Spare Time at Hotel

April 18, 2009 in Race Reports

Right now my brother, dad, and I are sitting around in our hotel room. Tomorrow morning are the junior road races at Sea Otter. I’m pretty nervous because I’m not feeling very well, and there are a lot of out-of-state guys signed up, including some from the national team. But we had a nice Italian dinner on the way down here, and we’ll get a good night’s sleep and hope for the best tomorrow.

While I have time at the computer, I thought I’d recapitulate my experience at Copperopolis. Apparently my body allocated extra energy to its immune system fighting off a pesky rhinovirus leaving me tired even before the race. In a way that was good because it gave me an excuse for not doing as well as I had hoped other than that I ate nothing during the race and bonked.

I got a mediocre warm-up before the start. I had hoped to make it fast the first time up the climb, but I was not in the shape to do it and ended up setting a mild pace. A first for any juniors race I’ve been in, once we got over the climb everyone started to rotate without anyone saying a word. We went fairly fast, and I was already starting to wear down. The second time up the climb was okay, but on the flats I was pooped. I tried sitting out a few pulls, but Adam Hodes (Tieni Duro) got butthurt.

The last and third time up the climb I was done for. I hung on as long as possible, but once I was done I was ausgespielt. I completely hit the wall and rode back at a laughable pace. Because the field was fast but small, I still came in fifth and won a t-shirt, succeeding again in my universal goal at Velo Promo races.

Now here I am with a lingering sore throat the night before a big race that I really want to do well at, so there is nothing to do but to wait anxiously. My brother is drinking a can of lemonade, and I’m going to eat some oatmeal cookies (no raisins) for dessert. Yeah, it’s a real party here.

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