2 days 'till Paris!!!

Eeeek!
Am going to PAris in 2 days! I'm so excited I can't wait! I mean... of course, am terribly sad to leave Paul here. But I think stuffing my face with crepes, cheese and wine will make up for a little bit of the sadness... :-P

Got on the scale...

And was shocked. I've somehow managed to put 3 pounds on since Monday. I'll just keep myself happy by saying it's water weight... though I've been quite dehydrated lately. Oh well,enough said. The bigger I get, the more there is to love.

So as an instant reaction to my weight gain, I put my sneakers on and went for a run. Now that's a true test of character right there. It's been a few months since the last time I ran... and I always feel terribly akward the first time back on the trails. I ran for about 2 miles and then decided i'd rather be on my bike, so I ran back and changed, gearing up for a ride. Who said anything about girls changing their minds?

Final race day...

SO yesterday was kind of a roller coaster of good and not-so-good emotions.
It all started quite well, as I managed to place 2nd in the cat 3/4
race and make $75!! The course was absurdly hilly, but it all came
down to a final field sprint after 50 minutes worth of laps. I barely
managed to pass the girl that came in third and out sprinted her. The
girl who came in 1st had managed to break away pretty early on, and
though we tried to pull her back in... it wasn't happening.
So with my ego somewhat high from this first race, I figured I'd go
for a spin with the big girls- assuming that I'd only last 3-5 laps
before getting pulled from the race. The race went off, and as
expected, the big girls went off REALLY hard.
I survived the first two laps, but started falling off the back by the
3rd lap. By the 5th lap, I was looking forward to the official or the
pace car telling me to get off the course. But to my horror, the 6th
lap around, the official yelled at me that they would not be pulling
anyone... and that I'd have to finish the remaining 50 laps (about 75
minutes) in order to be placed in the general classification results
(for the overall week/points). To add insult to injury, I had only a
little Gatorade in my bottle left from the prior race... enough to get
me through MAYBE 20 laps.... but not 50 in the blistering Georgia
heat.
The rest of that race was pretty much a blur... probably the worst
idea I've had in 25 years was to do that race. I hung in there for
dear life. I was lapped at least 5 times even though I kept going as
hard as my legs would go. 65 women started the race, and only 45 of us
finished. I'm pretty sure I was either 45th or 44th place.
Overall for the week:
"Team" Rogue took 22nd out of 29 places... I thought that was pretty
neat considering that they take into account only your 4 best riders
(... and I don't recall having any Rogue teammates out there other
than myself!)
As an individual, I placed 62nd out of 91 riders (would have been 68th
had I not finished the race yesterday).

I guess if one good thing came out of the second torture race
yesterday, it was that I managed to score an invitation to race with
(Pro) Team Revolution's development squad at Super week in late
August. They are a team based out of St. Louis (i think). Their team
director and team ladies that were out there racing saw my 3/4 race
and saw me hanging in there with the pros... they said they'd love to
have me as a guest rider for that week out in Wisconsin(?)... which
means all expenses paid! Wahoooo!!! No worries, am still very much
Rogue... but who passes on free lunch for a whole week?!
Ok, back to normal life again. Urgh... and it's Monday.

Race day # 3... Spartanburg x 2

Ok, let me just say that if you feel like I'm spamming ur inbox with
my race reports, just hit delete now.

So today was a little better than my other days. I started out the
category 3/4 race with 20 women... of which only 15ish of us survived
a big ol' crash (I think it may have had something to do with the
juniors racing at the same time). I placed 7th overall and won the
sprint lap (a cool pair of socks). I wasn't ecstatic abt my placing,
but quite OK with it... most girls had travelled from far away for
this crit, which was cool cause you knew right from the get go how bad
they all wanted it.

So after the 3/4 race, I went for a little spin to cool down and waste
time before the BIG race. I stopped one last time by the ladies room,
and when I came out, Laura Van Gilder
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Laura_Van_Gilder) walks up to me and
asked how my last race had gone... I was speechless. Here was this
demi-god figure who is pretty much at the top of the world wide
cycling food chain, asking about my 3/4 race had gone. She said she
had seem me racing and that she knew I was also doing the other
races... she went on to encourage me to keep trucking and attempting
to survive these "real" races... she said hard work really pays off.
That was all the encouragement I needed to get pumped for the next
race and forget that I was missing out on Oaks and Derby for this
bloody bike carnage.
I lasted all of 17 minutes before getting pulled.

