A Strange Weekend of Racing

Rider 3 has already provided a couple of typically entertaining recaps of his weekend of racing, so I thought I'd get in the action too. After all, we took part in different races, although with similar outcomes, at least part of the time.

You probably have picked up on this by now, but our mighty Team Two Wheel has a fair amount of bike racing experience. Rider 2 and I perhaps have a bit more, but all of us have been around the proverbial block.

So given this, the past weekend was somewhat bizarre. Rider 2 probably put it best when he said something to the effect that we all should have paid attention to the omens when they first started showing up.

To wit:

• Just prior to the start of his time trial, Rider 2 clipped his foot out of his pedal while rolling to a stop, placing it on the sidewalk. In doing so he tripped the race's chief official, who yard-saled, crashing to the pavement. She evidently wasn't terribly pleased with him.
• Feeling crappy during his time trial, Rider 2 realized at the finish that his rear brake had rubbed on the rim his entire ride. Seriously rookie error. From a guy with 25 years of racing under his chamois? And he still finished in 4th place.
• Rider 3 meanwhile realized the night before his race that his tubular tires were threadbare. The night before the race he realized this?
• But if you think that's bad, check this out. Somehow, even though I spent the morning scrambling to get ready for an afternoon road race, I FORGOT TO EAT LUNCH. Also forgot to bring any food with me to the race. Seriously? How old am I?
• And then there was this bonehead move: I was sick for 3 weeks in March, during which I rode a total of two times. Then the week before Frozen Flatlands I went on a family vacation where exercise was limited to walking from one restaurant to another. So I went into a hard race with at best one match to burn. And what did I do early in the road race? Yep, I followed a series of ill-timed attacks, and once our break was caught I blew up and got dropped. So much for using my head, which is typically the one and only thing that gets me through hard races.
• Then on Sunday, 20 minutes before the start I realized I had left my jersey at home in the dryer. I seem to remember fining riders for stuff like this back in the day. Another rookie mistake.

OK, so it was a weird weekend. Now that those excuses are out of the way, here's a brief report on the weekend's racing.

As you know by now, Frozen Flatlands is the kickoff to eastern Washington's race season. The kids might say that the flatlands part of the race's name is a bit ironic. For once they'd be right. (By the way, I blame Alanis Morisette for the public's apparent total ignorance of the definition of irony. "It's like rain on your wedding day," isn't ironic. It's unfortunate. Anyway...) There's not a lot flat about the race. OK, it's not mountainous, but constantly up and down. And this weekend was hellawindy.

Like 30 mph windy.

With hail.

And cold.

And more wind.

Nope, not a terribly flat course profile.

Nasty. In fact it's the kind of weather all of us (well, at least Rider 2 and I) love to ride and race in. As long as we're feeling strong. The thing is, racing in hail and nastiness is

miserable when you're 100 meters behind the caravan for mile after mile.

FF starts with a 20K time trial. It's followed a couple of hours later by a 50ish mile road race. Tough first day, no? Sunday features a somewhat less hilly, but definitely not flat, 25 mile road stage.

I opted to skip the TT for a number of reasons. First, I was still less than healthy, so starting a TT in sub-freezing weather with 35 mph wind didn't sound like a great idea. I've also been scrambling to get our house on the market. Finally, my wife was hankering for a morning yoga class. So I did my family duty and nodded out of the TT.

Saturday's road race:

Going into the road race I didn't really know what to expect of myself. I certainly wasn't anticipating a win, but thought I'd at least finish with the front group. Like I already mentioned though, this didn't happen. I followed a couple of moves in the first big crosswind sections, but our little group was reeled in just before we made a right turn into a brutal headwind. Then I got dropped.

The one silver lining was that I was gapped with two very nice guys, Ted and Alex. They're also two typically strong guys, but my guess is after finishing second and fourth in the TT were blown.

My conversation with Ted, in fact, was limited to something to the effect of his comment of "bad legs." Short and sweet, and enough said.

We actually worked well together, and for four or five miles kept the main group close. One of the more frustrating things in cycling is getting dropped, only to put yourself on the rivet while riding 50 meters (or whatever) behind the main group. Totally unsustainable in a nasty headwind and we worked a hell of a lot harder than the riders in the main group.

In the end, Alex and I ended up riding in together. There was so much collateral damage in the main group that somehow I scored a handful of points at the finish, but I was tired, disappointed and demoralized. And I own Alex an energy bar. My stomach started growling about an hour from the finish, and thankfully he helped me out.

