What a Week!

One word to describe the past week I have had, TITS! The week started out meeting the newest members that are going to help this team win its third straight track championship. Also met a new face that has introduced me to a new style of racing, Jeff Hopkins. Working with him and Dean seemed to have helped me reach down into places that I never knew I could reach.

Monday: Was probably the worst day I have ever had on a bike in a while. Coming off a very disapointing race at Marion I saw probably the worst 3K pursuit I have ever done in my life. I can also claim that about my Kilo time which was nothing to brag about.

Tuesday: Was a much better day doing some 500 meter sprints and other events that I normally suck at. I am not a sprinter and seem to struggle with those events but some how I seemed to have a pretty good day and held my own.

Wednesday: Started out with a morning track session before we hit the road for the first time all week and rode a simple easy CIBA loop. Nothing too bad.

Thursday: The week really picked up here. Started out with a slight rain delay before we did 200 meter time trials to seed ourselves for our sprint tourny. Have I mentioned I am no sprinter. Well, it seems that things have slightly changed? Went second and posted a time of 12.28. I have never posted a time like that ever. I dont recall ever going under 12.50. That was good enough for the second seed in the tourny only behind coach Curtis Tolson who posted a 12.18 200 meter. In the first round I had to face a new rider to our team Pete. After fixing a mechanical Pete put up a really good fight but I was able to hang on.

Friday: The morning should have been a sign of things to come. After posting some great results beating Zach, and Jeff (Just for fun) in the tourny and losing to Alex (eventual winner) I was able to claim third place. Not too bad for a guy that cant normally sprint. Later that night we showed back up for Friday night racing at the velodrome. Damn, I have never seen so many people at that track in so long. The night started out with 3 lap scratch heats. Took second in my heat with Zach right behind me taking third. In the 3 lap scratch final I got kind of screwed but managed to salvage 4th. In the 12 lap scratch race I covered an attack from Josh Pratter, Kind of rode away from him and managed to create a large gap form the field and soloed my way to a win in front of a large bunch of Marian athletes and fans. In the points race I managed to take the first sprint before Zach got off the front and manged to collect 25 points when he lapped the field. I managed to get away again and colleect the last sprint to secure second place.

Saturday: Mass Ave Crit was one of my better races. May have stayed on the back the entire race but managed to squeeze a 22nd place finish. Was just glad to stay witht the field and finish the race. I dont really get the chance to push myself on the road with the 1-2 fields.

Sunday: Zipp West Clay Carmel Crit. Managed to get an 8th place finish in my Cat 3-4 race as my warmup for the 1-2-3 race. I am pretty sure that I was one of only a handful of Cat3's in that field but I managed to handle myself rather well. Tried to attack went no where. After that I fell to the back and shadowed my coach's wheel before finding my way back to front of the main group which we were chasing a group up the road. Stayed up there until about 3 laps to go when the sprinters started to make their way to the front. I did not really have much left in my legs so I fell back to the back to make sure that I did not screw anything up and came in some where around top 30. This was probably the best week I have ever had on a bike. Now its time to start focusing on Collegiate and Elite Track Nationals. Not to mention classes start tomorrow.