Nobody said it would be easy

I rolled across the finish line and coasted to my team car. Wordlessly, I slowed to a stop and dismounted, handing the spare bike--it wasn't even mine--to Jelly, our mechanic. I squeezed into the back seat of the car with a grimace, just trying to get inside before the dam burst.

Wohlberg, my director, got in and started the car, speechless except for the conciliatory, "Sorry, buddy."

"It just keeps happening..." was my response, choked out between sobs. The tears rolled off my face onto my first NRC yellow jersey as I tried to sink lower in the seat while keeping my bloody knees off the upholstery. The emotional rollercoaster was simply too much to handle. It was barely 18 hours after my first professional win, the highlight of my year.

A poor performance resulting in the loss of yellow would have been difficult enough to handle--I hadn't even gotten the opportunity to try. Instead, I was taken down in a large pileup that surprised no one at the start of the stage--the third such pileup in as many years--and came out of it with the worst injuries.

For the third time this year, Wohlberg and I headed off to the hospital. In my mind, it was merely a formality, a reassurance that I'd only sprained my wrist again and jammed my thumb badly. I convinced myself of this all the way through the x-rays, right up until the doc walked in with the results.

Broken wrist, broken thumb. 4-6 weeks. I was numb mentally. I couldn't believe I was going to have to start over again. Oh, and I needed surgery. On both. The hits just kept coming.

After a conversation with my mom in which I broke down yet again, we decided that I'd fly home for surgery because I would need a lot of help for a while with both hands out of commission.

A day later, I was home. At noon the next day, I was in surgery with a highly-recommended hand surgeon in Dallas, shortly after learning that it would likely be 12 weeks before I was cleared to race. My season was over.

Almost 2 weeks later, my hands are 75% functional. I can't use my right thumb or either wrist, so there's still a lot that I need help with. I rode my TT bike on the trainer yesterday...I'll be doing that a lot for a while.

What I'm trying hardest at, though, is to not allow myself to feel depressed. It's tough. After a trying year to say the least--fighting either sickness, injury, or fatigue since March--I had finally come back. All I did was rest and recover, get healthy again. For 2 weeks I'd done nothing but some consistent, moderate riding with some intensity here and there. And I'd done a couple of little races. Then my first big race with the team back, boom, my first win. I knew the form of my life was soon on its way, because every day I swung my leg over the bike I was better than the day before. And the races I'd been looking forward to all year were still to come. I was going to race the Tour of Utah--a race at the highest level America offers--in just a few weeks, and would spend September racing in Belgium.

The next day, my season was over. The rug had been yanked right out from under me, and I was heartbroken.

Now, all I can do is look ahead to next year. There may be some racing for me late this year, but I can't count on that.

I've been asked multiple times this year, "Are you sure this is what you want to do?" I suppose it's a good thing that I won the day before the crash, as I knew without a doubt the answer. That feeling after I won the prologue? Simply awesome. I want that again.

Seconds after Mancebo crossed the line, my time untouched.

So when I wonder how I'm going to overcome this challenge, I realize how trivial it really is. My dad has defeated setback after setback in his battle against cancer and come out on top, his faith guiding him through each challenge. God can certainly handle a couple of busted hands, I just have to stay out of His way.

Motivation and morale, and a big ol' nasty crash

I've been planning on catching up with race reports for quite a while now, and now that I have some serious time on my hands to kill, I will. But first, we're going to skip ahead to the present. And to do that, we must go back, even before the point that I last left off. Confused yet?

My base training period this past winter was more miles than I've ever done before, at a faster pace than before. For the first time, I did 3 straight 5-hour, 100 mile days. I thought that was impressive. I went to team camp in February well prepared, and it's a good thing. In the 9 days before my PCH crash, I completed the biggest, most-intense block of my life of 600+ miles. My recovery after camp was a double-recovery: recovery from training, and recovery from the crash.

The next block was Merco--4 days of racing (including another crash) followed by a hard 3-day block of Tour of California recon. I'd never done 7 straight days of intensity before. Another personal best.

Next was Redlands, which is a hard race to begin with, and my short bout of food sickness on day 2 didn't help.

After Redlands, I got the first stamp on my passport when I traveled to Uruguay for a 10-day stage race covering 1000 miles. The racing started 4 days after Redlands--that's 14 days of racing in 18 days. My previous longest race was 5 days. I made it through 6 days before the floor disappeared from under me. I had been sick for a day early on, and then day 8 marked the beginning of 5 days of toilet destruction. So my return to America was another double-recovery: recovery from sickness, and recovery from the biggest block of racing I'd ever undertaken.

Once healthy again, it was time for the Joe Martin-Gila double: 9 days of racing in 11 days. I had a couple of good days, but I really struggled with the heat at Gila, and I could tell my top-end fitness had been sliding since Uruguay.

After two days in Fort Collins, I was off to Guatemala for an 8-day race, ranging from the stifling heat at sea-level to the cold, thin air at 10,000 feet. I had a couple of good days, but some really bad days as well. I got sick with just 2 days left in the trip, a chest cough with oodles of mucus.