Rider 2 did us proud though, finishing third in the Master A category and among the top riders overall in the combined Cat 3/Master A field. In fact Masters riders were first and second overall in Saturday's road race.

Sunday:

The energy was light ahead of Sunday's short, 25-mile road race. Most comments I overheard involved the word "tired" somewhere in the sentence, but that said, I wasn't sure how the race would go. Balls to the wall? Sit and sprint? Early break rolling off the front and staying there? My plan was to not be stupid. This is hard for me though.

In the end, it was one of the most negative races I've ever done. If you're not familiar with this expression here's how things go down in a negative race. The group rolls along at 20 mph. Someone attacks. The group then goes 30 mph until the attacker is caught. Then the group goes 18 mph until someone attacks.

Hat's off though to Eric Schuman from the Lenovo team. He attacked alone, over and again until the group got bored of chasing him. In the end he was joined with another rider. Eric ended up in second for the day, so kudos to him. Thanks for not being a pansy like the rest of us, and being willing to actually attack the race.

To tell you the truth, I didn't expect the break to make it. Even at 3K to go the main peloton was fresh, and maybe 10 seconds down on the attackers. It's a fast finish and I expected someone to get aggressive. But like I wrote earlier, it was one of those super-negative days.

This race has a tricky final kilometer. The road is narrow--three abreast at best--and we weren't exactly moving quickly, so position was everything. I was a few rows back from the front, where I could see Rider 2, who I wanted to try and help in the finish. But there was no moving around. My bad.

In the end Rider 2 went on a flyer with about 800 meters to go, immediately opening a big gap. But there was a headwind and eventually the group decided to finally start racing. Somehow I popped through a hole, and for some strange reason the boys sat up for a second with 200 meters to go, just as we caught Rider 2. Even though it was early (the finish is uphill), I started my sprint then, almost closing the gap to one final rider.

So second in the field sprint, second in my official racing category and fourth overall among all riders. Ordinarily maybe a result to be disappointed about, but after my "performance" the day before I was more than OK with it.

And thanks to Chad for loaning me a jersey!

OK, tomorrow is another day for battle: Ronde van Palouse. I'm wildly underprepared for a day of hell. Wish me luck.
Rider 1

Rookie Mistakes

I am currently reading Johan Bruyneel's book "We Might As Well Win". Well, I'm not "literally" currently reading the book since I am obviously speaking words into your brain right now, but you know what I mean.

I will save the book review for later, but one of the chapters I just read was about the sayings in cycling that seem so simple and yet are so important, like "eat before you are hungry, drink before you are thirsty"; "stay out of the wind", "only ask a witness for the prosecution a question when you already know his answer", stuff like that. Johan's point is that these things seem simple, but it is hard to remember them in the crush and rush of a bike race.

I should have read that chapter before my weekend at Frozen Flatlands, then I wouldn't have had to make a bunch of rookie mistakes, or as someone said this weekend, "What a Cat 5 boner that was!" Again, not literally.

Here is my list of stupid things I should not have done to get more benefit out of my racing experience at Frozen Flatlands.

Show up for the time trail AHEAD of my start time. What?, you say. My start time was clearly stated about 18 hours before the race time. I was at the race site at least 90 minutes ahead of my race. I showed up at the start line approximately 2 minutes after my start time. And no, for those who aren't familiar with Pedro Delgado, you don't get a "mulligan" or a new start time. You roll up to the start line, put your foot down so it is not a rolling start, and you ride with your original start time. In other words, when I was one linear foot into the time trial, my time was already at or past 2 minutes. This was stupid.

Spend time with any equipment you are going to race. As previously blogged, I was traveling for most of the week ahead racing. I put tires on my race wheels, a cogset on the rear wheel and wiped down the time trial bike after dinner on Friday. I got on the bike for the first time in over two years on Saturday morning in the 60 minutes before the event. I then remembered what I was going to do to the bike after the last time trial - replace the handlebars that put me in an excruciating position and that have a tendency for the arm supports to unexpectedly give way and rotate on the center post. This was stupid.

