd and Michael "The Manatee" Weber. Webers race was earlier in the day. He proved that he is getting better and better. He was placed well late in the race, however he got stuck to close to the front with one lap to go. I think he ended 16th or so. Every race he does he improves. He still struggles on maintaining good position, but he will get the hang of it. Robbies race was before mine. His race was a selective crash filled race. After sitting in the field conserving his energy, he sacrificed his position to avoid crashing (a good sacrifice.) Had Robbie wrecked, he would have ruined his wheelset. Once he avoided his wreck he slipped to the back of the course. The course was extremely narrow and technical making moving up very hard. He ended up coming in mid field in the sprint I think. My race was delayed due to a guy wrecking and the ambulance being on the course. Kinda scary knowing the course is sketchy enough for a guy to be wheeled off in an ambulance. My race starts and it is hard from the gun. To be honest, I was in the red zone for the first 20 minutes, no rest. Even though I was hurting, alot, I was still doing a decent job of staying near the front. I knew how hard it would be if I were at the back, so I tried with everything to stay at the front. As I was covering some moves at the front, my two teammates where chilling at the back, which kinda sucked cause I was dieing trying to cover this stuff and they were no where to be found. As the race goes on, we are constantly dropping riders. about 30 minutes into the hour long race, I begin to get some pretty severe stomach cramps. The race doesn't sit up til about 40 minutes in. Once the race sits up, a d-bag rider attacks and stays away for the win. About 45 minutes in, there is a small split int he field. At this point, my stomach cramps are getting worse and worse. I decided I was going to drill it to make the split, and if I didn't make the split, I was going to drop out to relieve my cramps. Well, I don't make the split, so I pull out and go strait to the restrooms. Once I get done, I go to watch the race and I realize there are only like 15 riders left in the race, 35 started. The winds and technical course destroyed the race. I definitely learned some things from this race. Kinda suck it ended up that way, but I learned. So whats next you may ask? Last race of the year is coming up a week from today, US 10k classic. I can't wait for it to come. My power is getting slightly better. More than anything, I am looking forward to letting loose for a couple of weeks. My discipline is getting weaker and weaker. It's ok in my opinion, for the first time, I am not physically or mentally burned out at the end of the year, its kind of a crazy feeling. Yes, the sensations of being peaked have left my legs. However, I still feel good. I might give a midweek update, if not, I will definitely give a post race/season recap.
Til next time,
the Crow

thank god thats over with

My apologies for the late recap, here's how it all went down this past weekend. Friday night, I agree to meet with the Rigbys (race officials) about approving the feed zone area. I agree with them to meet at 6 o'clock at roan state community college (that is where race packet pick up is.) They finally show up at 6:30. They get there and I say cool lets go check it out. They then tell me they must wait on another official to get there. What? I got crap todo, at this point, I still have to go to Knoxville ad overhaul my bike. So here we are, waiting for this guy to show up. Finally, 7:30 comes and he shows up. After they talked for 15 minutes we finally get going. IT took them roughly 15 minutes to approve it. In that amount of time, we could have approved and been back before the official even got there. So I am on my way to Knoxville and it is roughly 8:30. I haven't had dinner yet, and I still have to overhaul my bike. So I get to the shop and I then begin the whole process of cleaning, putting new bearings in, etc. I get on my way home around 10:30. Knowing that I have an 80 mile road race the next morning I begin eating pasta as if I were a vacuum. I finally get in bed around 11:45.
The next morning comes, and I have more stuff to do, therefor I have to get up at 5. So I get up, put everything in the car and immediately go out to the course and begin sweeping some turns. So here I am, outside someones house at 6 in the morning sweeping gravel off the road. This took me about 45 minutes and by the time I was done, I was dripping sweat. I head to the start area and begin to get ready to race. As I'm getting ready to race, one of my co-promoters begins sending people my way. If someone asks him anything, his response was go ask Jon Crowson. He literally sent 15 people to me in the span of about 5 minutes. THANKS ALOT. Thanks for screwing my warm up. So the race finally starts. The course has a one mile climb, right after the descent of the climb, there is a short, but supper steep roller. I get over the climb fairly well, towards the front. We hit the roller and I am dead. My guess is due to my lack of sleep I could not recover. I go out the back like a brick and I pull the plug to start volunteering. Due to pouring rain, less than half the expected volunteers showed up. It was a huge pain in the butt to find wheel vehicles and lead vehicles for the second heat of races. I could not have done it without my lead and wheel vehicles for the second heat. Thanks so much to those guys! The day finally ends, and I am beat. I skip the tt and take a good nap.
The next day was the crit. I decided to announce for the race, so whenever I got up, I headed over to the crit. I get there around 10 and begin announcing. My race starts at 3:55 and I announce all the way up to that point. I begin my warm up and my legs are feeling horrible. I start the race and immediately go off the front to try and get them going. That was a FAIL, instead of warming them up, it just put my in the hurt box for the rest of the race. I get in a couple of moves, but with no avail. Thee race comes down to a sprint and luckily enough Stefan was in good enough position to sprint to 6th. I am way back in the field and I cannot move up in time. I probably ended up getting 20th or something.
After the weekend was all said and done, I have decided to not promote the road race next year. I will continue to try and get a twilight crit for next year, but thats it. I have had it with this, I don't enjoy being part of screw ups, which is what the road race was. Was some of it my fault? possibly, however the fact that half of my volunteers showed up was the cause in my opinion. I was not head of the volunteering area.
So the next race is the Chattanooga crit on Sunday. Hopefulyl my legs with come back around cause a couple of Mondays from now is the 10K classic. Possibly the biggest race of the year. A super high speed circuit race with a 45+ mph sprint. I will give another update probably on Sunday. Until then,
The Crow