So after racing 17 days out of 25 (I think my number of race days for the year was almost 50 by this point), I again went back to Fort Collins to recover from both stage racing and sickness. I was improving slowly--the question was whether I'd be healthy in time for USPRO championships the next weekend. The answer was a resounding 'no'. It's the most pathetic I've ever been on a bike. The best power I could manage on Paris Mountain in the road race (after withdrawing from the TT two days earlier) is a far cry from what I was doing as a cat-2.

So I went back to try this recovery thing again. 7 days completely off the bike. 5-day course of antibiotics to get healthy again. Another 7 days of easy riding, with a little effort thrown in to test the legs. Things were looking up. I knew I wasn't where I used to be fitness-wise, but I could tell that I was fresh for the first time in months and that the legs would come around quickly. Tour de Beauce would be a tough race, but I would get stronger as the race went on.

Stages 1 and 2 went as expected: strong at the beginning, and fading towards the end of the tough courses. That is, until everything went pear-shaped with just 20km remaining in stage 2.

The final KOM of the day was a very steep pitch that saw us crawling along in the 28, and after finally making it to the descent our group was only 20 seconds or so behind the lead group. We were doing a hard rotation down the hill to try and slingshot back on when they hit the next riser, going 40+ mph.

Crashes are always weird. Everything goes into slow motion at the time, but all you take away from it is a series of snapshots.

The rider directly in front of me was out of the saddle when a weird series of bumps he didn't expect threw him forward onto the bars. He swerved violently multiple times, back and forth, over the next fraction of a second. I had just enough time to think, "Please save it" before he lay sprawled and tumbling on the ground in front of me. I was trapped on the right side of the road, at the edge of the gravel shoulder. The snapshot in time when it finally went wrong is not one that I brought back with me.

I remember being above Craig, and then the next shot is the pavement right in front my face, chest smashing into the ground--not hard enough to knock the wind from me, but enough to force an "ooooof" out. Somehow I kept my face off the ground. I was completely stretched out, the entire front of my body contacting the ground at once.

The next series of shots includes my arms shielding my face and head as I tumbled repeatedly on my side. I remember wondering if I would ever stop rolling over, thinking--while still in motion--man, we were going really fast.


It finally stopped. I was sitting up, facing backwards in the shoulder, and my bike had come to rest in my lap. For a brief second, I thought I was okay. Then I saw the hole in my knee looking back at me. The sinking disappointment and fear I felt at that moment could only be expressed with one word.

"Fuuuuuudddddgggge," I breathed out slowly. Only I didn't say 'fudge'. I said the word, the mother of all curse words. The 'F, dash, dash, dash' word. (Sorry, I just had to include that little monologue there.)

Now would be a good time to set the stage for you, and rewind a couple hundred meters. Whenever families hear the race is passing by their house, they often come out to watch us fly by. This particular family was standing in their driveway, next to their mailbox when Craig and I took flight.

Craig came to a stop face-down, unconscious, in their driveway at their feet. I was 50 feet further down.

During my self-assessment, I took notice of the fact that Craig wasn't moving, and he was on his face. Finally he came to and started moving. He rolled over and started wailing and moaning, just as the ambulance that was following the race pulled up. The EMTs checked that I wasn't seriously injured and then went to work stabilizing Craig.

During that time, my leg was not actually mine. Suddenly it was this cadaver leg attached to me, and I was morbidly fascinated with the big hole beneath my kneecap, and the whiteness that could only be bone at the bottom of it. I picked out the rocks that I saw.

Eventually Craig and I left for the hospital in the ambulance, and we had the same conversation 4 times. He'd hit his head, then slid on his face for a while and had road rash all over his body. After a bit of waiting at the hospital, they got me fixed up and on my way.

Here I am, 3 days later, and my knee looks like a grapefruit that a zombie attacked. I can bend it a little bit, and can hobble to meals alright. I could have jumped on an early flight back, but flying would be suffering, and I'd just be headed back to a life filled with stairs and smoke and food that I pay for, so no rush there.

So it looks like I've finally got some serious rest on my hands.

It's been a roller coaster year so far for sure. A building year. I don't wish for a second that I hadn't done all those races. I'm sure that I'll reap those rewards later this year, and definitely next year. It's just been a tough year. I've pushed my body to limits it's never before known, then told it to recover while sick and injured multiple times. I've never ridden in the gruppetto before, and this year I've become familiar with it. Mulitple DNFs. Every one sucks. And yet I've still had good results in there, and learned how to be the best teammate possible when my own form is lacking. And I've done it all while traveling the country, continent, and world. And yet I've been disappointed at meeting my own goals for the season, and missing outright my target races of TOC and USPRO TT. I've got a lot of making up to do in the next 4 months.

Rest assured, I will finally get this knee better. I will be very well rested. And I'm going to attack the second half of this season with a vengeance. Mediocrity is not acceptable.