Dose your efforts. On the long road race, I was, sadly for me, dropped by the front of the pack on an uphill surge. I knew this might happen, but I was hoping it wouldn't until the Williams Lake hill and I figured it was training no matter what. After getting dropped, I managed to claw my way into the wind and catch up to another rider. The two of us worked together to catch up to a third and then the three of us did the same to catch two more. At that point, we had two groups of three that we could see ahead of us with the remaining lead pack ahead of them. I thought that if we could put together a pack of 11 we might not see the lead group again, but we would get around the course in decent fashion and pick up the second dozen spots in the race. Not great, but nothing to cry about. So what did I do? I took a monster pull to get my group up to the next three on the road just as we turned a corner into the teeth of the wind and a short climb. Instead of moving to the back of the group and latching on . . . I opened a 5' gap, that instantly turned into 10', 20' and then a few seconds . . . and then I was screwed. Instead, I could have taken shorter turns, paid attention to the hills coming up and dosed my efforts. That was stupid.

Show up with a racing jersey. Oh, wait. That wasn't me. That was an unnamed teammate.

So, the Frozen Flatlands wrap-up? First, thanks to the officials and the men and women of the Baddlands Cycling Team. They put on a great event (although could we talk about a later date on the calendar?) and they single-handedly pulled road bike racing through the doldrums so that there is a growing group of people putting on more and more events each year. Second, they say there is no whining in bike racing, so I won't whine. I accept the blame for my own fitness and my own rookie mistakes. Will I look to change a few things next year? Yes. Will I hope for better weather? Yes. Will I try to avoid any stray dogs on the course? Yes. And will I try to avoid making rooking mistakes? Yes, I will try.

Uncle Larry

Even in this age of information, we humans still like to play a game similar to "telephone", the nursery school game in which one person whispers a word in the ear of the person next to him or her and then the word is whispered from ear to ear around a circle. It rarely, if ever, gets back to the person who started it without the word changing, sometimes multiple times.

In the case of an accident, the same thing happens and it happened again at Frozen Flatlands. Let me be clear, I don't think that anyone was making things up or trying to not be completely truthful, but it is interesting to hear the various stories.

Here is what I heard straddling my bike before the Sunday race: Uncle Larry was involved in a bike crash with three riders which was caused by Larry hitting a dog. Larry was badly injured and is going to need reconstructive surgery on one of his hands.

Here is what I heard a few hours later: Uncle Larry hit a dog while he was in a group of riders and was involved in a bad crash which resulted in serious injury to one of his hands and a broken arm that was going to require surgery.

Here is what I heard after mixing a few tequilas and post-race dehydration: Uncle Larry was taken in a space-ship for human testing and using manipulation of the time/space continuium the aliens put Larry back into the race pack approximately one second behind himself causing him to crash into himself at which point the aliens, again using manipulation of the time/space continuium, place a dog at the scene of the crash causing everyone to assume that the dog caused the problem instead of Larry running into the mistimed version of himself.

Here is what I heard when I e-mailed Uncle Larry and asked him what happened: I was approaching the 3k to-go sign at the intersection of Mullinex Road and Dover Road when a space alien . . .

Let me start again. Here is my paraphrasing of Larry's e-mail: I was approaching the 3k to-go sign at the intersection of Mullinex Road and Dover Road. I was overtaking another rider in my class (50+) at 35 mph. I had a big tailwind and had just looked at my cyclocomputer when a dog came out of cover on the left and crossed the road in an attempt to bite a rider. I had about one second between seeing the dog and running into it. The dog was taller than the front axle because if it had been lower the bike would have vaulted but instead I did a superman flight off the bike (Larry knows these things since he is an engineer). Another rider in his group, a teammate, then ran into and over Larry.

The result was road rash from Larry's left knee up to his left elbow, including his armpit (I'll bet Larry shaved his legs, but I doubt any male cyclist thought to shave his armpits). His hands took the first big hit resulting in one dislocated and fractured finger and missing skin the size of a 50-cent coin on the palm/heel of each hand. He also has an assortment of bruising, sore ribs and various aches and pain. Not surprising at all.

Being a cyclist, Larry also reported on the condition of his bike. This is the sort of thing that non-cyclists don't understand at all, but readers here will understand. Larry is a bit of a gear-nut, with a constant rotation of bikes. In this case he was riding his Trek Madone 6.9 and you will be glad to hear that the initial survey is that the frame and fork are fine. I don't know what wheels Larry was riding, but the front wheel also appears to be fine. There were some scraps and dings on the bike and shifters, but surprisingly little serious damage considering the speed and impact.

Lastly, before you ask, I don't know the status of the dog. I know that Larry was not charitably disposed towards the beast, who appeared intent on putting his chompers into a bit of cyclist flesh just before the impact, and I know that I don't feel charitable towards the owner of this dog, but I don't have any other information on the poorly timed Kujo.

