Sunday, December 16, 2007

Gone to Mexico...

See you all next year.
Today Brooke and I each got 3rd place in our cyclocross races.
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Tony Cruz (Discovery Channel) won the Pro men's race followed by Brandon Gritters (Rock 'n road) and Lyle Warner (Team Bearclaw).
I led out the first couple laps (more or less anyway, it was all kind of a blur) before pedal planting in a turn and falling to mid-pack.
Clawed my way back to the lead group but by then Tony Cruz and Brandon Gritters had opened up a gap.
I thought we could close down the gap but by that time it was only me, Chris DeMarchi and another racer, we'll call him Mr. X.
DeMarchi wasn't willing to work because Gritters was his team-mate so I ended up doing all the chasing! I felt good today though and was able to stay on the front and keep attacking, trying to drop DeMarchi and Mr. X and trying to close the gap to Gritters and Cruz. Unfortunately I couldn't do it alone, but I kept the gap at the same time for the whole damn race so I really wish I hadn't pedal-planted!!!!!!!!
With the way I felt today, if I could've sat on Cruz' wheel like a little Biatch instead of getting out in the wind and chasing I might have been able to improve on my 3rd place finish.
Still, I was happy with my form and even though I wasn't able to shake DeMarchi (he rode a super solid, smart race) and Mr. X off my tail I was fast over the barriers on the last lap and held a tiny gap to the line! Exciting stuff!
All in all it was a fun time and even though most of my team-mates are in Kansas (look on cyclingnews.com for pics of Chet!!!!!) I made sure that the crowd heard a lot about Team Bearclaw during the race and even had a media guy come over and ask about who we were and what the team was about.
Here's some pics and vids fo' yo' ass:

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First lap.


Through the barriers.

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Me, DeMarchi and Mr. X.

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Tony Cruz and Brandon Gritters


Riding the runup.


Cruz leads the runup and Gritters muscles it over the top!

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DeMarchi and me, you can even see some post-pedal-plant blood on my knee.


Sprint for 3rd.

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Podium.

2 comments:

John McKeen said...

Nice job man! Have fun on vacation!

jsager said...

enjoy the vay-cay! and I'm thinking about doing the uci race in Jan...you'll have to give me the skinny on it.