Mother's [Birth]Day

For the past 4 years, my mother has had to spend her special day worrying about her son(s) racing in National Championships.  This year is different.  This year I'm racing in Guatemala.  She's a trooper, though!

My mom's birthday is just before Mother's day, so she gets a double celebration. I think she's 32 years old now. Or 29? You certainly can't tell by looking at her, because somehow the woman doesn't age even after all the stress Shane and I put her through.

back when she was the tallest among us

Before I continue, I just want to say that it's kind of bizarre to think, "Yeah, this post is definitely going to make my mom cry.... Welp, better get typing!"

As I call up my mental file titled 'Memories with Mom', there's a fast montage that runs behind my eyes, and I've got to decide which ones you want to read about.

My whole life, her obvious goal has been to make me into a domesticated, well-balanced, educated, and polite human being.  Shane and I naturally resisted most of these efforts, but she still somehow succeeded.  We had weekly chores, manners training at the dinner table, cooking lessons....

I'm embarrassed to think of how many arguments we've had over doing our chores.  We really didn't have much to do, but I think we fought back on principle. I remember, sometime after moving to McKinney, convincing Shane that he was better at cleaning the bathrooms than me--and that I was better at vacuuming--so that I could avoid bathroom duty. I can't believe my mother let me get away with that.  I think it took Shane about a month to realize he'd gotten the bum end of that deal.

My parents wanted Shane and me to have nice things, but they weren't going to just buy them for us. If we wanted money, we were going to earn it. So, my mom started creating work for us to do, so that she would have a reason to give us money.  It started with pulling weeds in the yard.  A bucket of weeds earned $.50. Yes, 50 cents.  As we got older and needed more money to buy our toys, she invented bigger jobs for us.  It seemed there was always something to be done in the yard.  It was only fair to pay us the normal hourly wage for lawn work, so we racked up the bucks.  Nowadays, it seems the living room needs to be painted a new color every other year.

I remember the first cooking lesson I got from my mom as a kid: grilled-cheese sandwich.  She then taught me how to make cookie dough.  Although, truth be told, I think that was as much for her benefit as mine. I remember her saying, "Your grandmother would never let me, but the dough is my favorite part!" Shane and I would later take this to the extreme, making full batches of cookie dough with no intention of it ever reaching the oven.

My mom is quick to tell you that she enjoys baking--not so much cooking. She makes a mean apple pie, and always set aside the extra pie crust dough for munching. Any time she made any type of batter, she'd ask, "Do you want to lick the beaters? Or the bowl?" to which I would laughingly reply to the obviously-rhetorical question, "Do I want to lick the beaters and the bowl...." To which she would respond, "Or the bowl. I get one of them!"

She would take sick pleasure in singing her special wake-up song to me and Shane, despite our squeals of protest, and get it stuck in our heads for the day.

I already gave a background in how she got me started with piano, and I mentioned the various duets that we did.  Those duets are the best memories that my mother and I share, bar none. We got to share something that we both really enjoyed.  Of all the duets that we did, my favorite was the piano-flute duet of "The Battle Hymn of the Republic", which we performed as an offertory at church during the Memorial Day service.  Not only was the song really fun to play, but it held special significance on that day.

Today is a day to honor the most selfless woman the world has ever known. I suppose her weed-pulling obsession is also for her benefit, but we learned many years ago that when she says, "I'm going out to work in the yard," that our search radius is 3-houses wide should we need to find her. Here is an actual conversation I had with her just the other week:

Me: "How was your day? Relaxing?"
Her: "Yes, I worked out in the yard pulling weeds."
Me: "Our weeds, or neighbors' weeds?"
Her: "Just our weeds!"
Me: "...."
Her: "Well, and the weeds that were right next to our yard."
Me. "...."
Her: "Okay, I spent the majority of my time in our yard."

Ever since my dad was diagnosed with cancer, she has been going nonstop.  Whether taking care of him when he was really sick, putting pounds back on him after he was sick, researching medicines and treatments, or anything else, she has been amazing.

I wish I could make her breakfast tomorrow, but she's in good hands.

Happy Mother's Day, Mom! I hope you find the time to take a much-deserved nap.

Baby Haga

If Merco Classic could wait a month to be typed up, Uruguay can wait a few more days.  After all, today is Shane's 21st birthday!

Who is Shane? Well, he's my twin, born two and a half years later, and my best friend of 21 years.

According to our mother, we were best friends from day one.  I suppose there is some evidence of that....


Growing up in an older neighborhood in Sherman, TX, there weren't many kids around to play with. We made do just fine.  The two of us were always paired up, ready for any adventure.  On any given day, we could be Power Rangers, Cowboys, Indians, pro baseball players, Batman and Robin, ninjas, astronauts...you name it, we rocked it, and our mom has pictures of it.

Not everything was peachy, though.  After all, I was the big brother and I had to make sure he knew his place.  I only told Shane this story and the next one a year ago.  I think I was 6 or 7 at at the time.  Shane and I were getting along just fine, but I could tell I needed to assert myself again.  So I opened up the calendar on my dresser, picked out week a couple weeks away, and decided that would be a good time to give Shane the cold shoulder.  I drew a line through that week, and atop it I wrote, "No talking to Shane." You'll be relieved to know that I failed to carry through on my plan.

