the season has been rolling along and its not that far from being over as i head back to school on august seventeenth. it feels like the season has gone by very fast, i guess it always does. since nationals ive done several races...fitchburg, hagerstown, capital crit, cascade, and most recently the tour of the catskills. nothings been great...i feel like ive used that term--wasn't great--a lot to describe my races this year, what does it take for me to describe a race as bad? can a bike race be bad?...knock on wood.
cascade was maybe the worst...purely in terms of frustration...worst because i think my form was the best...however perhaps all the cosmos were not aligned...but to all the spirits listening out there know that i accept it! when i showed up in oregon my bike was broken, with a pretty serious crack on the seatstay...not a great way to start the trip. i rode the whole race on my old trek which my mom overnighted out, it worked but wasnt great. the first real day of racing was perhaps the worst luck of the trip when my seat clamp broke a few miles in and i was in the cars trying to get it fixed pretty much from mile 0. later on in the stage after a big selection had been made i broke a spoke 5km from the base of the final climb. by the time i got back on i had no legs left to do a good ride. i lost a bunch of time that day and ended all hopes of doing well in the gc at all. the rest of the race was fine, nothing brilliant, some decent results and took some big gambles, especially on the last day coming up a bit short. however the results sheets dont have asterisks explaining what happened between the start and the finish...i gues thats what people have blogs for.
this past weekend i went up to ny for tour of the catskills it was pretty cool race with a biggish field. pretty hard climbing on the two road race days. some french guy won that i guess rode the tour de france in 08, but he only did the first five stages i think...so really hes no big deal. i felt decent, it was really nice being up in that part of ny, ive never been there and it was gorgeous also the weather was super refreshing not so hot as it has been down here this summer. couple good races on the calendar, ill be back in colorado soon but back soon after for univest i hope.
after writing this actually it doesnt seem so rough after all, perhaps bike racing will go on for myself, but who realy knows.