So to sum it thus far, as of yesterday, in the overall Speedweek Pro
1/2/3 category, I'm ranked 66 out of 85. I'm pretty psyched... I
mean... I'm not # 85... or #84 for that matter.
Well, tomorrow is another women's Open race in North Carolina... no
3/4 category race to lift my ego off the pavement. 3 more races to go
and I'll be heading back to KY... to drink whatever leftover beer and
mint juleps I can find.

Race day # 2.... Walterboro Crit

WELL... I lasted 5 more laps in the pack this time around. A total of
15 laps (out of 25). So at last I got somewhat of a good workout in.
At around lap 13, I was hanggin' on for dear life to the back of the
pack, when one girls went down (I think it was Tina Pic), and needless
to say I was in the back of the mass that had to slow down completely.
I guess the ladies up front that avoided the crash picked up the pace
and took off, cause 2 laps later, they were lapping us.
Quite honestly, I bet these women eat children for breakfast. It just
seems humanly impossible to ride so fast! Argh!!!! I take comfort in
thinking that most of these women are in their mid 30's... so I have a
good 5-10 years to work on my winning strategy.

On a more comforting note, I went for an early am ride in the "Great
Swamp" park near here, and not only did I get to see an alligator, but
I ran into the Jittery Joe's pro-squad and we all rolled along merrily
for about an hour. I got to chat quite a bit with Rebbecca Larson (6th
yesterday, I think 5th overall in the series) and she was VERY
encouraging. She said it takes a lot of dedication to race at that
level, but half the fight is having the guts to show up to this kind
of race and not get discouraged.
SO there. I'm not discouraged, in fact I think for the next two races
I'll race the cat3/4 AND the pro 1,2,3 races... I figure my odds of
lasting the whole pro race are slim, but I may as well give it a shot
b/c the 3/4 races are only 15 or so laps (and I proved today I could
last just as much!)... and if I'm gonna have my a$$ handed to me, it
needs to be done in high style.

Ok, am off to pack and bed. Driving up to Spartanburg tomorrow and
chillin' with Carolyn's parents. Tomorrow is a day off from racing and
it'll pick up Friday... YAY! CAN't WAIT FOR ANOTHER REALITY CHECK!!!!

Speed week race# 1- Beaufort Crit

Wow, talk about a reality check- I have never before been pulled from
the race while going at 29mph. Now, it's just my opinion, but I
thought that was pretty fast... obviously the officials and the
Lamborghini(?) pace car didn't agree.
The first hint at what to expect in this race, was the fact that the
prize purse paid down to 30th place ($45 for the 30th).
The second hint came to me when they called up the first 10 women: 4
world (pro) crit champions, 3 national champions and a swarm of
U-23-25 world/national champs. While part of me was thinking I should
just turn around and go cheer from the beer tent, my ego told me I had
to suck it up and go for a spin.
So the race went off with a prime/sprint lap; $100 to the first one to
cross the line for the first lap. I had a pretty bad start, being dead
last out of 50+ women... Lesson for tomorrow: EVERYBODY shows up to
the start at least 25 minutes before the start.

The next two laps were also $100 sprint laps.

About 5 laps in (out of 50), the pack started to string out (kind of
expected when going at 32mph). It didn't help that one of the corners
narrowed into somewhat of a bottle neck and there was no way of
turning the corner more than one rider at a time. Which implied that
by the time the first 30 girls came through, the leader and pace car
were already 2 corners down. It was very strung out, but the pack
tried to re-group after that corner... when I believe Laura VanGuilder
(ultra pro), attacked and ramped it up to who knows what speed. Next
think I knew, I was in a chase pack of about 8 girls, trying to catch
back up to the top girls (all 30+ of them). One by one, our little
chase pack shrank to just 3 of us... we were about 5 seconds behind
them and at around 40 laps to go, the officials pulled us out cause
the pace car was rolling in on us.
Geez. It was awesome to say the least. Those were the hardest 10 laps
I've ever raced, and it was amazing to be in a field where you had no
option but to feel confident that everyone around you knew what they
were doing when flying through those corners.

I did get complimented on our kit/ team name. Some pro reps thought it
was a pretty sweet concept.
Anyway, that's it for the day. I was happy to not be the first one
pulled ( I think there were 15 before me!). Hopefully tomorrow I'll
pull it all together and teach those pro's a thing or two about bike
racing... maybe even podium (...) ???