Around that same time, our mother was beginning her instructional lessons on how to clean the bathrooms.  She put us to work early! She showed me how to clean the toilet with a paper towel and the cleaning solution, then told me not to flush the paper towel down the toilet.  My young mind interpreted this to mean that it was the cleaning solution, not the paper towel, that should not be in the plumbing. Obviously because of some chemical reaction, right? Hey, I was smart, I knew about that sort of stuff.

As Shane and I cleaned the bathroom the next week, he took care of the toilet, then flushed the paper towel before I could stop him.

"Shane, you're not supposed to flush that!"
"Why not?!" he replied, with alarm in his voice.
"Mommy says not to flush it! Now the house could blow up!"
"But I don't want the house to blow up!" he fearfully choked out.

Thankfully, the house didn't blow up.

After we moved to McKinney and I started getting into the teenage years, I started to dislike Shane because it wasn't cool to be friends with your little brother.

That didn't keep us from wrestling though.  Just good-natured fun, right?  Well, it always started that way. We'd be romping around upstairs, and our mom would hear us.  "I hope you're not wrestling!" That was always about the time that one of us got too physical and it turned into a real fight.  Rule #1: keep quiet, and calmly reply that "everything's fine, we're just running around" despite the hands around your neck.

At one point, the fad was airsoft guns.  These are little mini-bb guns that shoot plastic pellets at a couple hundred feet per second.  Somehow we persuaded our mother to let us get a couple. "Okay, but as long as you promise not to shoot each other with them." I don't know if she was really that naive, or if we were that convincing.  But you know as soon as we got home we were shooting each other the second she left the room.

One summer afternoon, with the parents gone, we decided to have a mano-a-mano war upstairs.  We were smart about it and wore our swimming goggles for protection.  I decided to hide in Shane's closet, and when he opened the door I would attack him in a terrific ambush worthy of cinematic commemoration. I didn't completely think it through, though, as we had purchased different guns.  My gun, while more powerful, could only shoot one pellet before I had to cock it again.  Shane had opted for the less powerful pistol--but it was semi-automatic.

I think you can see where this is going.

He opened the closet door and I got one good shot off.  Then while I was trying to re-cock my gun, Shane stood there pumping round after round into my body, laughing all the while. It was a very short battle.

Ping-pong served as a competitive outlet for us.  We loved to play it, but Shane hated losing, so we would usually only get to play a few games before he stormed away.  To incentivize him a bit more, we started playing Sting Pong, a game we discovered on TV.  Instead of getting a normal point, you instead earned the opportunity to hit the ball at your defenseless--and shirtless--brother, who just stood there and took it as the little ball left pink circles all over his stomach.  Shane seemed to like this game a little more.

Another game we played--once--was Around the World. In this game, the players are running laps around the ping pong table while trying to keep the ball in play.  Fun game, but it wasn't great for our close-quarters upstairs.  The game ended when Shane put his hip through the entertainment center's glass door.  I think our mom took the stairs three at a time to come upstairs when that happened.

Want to know how I made Shane get fast on a mountain bike? I stopped waiting for him to catch up. True story.

The worst part about college was leaving my broski behind.

And then he graduated from high school.

The kid already had a nickname on the cycling team--he'd been an adopted member of the team for a year beforehand as they'd watched him dominate the high school races.  I was Hagasaki, Shane was Hagasita.

The quickest way to ruin friendships can be to move in together.  Well when Shane started school at A&M, we were sharing a room.  If we had similar mannerisms before that, we were certainly becoming more and more alike by living together.  It's like we were connected at the head:

You know all those games we played as kids?  Well, it turns out that the key element is that we have to be on the same side.  Shane, Lee, and I, with our synergistic procrastination, spent an entire evening creating Bike Capture the Flag.  It really is an amazing game.  To make the teams a bit more even, Shane and I would be on opposing teams.

Not a great idea, as it turns out.  We're normally competitive under any circumstances, but there were a couple times that one of us was chasing the other through campus to reclaim the flag.  We'd be in an all-out sprint, jumping curbs, small shrubberies, bounding down stairs.

There were two crashes that night.  They were Shane and I, while chasing one another, each managing to crash into the only two ladies on the team brave enough to come out and try our new game.  Future games had Shane and me on the same team for everyone's well-being.

I could go on forever with more stories, but I'm exhausted from my 127 mile bike ride yesterday, so I'll wrap it up with the best one of all:

To use up the some of our eggs before they went bad, Shane and I hard-boiled several one evening.

The next day, while Shane was in class, Lee decided that he wanted to prank Shane, and get him to crack a raw egg.

"Come on, Lee.... You've got to do better than that! I can get him to crack a raw egg on his face." You see, Shane and I enjoyed cracking hard-boiled eggs on our heads just to be goofy.  I had a plan.