So, thankfully, Larry will rise to fight another day, although it sounds like it will be in the warmer weather and unfortunately losing some of his hard won fitness that he was carrying into the spring. The good news is that he won't be facing surgery and the aliens got everything they need so they won't be back soon.

Shop Ride Review

Despite the looming bad weather, 19 hearty souls appeared for the 2010's first Shop Ride from Two Wheel Transit. We really should credit the ride with 20, but I will get to that in a moment.

As previously reported, the first shop ride of the year was set for 5.30 pm on April 1. Let me repeat a couple of important points there: "5.30", "pm", "April", "1". Even though it is in the past, it is still important for our story.

So, as I said, there were 19 (or possibly 20) people who showed up for the shop ride. All three members of Team Two Wheel were in attendance, one of the owners of Two Wheel (Geoff), a couple of GU cycling team members (one of them 2nd in last week's Bellingham race - didn't catch K.C.'s finish), a couple of Baddlands riders and that left the majority as guys (sorry, no ladies on this trip - they may have been more mindful of the bad weather) who like to ride.

It was a good and compatible group, but I think that there were really two stand-out heroes of the day. The first shall be known as "D". D did a couple of triathlons last year with a 12-mile bike portion. He is interested in improving his cycling speed and fitness and thought that a group ride would be a good way to do that. He is relatively new to town and also wanted to meet some more riders and learn a bit about the routes around here. I think that part all went well, but a combination of a prior work-out that day, a rubbing brake pad that wasn't detected and fixed until late in the ride, and a more vigorous pace and distance than he was used to and D found himself struggling whenever the route headed upwards.

Now, every cyclist knows what this feels like. There really is a special kind of misery that goes with that sinking feeling as your legs and lungs refuse to cooperate as a group of riders seems to effortlessly ride away up a hill (I expect to have that feeling this weekend at Frozen Flatlands at Williams Lake!), but I also think that it takes a special reservoir of courage to keep with it and keep trying no matter how fruitless it appears. And that, my friends, is exactly what D did. No whining, no complaining; just kept riding the best he could and giving it what he had. He kept a good attitude and finished the ride.

His reward was pizza waiting for us at Two Wheel Transit. The benefit to having Geoff along, besides his pace setting and breaking wind, wait, I mean, anyway, at the end of the ride Geoff had arranged to have some pizzas delivered to the shop so that everyone who wanted was welcome to come in and have a bit of refreshment and hang around for a few minutes. It was a nice way to end a cool, but not wet, first shop ride of the year.

Now, about our mysterious 20th rider. This rider is a well-known, well-liked, fit and fast cyclist. He has a respected profession and, in fact, I recently saw him in Spokane Coeur d'Alene Living Magazine in a "Best of" story. In light of the cycling and community stature of this individual, I don't want to embarrass him, so I will simply refer to him as Dr. SJ. So, why, you ask, does Dr. SJ get to be a counted/not-counted member of the ride and how, you ask further, does that make him a hero of the ride? Well, my friends, Dr. SJ showed up for the shop ride on April 1st, at 5.30. Unfortunately for both him and us, it was 5.30 AM and not PM.

We should let that sink in for a moment.

For those of you around Spokane, you know that it was dang cold at 5.30 am yesterday. You also know that it was dang dark at 5.30 am yesterday. You also know that not one other sane person was on the street, much less on a bicycle, at 5.30 am yesterday. Nonetheless, Dr. SJ heeded the call for a ride and showed up at what he thought was the correct time. I'm not sure how he thought pizza fit in for the 6.30-7.00 am finish time, but you can't let little inconsistencies get in the way of a man's desire to ride his bike in a group.

So, to a ride hero who kept riding when he felt like stopping, and to a ride hero who went riding when no one else was looking, we salute you and thank everyone who showed up for the ride.

We will be having shop rides on the first Thursday of the month for the next several months, so put it on your calendar for Thursday, May 6 at 5.30 PM (please note the correct half of the day!).

See you at Frozen Flatlands this weekend!

Ready to Race

The race season has started for the Pros. You have to throw out the Tour Down Under simply because it is in January and their water goes down the drain the wrong way. We have to have standards, right? And you have to discount those oil-sponsored desert races. They make office park crits look picturesque. We have to have standards, right?

Well this weekend we got the first of the "real" races with Het Volk (please, I am not going to call it by its new name until is has been 25-50 years) and Kuurne-Brussels-Kuurne. These are real races run in the face of rain, snow, hellish winds and misery.

