Monday, April 14, 2008

Äußerst Raffiniert-Wirklich harten tag


Thats right... I am sophisticated. Or just looking for a good enough way to present the fact that I now have a blackberry! No good can come from this.

With the random picture so too must a description of this weekends eventful races. I got my first introduction to exactly how some race directors feel when trying to ensure their team is prepared for a race. After making our way (via big pimp hincapie bus) to chattanooga for round 4 of the Georgia cup Baker and I were up bright and early (sometime around 5:45) in order to get to the race in time to set up the tents, trainers, unload bikes, run my TT, get passed by Frank Travieso for the third week in a row, get back, cool down, load back up the bus go eat a sandwich at Carpenters, go downtown, unload the bus, set up the tent AGAIN...break down the tent two minutes after setting it up(it was a tid bit windy), get sunburnt, watch Gabardi win the cat III crit, start my crit, miss a wreck, no two wrecks, no wait NINE wrecks (actually I missed 8 and got stuck behind one) eat dinner, shower and finally get to bed at the early hour of 12:15. Fun. What made it even more fun was getting up again at 5:45AM to go do the same thing again the next day. yeah. It's really easy to perform at your best under those circumstances isn't it.

I was happy with the weekend though. It was a good time getting to ride with the guys. Sundays road race was hard, and given my soreness from my several crashes this season as well as the lack of sleep I was simply wanting to finish the 90 mile road race in the 20+ mph winds and 20 some NRC and Euro-pro's preparing for tour of Georgia in two weeks. It turns out wrecking can kind of keep you not feeling 100% for quite a while if your not careful. Simply wanting to finish wasn't enough so I ended up getting two teammates back into the race in the cross/headwind section when everything hit the fan on the final lap, and given that I had one BIG bullet to use in the race, I wasn't able to stay with the field (or what was left of it) over the climb on the last lap. But being able to say I was rocking at 40 mph on a flat windy section of rode with 10 or so riders in town gave me some positive re-enforcement of my riding right now. Regardless, teamwork was great and I was able to justify crying myself to sleep last night.

Finally what would the trip from Chatt-town to Greenville be without something eventful happening? Turns out the alternated belt on the bus just didn't want to do any more work and decided to blow up like Jan Ullrich chasing Lance in all seven tours. After a detour to several parts stores Baker and I proved once again that the Hincapie Barkley team is a force of in-surpassable power not only fixing the bus but doing so in the dark of the autozone parking lot. Yeah. It was a good time.

So i suppose now is a good time to relax and recover from a terrible, rather hectic yet comically fun weekend. Farewell to all. Until later. Ciao!

2 comments:

T.Karnes said...

Funny thing is, I can read this and its exactly what would come out of your mouth if we were sitting in the bus blaring techno while listening to AJ and Talbot argue about sprinters and climbers. Well mabye not that much but still sounds like a fun time!

hecklejack said...

Your bus is pimp, but not as pimp as your wheels.
Such you are such a good mechanic, can you fix my transmission that blew out while I was driving home this weekend?