We pounced on Shane as soon as he got back from class.
"Shane, will you crack an egg on your face?  Lee says it would hurt too much to do it and won't believe me that we do it all the time.  I'd do it, but I just ate one and don't want another."

Always jumping at the chance to prove Lee's a wuss, Shane didn't even bother taking off his riding jacket first.

Lee and I had swapped all the hard-boiled eggs for raw eggs. This would be good....

The first warning sign should have been that we wanted to record it on camera.  I don't remember how we explained that one.... Shane should have also caught on to the fact that Lee was barely holding it together.  Our plan was going to work.

As the video starts, we are joking that we should have swapped the hard-boiled eggs for raw ones.

"That would've been a good one! You shoulda done it." Shane jokes.

But seriously, my best friend is now 21 and I would give so much to be there to celebrate with him. To the guy that pushes me to be a better brother, son, Christian, friend, racer, movie quoter, and cook: HAPPY BIRTHDAY!

Now hurry up and graduate so we can be reunited!

Sincerely,

Broski/Broseph/Brochacho/Dwog/Foo/Bruddah

Redlands

After a nice 10-day break to rest up after the Merco/TOC Recon trip, I was headed back to California for the third time this year to race the Redlands Classic. We were taking a great squad to win the race, with both strength and experience.  This would be my first time doing the race, but I had a couple of teammates that have done this race more times than they can count on their fingers.

The prologue time-trial was only a few miles long, and predominately uphill.  The suffering would only last 9-ish minutes, and I during my preride the day before I had decided on how I wanted to pace the effort.  I had forgotten my ipod at the house, and spent most of my warmup mourning its absence:

The prologue was a mixed-bag for me: I successfully paced the course exactly as I wanted to, and timed my final push for the line perfectly.  The downside was that my legs didn't deliver me as quickly as I'd wished, and I rode to a 15th place finish.  On the upside, I'd taken another 'win' in the season-long duel between me and Zirbel.... Jesse was our best-placed rider in 8th, and most of the team was in the top-30, so at least we had plenty of cards to play in the upcoming stages.

That night, I and the 3 others staying at our host house each spent some quality time with the toilet.  The next morning, we decided that our ailment must have been the work of some bad chicken we'd had at dinner; it was the only food that all of us had eaten.

The first stage was a 120-mile road race, with a tough climb towards the end of each lap.  With the size of the field, we held our cards close until many of the amateurs tired in the first 80 miles, then we lit the fuse on the climb to see if the field would split.  Each lap, there were breaks in the field over the top of the climb, but everything kept coming back together.  The lead group continued to dwindle in size, but all of the key players were still present.

As I would learn after the race, I was not the only one fighting cramps and feeling a bit sub-par late in the race; my housemates were also suffering, presumably from dehydration as a result of our bad chicken.

By the end of the race, our and others' attacks had shrunk the field to about 60 riders, and we still had everyone there. Zirbel was taken out in a stupid crash just a couple of kilometers from the finish--thankfully, he would get the same time as our group.  We failed to organize our leadout, and Bissell's Bevin took the stage win, but our team had continued its march up the GC ladder.

Post-race cleanup and discussion

The crit was a technical 9-corner, 1 mile loop that usually did a good job of wearing racers out.  With 150 racers, it was key for us to start in the front and stay there the whole race.  This would help us avoid the accordion in every corner, and keep us away from crashes.  We were biding our time for the 30-minutes-to-go mark, when we would take control of the front and begin our leadout.  It was a long way out, but was the only sure-fire way to keep us safe.

The finishing straight was the only place on the course for 8 guys to swarm the front together, and it was a bit chaotic but we succeeded in taking the front just before the first turn.  I was again in the front rotation, just keeping the pace high until the real leadout would start later.

We continued averaging 30 mph lap after lap, but made a mistake with 6 laps to go.... We didn't realize that the Bissell team had managed to organize behind us, and we failed to shut down the outside lane early enough on the finishing straight.  They pulled off a perfectly-executed blow-by and brought with them the swarm that disorganized our train.  They certainly weren't going to let us do to them as they'd done to us, and our train could never re-establish control.  It would once again be up to the sprint squad to deliver a result.  I managed to dodge a couple of crashes in the finishing laps and rode it in for a pack finish as Cando snagged the first podium of the race with 2nd.

Like Joe Martin and Nature Valley Grand Prix, the GC is far from set in stone at the beginning of the last stage.  In fact, the Sunset Loop at Redlands is the most significant factor when it comes to final GC placing.  To make what is already the most difficult stage of the race even more interesting, the race was forecast to have high winds and torrential rain--something that apparently has never happened before at this race.

The race is a lollipop course, where we race out of town and then do 12 laps of a circuit through a neighborhood on a hillside before racing back into town to finish on the crit course.  The loop was uphill on one side and a technical and fast descent on the other.

The first few times up the climb, everyone was fresh so the gaps that formed at the bottom weren't too critical, as the climb flattened after the KOM halfway up and we could chase back on.  We stayed aggressive early until Creed made the break and rode up there for a few laps.