crossing the T's

Well after a break of blogging, it's time to give my few readers an update. My life is now complicated. Mostly complicated with stupid stuff, but stuff none-the-less. The Oak Ridge race is this weekend and it is taking up more of my time as each day goes by. Sunday, I was out riding the course. Once my 90+ mile ride was over, I went back out there for a couple of hours to mark the course. Today, I was back out there for even more hours. Lou (race co-promoter) and I were out there putting fliers on every single mail box. Might not sound like much, but it is. We started with 200 fliers and ran out with about 100 houses to go. I will probably go back out there on Friday to sweep a couple of the turns, but then I 'm done. I'm actually focusing on the race this year, so I will probably show up right at the start time so I don't get stressed out on race day. Those are the perks of living a 20 minute ride away from the staging area. I am also doing the Oak Ridge time trial. It will be my first time trial all year, so I will probably crush it. Especially since my tt setup is probably worth 1/5 of what my teammates setup is. O well, no need in getting worked up over it, if nothing else it will be good to spin my legs out. The crit is one of my top 5 favorite crits. The only way it could be better is if it was on Saturday night (in the works.) I'm also looking forward to Atlanta 10K. It says 10k but really its 100k. The race is very fast and I think that would be a cool way to close out the season. It's crazy that I'm already talking about my end of the season break, but hey it's almost September. I think once 10K is over I will take 1-2 weeks of absolutely no exercise then start doing some cross training. To be honest I don't want to take a break, I want to race the whole time, but at this time of the year, life starts getting in the way. I start becoming more and more busy with none cycling stuff. Once my break is over, there is a triathlon that I'm looking forward to doing in late October, then I am doing a 6 hour mtb race in mid November. To be honest, that is what I'm really looking forward to. I can't wait to hang out with some of my friends from Murfreesboro. I went to college with some super cool guys and they will be there representing their bike store MOAB. Also, I'll be going over ther with my good friend Mike "The Manatee" Weber. He is a cool guy that I work with. He is getting stronger every day, I think he has a good chance of winning the mountain bike race. I will probably post an update Saturday night giving a race recap. The road race should be very hard and fun. I love long road races, so this should suit me.
til next time
The Crow

back to reality

Well, my week long vacation has come to an end. Boy did it end with a bang! The second to last race (Friday night) went well. I started on the front row, got a good clip in and it was on. I felt great early on and probably did too much. I was too near the front early on and got caught out covering some breaks. It was not smart of me, but at least now I know I can compete on this level. When it was all said and done, I got popped with 3 laps to go, but I hung in there and finished the race. It was not a good result but it was good for my mentality and I now know I have improved from last year. Also, it was good to see more familiar faces. Not only was Stefans awesome family there, but Greg Casteel. Casteel is a great masters racer and a local legend. When I was really struggling at the end, I could hear his voice. A voice that is so distinct due to the large amount of heckling he gives me.
Saturday, the last race was about to happen. Most of the big guns were doing the big NRC race that evening, so the field was noticeably smaller. The race starts, and for me, it was significantly slower. I begin doing very well, I bridge to a break to open my legs and recover well afterward. With about fifteen laps to go, I am sitting about ninth wheel. A Mountain Khakis rider in front of me begins slamming on the brakes, so I am forced to slam my brakes on as well. In order to prevent from hitting the rider dead on, I slide to the right just a little bit. He begins to go to the right a split second later and takes me out. A begin to roll several times. I think four riders end up rolling over me and they themselves go down as well. I get up and get my bearings strait. I try to ride on, but my bike is too screwed up to compete. Not the best way to end the series.
So whats next? Well, it's back to reality for me. Going back to work tomorrow. The Oak Ridge race is coming up and I must meet with police and volunteers and deal with that headache. My other bro Josh is leaving for college in the next couple of days so I might be able to hang out with him one more time. Stefan is going to college next weekend so I will for sure hang out with him before he leaves. Real life is starting as the summer is ending. I will be pretty busy this week, but I will try to do a midweek post to let you know I haven't succumbed to the stress.
thanks for reading,
The Crow

