Stage 6: Circuit Race and Beyond

Stage 6: Aubry Butte Circuit Race

4 laps.  Power climbs, Rollers, Fast Descents, a Wall, a roundabout and a hard finish.

We started the circuit race in great position.  Having AFR 2nd, JBev 4th, Kat 6th, Me 9th and Mer 10th in General Classification.  We needed to make the race hard, try to get some breaks up the road, hopefully make Webcor work really hard, then hit them again when it counted.  About 5k into the race, we starting launching the attacks.  I ended up in a break that lasted for about a lap.  Once that break was caught, we never gave up.  We continued our attacks.  Mer ended up in a break that last for 1.5 laps, and had an almost 3 min. gap over the peloton.  We were shattering the race, yet all the key players were still present and accounted for.  On the final lap, we were running out of room.  We continued the onslaught.  My legs were feeling heavy, but I took faith that most of the girls felt that way, if not worse.  AFR and JBev made the last few attacks within 5 to go.  It was brutal.  I drove the chase to try to limit Kat and my losses.  Kat kept yelling for me to “go go go”….I started to swerve.  I was seeing red.  I was going as hard as I could, and then I blew.  TIBCO officially used every last resource they had in me.  I did my job, and I was so satisfied with that.  It was 3k from the finish, and it took everything I had to keep one foot moving the cranks at a time.  I finished the race.  Jo got 2nd in the circuit, and AFR kept her 2nd place GC.  The rest of us lost some GC position due to our work in the circuit, and never once racing for ourselves.  I ended up 11th in GC and never was trying to race for my own result (except in that time trial…).  Excellent.  I love it.  Cycling is great.  We gave that race everything we had, and we had the firepower, and didn’t quite make that race go according to our plans.  I can’t look back at it though without knowing that I gave each attack my 100% effort.  I meant it.  And that’s bike racing.  A lot has changed from last year.  I can race, and I can recover. 

On to National Preparation 2009.

Yesterday was spend floating the Deschutes River.  It was amazing.  We floated down the river, then got some great burgers.  It was relaxing and a good day “off the bike” and “on the river”.  Little did we know that our exercise would take form yesterday in trying to blow up 7 air mattresses. 

Time to get the head in the game for Nationals.

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