Frostbite/DU Crit

Saturday-- Frostbite Time Trial. Windy, cold, windy. And Hard. Enough said. For more, go to www.teamamericasdairyland.blogspot.com . :)


Sunday:
Cari picked up Clare and I to head down to Denver’s City Park. It was a nice spring afternoon, but a little on the chilly side. The wind was calm and did not turn out to be a major factor in the race. We lined up at the start/finish (indicated by the white arrow) for the Women’s open race along with about 35-40 other women. The course was interesting with 2 major turns and 3 roundabouts.

Clare wanted to animate the field and just after the first few laps she attacked. After a few more laps the group came back together. This is where the race became a completely different race for me! I found myself working very hard, but moving backwards in the field. I was thinking that ‘I must be unfit!’—or— that I really needed to do more speed work! As we got further into the race, I was beginning to feel more and more sketchy going around the roundabouts… I kept thinking that my tire was going to roll off of the rim! FINALLY, after the 2nd roundabout, I glanced down and realized that my tire was completely flat. Hmm…. no wonder why I felt sketchy in those crazy corners! That is when I leapt off of my bike hoofed it to the wheel pit. If you look at the aerial photo... you will see that it was a long mad dash (through a ton of goose poo)! As I ran up, the announcer was aware that I was coming and was nice enough to explain EXACTLY what I had to do and also EXACTLY what Missy and I were doing to the crowd…. fun to listen to, but kind of distracting… especially when he told everyone to look at how my legs were shaking while I was waiting to get back in the race AND also how bad they must feel after running across the field! Missy had to tell me to calm down J I was pretty excited! Thanks Missy—she’s solid as a rock! Success—we changed the wheel and I got right back in the field.

As soon as I rolled back into the pack, Cari had just attacked. Two other riders were with her—and there was a 3-4 second gap between the break and the field. Since Cari was already in the break, I held up and settled in the front of the field with Clare—now our job was to block, to protect Cari. There were only a couple attempts to bridge the gap, but we stopped them and brought the field back together. With 4 laps to go, I almost got taken out by a rider who ended up crashing pretty bad. She faltered while going around the first round about and I noticed her starting to totter, so I took the corner wide… on her way down, she bumped me in the thigh! I thought I was going to hit the pavement, but safely made it around the next tight corner. phew.

Long story short… Cari played the last lap smart and was patient--- she made the other girl chase down the girl who attacked… Cari stuck on her wheel and took ‘em alllllll at the line. Nice work Cari! The team work was awesome! J

Sequoia is coming up on Saturday and Sunday. Missy, Cari, Clare and I are flying out on Friday morning. Gabe is driving out to Boulder to hang out with some friends for the weekend! He’ll pick me up from the DIA on Monday and we’re heading on a short excursion to visit his Aunt and also some sweet powder!! This will be my first powder ‘out west’ in over 5 years! I’m really looking forward to it…. AND for all those who are wondering, I AM bringing my rollers and Gabe and I have already been looking at a nice route for my long training day on that Wednesday (before we hit the powpow).