Pro/1/2

My category 2 upgrade came just in time for me to experience my first NRC race with the big names. Nervous? Uh yeah, just sorta. I was curious to see how long I could last. I just thought to myself: this is like a Drives ride but with a bunch of women and no asshole car drivers. And it was true. We started with 88 Pro/1/2 women. I've never been in a race that big with so many good racers. Each one of them could singlehandedly tear me apart if they wanted to. I had some wise words of advice from riding with Nicky the day before. I had to get to the front, and stay at the front. Easier said than done when you are starting from the back of the pack and there's a huge crash right in front of you on the 3rd lap or so. So these girls go down, and the front pack of 17 take off, and I'm trying to bridge along with Rebecca Wellons, Anna Milkowski, and others... wait a minute... I was in a race with those people?!!? Anyways back to the story, at one point, we get within 5 seconds of the front group and Rebecca gets across but I wasn't able to. My chase group of 11 or so finally gets lapped, but we don't get pulled because there were only 7 laps to go at that point. I didn't realize I could sit-in the field as a lapped rider, so I lost some valuable ($$!!) places that way. The end of the race found me with Jessie Maclean from Verducci, who, ofcourse, outsprinted me to the finish. At that point, I didn't realize that only 30 of us actually finished the race, but I was really glad to have been one of those 30... actually 28th out of those 30 but I will take that for my first pro NRC race.

[Me during the Pro/1/2 Women's Race at Wilmington Grand Prix. Photos by Michael L. Kirk and Anthony Skorochod.]

Sunday was a little stupid. Does anybody else not like Kelly BikeJam? There was a crash in every race. Unlike, the day before, I actually stayed in the front pack of 15 or so after the first crash which was well into the race, and guess what... THEY STOPPED US! And then they re-started us. They could've staged us accordingly, but they didn't, and I was immediately at the back of the pack again after I worked so hard to move up. That was a really dumb move by the officials, and changed the entire dynamic of my race. Yeah, I know there was a crash, but they didn't STOP us yesterday, and I worked so hard to chase the day before... I feel like if other people wanted to be in the front group, they needed to do the exact same thing I tried to do the day before.

But, I've definitely gained a little bit more confidence after being so unsure of my ability. I showed that I can hang in the fast stuff so I guess that's what really counts. I just need to be before the crash, and not have the officials stop the race.