sunday, sunday, sunday!

hey kids:

yesterday was a pretty rockin day of bike riding--i thought i would share it with everyone on a cloudy monday morning.

the day started too darn early as i met my friend Scott in Boulder to head down to City Park Crit/Circuit. Race time was 8:45, so leaving boulder at 7 meant leaving longmont at 6:30, which meant waking up at 5:45...ugh.

lookin hard at the start is a pretty imporant skill to have.

but, it was totally worth it as we dropped into denver and the itch to start racing my road bike again came back. i think gila last year was the last time i had a number on in a crit. Scott and i got our numbers, and marty was there as soigneur to get us pinned. we took a scenic tour through downtown denver as a warm-up, then took to the line with 60 other cat4's.

the race went well... neither scott or i left any skin on the course, and that was quite a feat in itself. There was the normal sketchiness associated with a cat4 crit, and more than a few times guys directly in front of me grazed pedals in the corners. The course was rad, though, and quite a bit longer than i remembered the city park loop being. I think it was almost 2 miles long? whatever it was, it was good. I lurked at the front of the field, and had decent position all race. my legs felt like they had good speed from the track workouts, but the lack of actual riding meant that strength was noticeably absent from my arsenal.

Scott in the white and yeller, and me taking it to the outside.

Cornering on the SLR's & Schwalbe Ultremo R tires is pretty righteous

Scott and i had good position coming out of the last corner, and i wound out the cannondale to about 36mph... paltry in comparison to the punx who rocketed the final 200 meters to the line. it was good enough for 19th place, though.

We cooled down briefly, packed up the truck and headed out of town on 285 for buffalo creek for some mountain biking, the real fun of the day. Scott called the other group that was meeting us there, and the race was on... they left the cars about half an hour before us. Marty, Scott and I suited up and put the hammer down to catch up. Actually, there was some sort of equestrian event happening, so we had to stop every couple of minutes to let horses pass. The benefit of this was that we got to work on our technical skills by trying to miss the copius amounts of horseshoit on the trail. mmm, tasty.

Marty looking resplendent in full Dirt Coalition regalia

Yours truly smilin' thru the pain as my legs remember what pedaling feels like

Marty with the hammer down

We caught the group at the lunch spot just as they were getting ready to take off again. no rest for the weary. My game-plan of cramming 2 weeks worth of training into a single day was taking it's toll on my legs.

The ride back to the trailhead was pretty rippin, and it was good to have some friends to ride with. Also, those friends brought a cooler of cokes, gatorade's, and snax for everyone, so amen to that.

Thanks as always to Marty, who tirelessly rocked out helping at the crit, taking pics, providing great color commentary on the transfers, and cranking the knob to shred mode to catch up on the buff creek ride.

over&out