When descending by myself or leading a group, I'm what others call a risk-taker.  I don't see it that way, though, when I have a clear line-of-sight and can take my own lines.  Descending in a group, though, can freak me out sometimes.  Especially on a sketchy descent like this one.  I was finally getting comfortable on the descent a few laps in when I felt it.  Just a couple of drops at first, but then a couple of turns later it started dumping.

The next time down, I was even more freaked out, letting gaps open and then having to chase them back over and over again. You may remember that the last time I raced in the wet, it didn't go so well. I love descending in the dry, but wet pavement puts a real damper on things....

The next lap, at the top of the climb, it was time to put our team's plan into action.  Nerves must be placed aside--I had a job to do.  We were going to take control across the top of the climb as a team and blitz the descent to see if we could disorganize Kenda's team and split the field.  I ended up second wheel, behind Friedman the Cannonball, as he blasted down the hill.  This was the first time we were truly testing our Challenge tires and HED wheels in the wet, and we were going all out.

I shut my mind off, and just focused on staying with Friedman.  If his tires could hold through the turns, and if his brakes could slow him down, so could mine, right?  When we finally reached the bottom, we were 15 seconds ahead of the field.  I was high on adrenaline.

Friedman and me pulling away on the descent

While the cold rain continued to pour, the race was hotting up. Friedman and I were caught behind a split in the field the next time up, and as the descent started we were 20 seconds behind the lead group of 15. Our task was now to blast the descent so fast that we could regain contact with the leaders.  With my newfound confidence, I was going wildly fast through the twisting neighborhood; Mike was going even faster.  He was slowly getting away from me, but he couldn't spare the time to wait for me.  He joined up with the leaders just before the climb started again.  When the road pitched up once more, I was just a few seconds off the back of the group, but I couldn't finish it off.

As I climbed at my own pace, I realized that I had just determined my race strategy for the final few laps: I would get my jollies and my adrenaline rush blasting downhill in the pelting rain at 50mph, buying myself some time over my group and getting to sag the first part of the climb at a more comfortable pace.

I pushed the pace extra hard the final time down the descent, as the GC time for our group would be taken at the edge of the crit course (the lead group would be the only one allowed to do the finishing crit laps). I had gained a 15-second advantage as we began to re-enter town, and was pulling away from the group with the help of Christian Helmig from Elbowz Racing.  Then everything fell apart.

I'm still not sure what happened--I think the course marshalls at the final turn to get back to the crit course had packed it up for the day.  The lead group had already made it to the crit and everyone behind us had been pulled and given a pro-rated time, so we were the last ones out there.  Either way, we missed our turn.  We knew something was wrong when there was cross-traffic at intersections.  We were now racing in traffic.

I didn't know where to go, so I was forced to nullify my attack and fall back to the group.  As luck would have it, a commissaire car was behind us, and they told us how to get back to the crit.  The message was sometimes slow to get around the group, and at one point there were guys going the wrong way on a divided road--in traffic.  It was a total mess, but we finally made it to the crit course (at the wrong place) and the comm got our numbers and would later give us a finishing time.

All that mess aside, Cando and Friedman had awesome days.  Cando rode into 3rd on GC to finish the race off well for us.  With that done, we wrung our soggy, cold clothes out and thoroughly enjoyed our hot showers.

As everyone else flew home, Zirbel, Amanda, Bob, and I stayed behind and began preparing for our next adventure: the Vuelta Ciclista del Uruguay.

Merco Classic

I suppose I've put it off for long enough; I have a post coming up with an actual deadline, so I need to get these done!

My first race of the year with the team was the Merco Classic, in Merced, CA.  It was also one of my first races of the year outright--very bizarre for me to not already have a dozen races under my belt by the start of March, but such is my new life as a Coloradoan, I guess.

Merced isn't a very large town, and there weren't a lot of options as far as hotels go.  We bunked up at the--not kidding here--Vagabond Inn.

I was well-rested coming into the race because we had some big plans afterward, which meant that stage 1 was also serving the purpose of my openers for the weekend.  I felt fine at the moderate intensities, but as soon as we would go hard, my heartrate shot through the roof.  The legs were good, though, and ready for some racing.

Stage 1 was only 80 miles or so--6 laps of the course that was flat to rolling, with one tough 5-minute climb early on.  With a field of 150 racers and only a few dozen pro's, the first few laps were aggressive but mostly just served to weed out the amateurs that couldn't hang.  For the final few laps, the Bissell and Optum teams lit it up on the climb to see if a break could get established over the top.  We came close a few times but everything eventually came back.

On the last lap after the climb, it became obvious that we would be executing our leadout plan; Bissell was thinking along the same lines.  With 5k to go, our train was fully organized and we took over from the Bissell train.  I was in the lead 3 riders, rotating at a hard pace but not burning out yet. With 4k to go, Bissell sent up a couple of riders to help keep the pace high.

