done

Josh took me out to 5th Street Cross on Thursday, and there was a 24-hour race going on. Kristy was racing. Her strategy was to sleep through the night and then wake up at the crack of dawn and keep doing laps when everyone else was napping. The conditions were terrible though. Extreme Mud. I thought to myself, perfect chance to practice sloppy racing. I did ONE lap, and as I was coming near the finish, I was having a hard time pedaling my bike through the tight turns so I got off. Then, I realized that I had a hard time ROLLING my bike. I thought Gee that is so weird, how come both of my wheels are not moving? Are both of my wheels somehow not in the dropouts? This is weird. The nightrider was on my handlebars so I couldn't really see what was going on. Then I realized that there was so much mud and leaves stuck in between the frame and the wheels that they were not moving. AT ALL. So I cleared the stuff off my bike, hopped on, and kept rolling. I had to do this THREE times in the time it took Mike Yozell to lap me in the first race. I was perfectly fine with being done because I pretty much started dry heaving after the first race. I got sick after racing in 40 degree rain at Staten Island last weekend. I have this horrendous cough that kind of won't go away this time. But, nonetheless, I just keep not letting my body get better for the sake of the bike. But good choice on my part for sitting out on the second race. In the midst of this, my Rudy Project glasses flew off my helmet so if anyone finds them please let me know!

So my first year of bike racing (which began in June?) just ended with a trip to Warwick, RI to compete in my final Women's B race in the Verge Championships. I headed up Friday night to the Warwick Verge Championship Weekend, not something I was looking forward to in my state of non-stop coughing and illness. I won a free wheelset rental this year from Gabe at Echappe, so I decided it would be now or never to use it. I've never used carbon wheels but they were definitely nice to have! I was staged in the LAST ROW of like 8 rows of women or so. My pre-reg number was like 50 or something. Swell. But I've been in this position for almost every race so I knew what to do. I needed to catch the front of the race before I hit the sand, which is in like 300 meters of race course. It was hard weaving my way through people but I was 10th when we hit the sand. I eventually caught the 2nd place person within the first 1/3 of a lap but lost sight of 1st place. I actually didn't know who was what place until we passed the officials tent. I was sucking wheel for a lot of the race because I felt so shitty, and that course was pretty perfect for sucking a lot of wheel. I actually put in an attack on the 3rd lap or so but immediately lost the small gap I had when I bobbled in the sand. The rest of the race had me wishing I had never raced, and wanting to stop. I lost the sprint for 3rd place when a junior (who was not in my race and not sprinting against anybody in his race) was trying to pass and took the inside line I was going to take on the last corner. I couldn't stop coughing post-race. Yeah, not a good day that day. I'm sorry I lost a sprint on your Zipps, Gabe!

I decided to call it a season after that and not race the next day. Good call on my part. But, it's all done. No more racing...well, until March. It's been a hell of a year. And I'm starting my new job soon and going home to the Pacific for a little bit to tell the island people about some crazy stories about bicycles.