crossroads pt. 2

As I'm driving to the host home, (Stefans Aunts house) I am thinking to myself, what could I have done differently so that Stefan could have won? Rewind 1.5 hours. I am standing on the front row of start line. A steady drizzle of rain is coming down. Lightning lights up the twilight sky in intermittent segments. The race starts and my foot stutters. Riders begin coming around me as if they were a swarm of ants on a dropped piece of food. We go into the first turn, Stefan is fifth wheel, I am thirtieth. Four turns later, we hit the first long stretch of the entire crit series. As the rider in front of me slowly begins pulling away, I realize I don't have the legs. Four turns after that, we hit the second long stretch, the finishing stretch. My legs begin to crumble. I realize, it is not a question of IF I get dropped, but a question of WHEN am I getting dropped. Seven turns after we cross the finish line, my rear wheel skids. The guy behind me slides and takes my wheel wheel with him. I do not go down, however, I do get gaped. I continue on, trying to close gaps that I, myself opened. Around five laps in, I can not do it anymore. The constant turning, wet corners, and wet potholes have taken their tole on me.
As I head back to the car to begin changing, I think to myself, "What happened?" I cannot come up with an excuse other than I just did not have it. The legs were not there. The wind was not there. My heart just wasn't in it tonight. I change and head back to cheer my Aryan teammate, Stefan, on. As I begin stand near the finish line, Stefan is continuously in good position, around the top 10. A couple of laps later, a five man break is up the road. None other than Stefan is chasing them down. With one lap to go, Stefan is around 10th wheel. Coming into the finish, Stefan is in fourth wheel and there is a huge gap to fifth place. I immediately begin cheering, but at the same time, I am thinking what could I have done differently to get him the win?
Well for starters, I could have had better legs. Is that control-able? Probably not, but I could have done something differently leading into the race to have better legs. If Stefan had a lead out of some sort, he could have killed it. If he didn't have to reel in that break away, he probably would have won the sprint. It's so surprising for some to think that one mid-race effort can change your result, but it can. I believe if I had closed that gap instead of Stefan, the outcome would have been different. But there is no use in playing the what if game, I just have to look to the future and learn from the past. The next race suits me a little better. It is a "lumpy" L shaped course. Many of the big teams will be saving their legs for tomorrows big NRC race, but I am not. I did not get in that race, so THIS race is MY race. Stefan will be at tomorrows big NRC race so he will be conserving a little today. Possibly not even finishing. That is fine with me, after seeing him yesterday, I believe he can get a top 20 in Americas richest Crit. I will probably give a recap in a couple of days.
Thanks for reading,
The Crow

CROSSROADS

Well Crossroads has finally come. Needless to say, something always goes wrong. For some reason, every time I plan on doing well in a race, I never do well. Last year, I was peaking for the Jerry Springer road race. When the Springer road race comes, I end up having the worst day on the bike I have ever had. Bar none, nothing has even come close to that day. I felt horrible. So what happens here? About a week before the races, I begin feeling weak. The day before the race, I begin vomiting. I vomit three times, the third being pretty bad. Needless to say, after that, I have nothing in my stomach and I can't hold anything down. So I'm going into Mondays race and I am afraid to eat much. I just got done recovering from some illness and I am getting ready to race the biggest races of the year.
Well, I show up to the start line and there are "only" two full U.C.I. teams there. When I say full, I mean 10 guys per team. The first race had about 70 starters. My broseph Stefan and I were the only ones representing my team. We get to the start line and we are stuck at the back. The race starts and I don't move up immediately. Instead, I take my time. I decide to take it easy at first cause too many times have I blown up trying to move up too quickly. So Stefan immediately goes to the front and starts mixing it up with the big guns. He does great! Midway through, I begin moving up. 40 minutes in, there is a prime and everyone goes on the right, I am stuck on the left. I somewhat salvage my position, but it was just too much. I try moving up again, but my stomach begins hurting. We are coming into the last couple of laps and some is dropping the hammer. I am holding on for dear life, but I still hold on. With 3 laps to go it eases up, but I am too tired and I can't recover. We go around the first turn on the last lap and I see Stefan on the ground. NOT COOL! I go around, finish the race, then make sure he is ok. He bike got somewhat mangled, but it ended up being ok. I come across the finish line near the back of the field, but I still finished. Last year I could not even do that on this race. I am happy with the performance. After being sick, I didn't know what to think. I figured I would have be dropped very early on, but that was not the case.
The next race was last night (Wednesday) The course is the shortest course at only .4 miles long. Last year, this was the only race I finished. (we averaged 29) The race starts and it is chaos. This time, there is another full team in the mix, Team Bissell. They show up with 9 guys. There are constant surges and the race wasn't quite as smooth as last year. Stefan begins mixing it up yet again, and I take a more conservative approach. The course has alot of pot holes and Stefans wheel ends up coming out of true, to the point where he could not go on. So I am the only one remaining. With about 30 laps to go there is a split in the field and I am in the second half. About this time, my stomach begins hurting and I am very uncomfortable. The bomb gets dropped with 8 laps to go, and I am shelled. I do not finish this race. Tonight is the race in Salisbury. A larger course which I will probably do better on. I will let you know how I do tomorrow, race time is at 8:45 pm.
The Crow