3k to go marked the burnout phase of our 9-man train.  Bajadali, then Jesse, then I each ramped the pace up further until we could go no more, then swung off.  I finished shortly before the 2k mark, and left it up to the likes of Creed, Friedman, Zwizanski, Zirbel, and Candelario to deliver Hanson to the line.  The most difficult part was getting back into the field and hanging on after burning out, because we didn't want a disadvantage going into the time trial.

Even with the perfect execution, we simply didn't have the speed necessary at this early-season race to finish it off, and Hanson got swarmed just as he was opening his sprint.  Live to fight another day--the next day was the TT.

My age not-withstanding, I'm holding myself to a very high standard in time trials this year.  I'm racing to win and want to establish myself as a time trial specialist among the likes of Zirbel, Zwizanski, and Friedman.  I had one of the best 30-second men in the race in the form of Ben Jacques-Maynes.  I was chasing that carrot all day, but could only pull him to within 15 seconds.

I snagged 4th, 25 seconds from the win and a measly 0.2 seconds slower than Zirbel.  The whole team rode well, and going into the crit the next day, we had 6 riders in the top-11.

In the crit, we just wanted to stay safe until we initiated the leadout with 12 laps to go.  With the tight, turn-laden course covered in box-dots, it was not an especially fast race, but it was difficult to move around.  Taking control of the front first was key, because it would be difficult to get organized once it began. Unfortunately, Bissell had the same thought and pulled the trigger one lap before we were to amass at the front.  With control taken, our train could never get organized in the swarm. We decided to let the sprint squad fight it out as the rest of us focused on getting to the finish in the lead group.

Well wouldn't you know it, amateur hour claimed me with 3 laps to go in the final corner.  Guys resfusing to accept the fact that, 40-riders back, their race was over because they would never see the front again on that course with so few laps remaining kept fighting for position and banging around.  Their needless zeal for mediocrity caused a pileup that I almost got around, but was knocked into.  I went up and over the top, finally hitting pavement on the other side.  My left leg was tangled in my bike with guys laying on top of it, but my main concern was my GC time, and my left wrist which I had obviously just re-sprained. With no free laps remaining, my GC place would depend on what time the officials gave me.

I was in a mood to crack some skulls, I can tell you that much.  I'd lost 30-something seconds on GC time because of the crash, dropping from 4th to 9th in GC, and my wrist was going to make the final stage (120 miles) miserable.

The last stage was on a course that was dead flat with the exception of a couple small rollers a few miles from the end of the lap.  I had taped my wrist to give it a little extra support, but I quickly learned that the hoods were only comfortable when out of the saddle.  The rest of the time would be spent in the drops.  Unexpected bumps in the road sent shocks of pain up my arm.  If I could see them coming, I could at least grip extra tight and my wrist wouldn't be jarred.

The race was very fast and aggressive, as both Exergy and Optum wanted to unseat Bissell from the GC lead.  We finally got Zwiz and Friedman in the 4-man break, but they were doing most of the work.  The lead quickly ballooned to 5 minutes--putting them well into the virtual lead--as the Bissell team set up shop on the front.  For a couple of laps, the gap simply was not coming down to Bissell's frustration, but eventually the break tired too much.

Me trying to give my wrist a rest

With the impending capture of the break, our team started launching bombs with two laps to go.  The excitement of racing again helped me forget about the pain in my wrist on one particular road that was probably last paved around the time I was born.

The nature of the course and the size of the field meant that it was very difficult for anything to get away.  The 120 mile race was finished in 4:15, with Hanson second on the stage and Zirbel finishing 3rd in GC.

With the race completed, the squad relocated to San Jose for 3 days of Tour of California recon rides, making for a tough 7-day block of racing/training.  They were some pretty fantastic courses that I hope I get the opportunity to race next month....

Ketchup

Today is a special day, everybody—today is the first day in a month that I have had both the motivation and the ability to type away on the ol’ blogger. More on that later.

First, you may have noticed my new banner at the top of the page.  I'm pretty proud of that, so if you could just take a moment and think to yourself, "Wow, Chad really worked hard on that a couple weeks ago and then didn't type squat to accompany it," I'd appreciate it.

I'd like to say that I've been super busy and just haven't had the time to type, but that would be lying.  I've had tons of time, but had a serious case of writer's block.

After our team presentation in Minneapolis, I was back in the cold and windy Fort Collins for about 10 days (or exactly the amount of time for me to stop noticing the thinner air) before I was off to Oxnard, CA for team camp.

The men's team was staying in a big beach house with lots of bunk beds, so we'd certainly get to know each other over the course of the 10-day camp.  After staying at multiple host-houses for races last year, I know what the kitchen situation can become with a bunch of racers.  So when I learned the housing situation for camp, my first thought was 16 guys....how many refrigerators? Just the one, it turns out.  Keep in mind, it's not just 16 guys and one kitchen and refrigerator, it's 16 bike racers that need to take in 5, 6, 7, sometimes 8 thousand calories a day just to maintain weight. We tried to limit our food purchases that had to be kept cold, and the rest of the house became the pantry.  Food was tucked into every nook and cranny of that house.  The fridge exploded every time it was opened. In fact, I'm amazed anything stayed cold because the fridge door certainly didn't close once during camp.

The rest of camp is a blur.  I got into a rhythm of waking up at 6:30 to beat the kitchen rush, stuffing my face for 2 hours before climbing on the bike, riding, more eating, massage every couple of days from our amazing soigneur Amanda, more eating, watch a rented movie with the team, go to bed.  As camp went on, I found myself crawling into bed earlier and earlier.

Waiting for everyone to be ready for departure

Cranking out the miles

The riding was awesome, with tons of climbing.  I was upset to not have a power meter, because I knew I was setting power records even despite getting dropped towards the top of climbs by our better climbers. Climbing means descending, though, and I was loving every chance to hone my descending skills.  You may remember my string of bad luck last fall, so I was still learning to trust tires again.  By the end of camp, I was back to my old self on descents.

Going up...

...coming down.

One of the high-speed wide-open descents

In 9 days, we logged something like 30 hours of riding--600 miles--and tens of thousands of feet of climbing.

All we had left was the VIP ride and then our team drag-race up Gibraltar mountain.  On the VIP ride, we had the whole men's team, the whole women's team, and a dozen or so others from the cycling industry/sponsors and team staff.  We had about 15 minutes left in the ride when it happened.

The whole group was riding 2x2 along the shoulder of the Pacific Coast Highway, zipping along down a hill.  We were all having a good time socializing and the rock just didn't get pointed out quickly enough.  I was standing up about halfway back in the group, looking ahead for any debris or holes that could cause trouble.  Suddenly I was bucked into the air, and my hands lost the handlebars.  I came down and managed to tuck my shoulder before impact.  I tumbled a few times before coming to rest in a sitting position, watching my bike continue flipping a couple more times, trying to figure out what happened.

The offending rock and its aftermath

I looked at my left hand, covered in blood from the large chunk of skin I'd just removed.  My arms, knees, and ankles were scraped.  I looked at my left shoulder and saw that there was nothing left of my jersey.  Mike Creed came up to me and said, "let's check that collarbone."  I shrugged my shoulders and raised my arms--test passed--sigh of relief.  I took my helmet off, as I remembered hitting my head, and saw that the back was crushed and cracked.  It did its job!

I was helped to my feet and walked back to the team car, where I climbed in for the ride home.  I saw behind the car a big rock.  Well, that explains it.  The next couple of hours involved a lot of chewing on my armwarmer while Amanda scrubbed my wounds and peeled my jersey off.  Then I had to take a shower.  All of the wounds hurt, but my back and shoulder were basically a low-grade burn, and that was especially excruciating.

Because scars aren't souvenir enough, I took pictures

It only made me a little dizzy--maybe I'm improving?

After we got the wounds dressed, I was off to the hospital to have my wrist x-rayed. A couple hours later, I was relieved to hear the technician report an "unremarkable left wrist".  All I had to endure after that was the oozing of my wounds through bandages onto my clothes as I waited for them to heal.

To end this post on a positive note, I've saved the highlight of the camp for last.  Day 8 was time-trial day.  The directors had picked out a 10k out-and-back course on rolling terrain.  Dino from HED was out to watch us from the car while we raced to see what position we're in when we're hurting.  I had one goal: win.  Nevermind that we have Zirbel and Zwizanski on the team, I was jonesin' for that W.

We only had two sets of race wheels and a few helmets, so we were supposed to climb off our bikes as soon as we finished so that the wheels and helmet could be passed on to the next set of riders to start.  I finished my time trial, feeling as you should when you've finished a time trial, and immediately got off the bike.  Well, on day 8 of camp, my legs were not happy with the sudden change in activity and began to tighten quickly.  I just needed a bike to spin around on.  Jelly, our mechanic, was putting another set of wheels on my bike so I could ride, but my helmet was back in the van.

As I set off in my post-time-trial stupor for my helmet, I heard the results called out to me: "Chad, you beat Zirbel by 17 seconds." I had set the fastest time of the day.  So to add to my post-race haze, I was now on cloud nine.  I opened the van door, grabbed my helmet, and shared the news of underdog triumph with Zirbel, who was sitting inside, "Hey Zirbel, I gotcha!" Ha, ha.

Two hours later, Tom Soladay said, "Dude, what you said in the van was hilarious, we were laughing for half an hour!" 

"Uh, what?" I didn't recall making any jokes.  I was horrified to find out what I'd actually done.

I suppose I should tell you here that it was rainy and cold that day.  When we weren't doing our time trial, we were warming up and staying dry in the van.  Remember my story of underdog triumph?  Well, here's what I actually did: I opened the door to the van containing all of my teammates, looked Zirbel square in the face and said, "Hey Zirbel, looks like I beat you." Then I shut the door and walked off.

Bajadali offered me an Arrogant Bastard Ale that night, but I was too busy still trying to pull both feet out of my mouth.

Next up: Merco Cycling Classic. If you don't see it in the next couple days, call me out!