Just around the corner here in Spokane our race season is about to begin also. The season kicks off with the Frozen Flatlands race. It is too long, too cold and has a miserable wall-style climb that separates me from the pack, but I will be there proudly supporting Team Two Wheel in my slightly slow but spirited manner. The omnium this year involves a 12-mile time trial, a 47-mile road race/misery-fest on the same day (what?) and in a change from the circuit race of prior years a 24.5 mile road race using the "old" finish line after a series of rollers. Should be interesting and painful.

So, how do you know if you are ready to race? I suppose that is in an individual question. I know I am ready when I can follow Quicksilver for an hour or two without wanting to throw up or curse him for failing to ever, ever notice he has a small chainring. Alternatively, I know I am ready to race when I can converse with Rider 1 on a ride and the conversation doesn't center on "my legs are shot", "my tank is empty", "I am sick", "I am hungover" or finally, "please, please make it stop".

Lance "Killing Machine" Armstrong has a different way of knowing he is ready to ride. Here is a picture from a new Lance Armstrong book, the caption for which is, "You can see here I wasn't yet serious about cycling: I still have hairy legs."

From Misc Bike Pics

Here is another picture from about eight months later. The caption reads, "It was a day or two before the start [of the Tour] . . . Clearly those legs were ready to race."

From Misc Bike Pics

Um, yeah. He looks ready to ride. And no, Tom, we didn't mix up a picture of your calves with Lance's.

Frozen Flatlands Race Report

"Daddy, Daddy, did you win that gold thing?" my four-year-old daughter asked the second I walked in the back door from Saturday's road race.

"What golden thing?" I asked right back.

"That gold shirt."

"Oh you mean the yellow jersey?" My wife laughed in the background. I'm pretty sure I looked like I had just walked in after barely surviving a mugging. And definitely not like I had just won a race. 

"Yes. Did you win?"

"No, not today."

Have you ever won the gold shirt?" More laughter from the kitchen.

"Yes, but it was a really, really long time ago." (And to our readers, no, it wasn't that yellow jersey. Just a yellow jersey)

"Why didn't you win?"

"Uh. It's a long story." (Actually it isn't. I don't ride enough...)

Fast forward 10 minutes and I'm eating with my daughter at the dinner table.

"Why are you coughing so much?"

"Well, sometimes when you exercise and work really hard your lungs hurt. Afterwards it makes you cough a lot."

"And you also get black boogers." This was a statement, not a question

"That's right sweetie."

"And then you pick them out of your nose." Also a statement. 

"Umm. You should really use a tissue for that."

"I know, but sometimes you don't."

"You should use a tissue though, OK."

"OK."

It's good to be able to talk about the first races of the year in the past tense. This weekend was hard. Racing is always hard, but there's something about that first race--not knowing exactly where your fitness is, not having done much intensity yet, and this year not even having many rides outdoors--that contributes to the pre-race nervous tension.

I expected to get slaughtered, but thankfully this didn't happen. Well, I feel slaughtered, but it's all relative. Results for me and Rider 2 were better than what we both thought we'd end up with.

Saturday was a double stage. The organizers were especially cruel this year. Saturday morning was a 12.5 mile TT, followed but a 50ish mile road race in the afternoon. Sunday was a 50 minute circuit race.

Rider 2 rode a great TT, finishing 2nd in his category. Fortunately while Quicksilver was battling wind and near-freezing conditions, I spent the morning with our plumber preparing for a bathroom addition. Nice. I don't have a pic of Rider 2's TT bike, but wish I did because he rocked his old steel road bike with a vintage Specialized Tri-Spoke on the rear and a deep section Zipp up front. Many a fixie-rider would be proud.

I registered as "Master A" for the first time in my life. I wasn't going to, but Rider 2 did and I thought it would be more fun to race in the same category. So we went off on a rare sunny day at 2 in the afternoon. The road course is deceptively hard. Yes, it's called the Frozen Flatlands, but it's really not all that flat. More like the Rolling Flatlands. Up and down virtually all the time, with one short (less than a mile long), but steep and significant climb about 8 miles from the finish.

I was totally content to see a break of four roll off the front a few miles after the neutral start, where (dammit) I lost a water bottle crossing a set of railroad tracks. This would haunt me later. 

I don't think the break ever got more than about 90 seconds. They just dangled. Perfect as far as I was concerned. A couple of other teams without riders in the break would occasionally send one guy up to chase for a solid minute or two. It made no sense. If they had stuck a few people up there for 5 minutes they'd have brought them in. But I was more than happy to let them burn their matches even though they weren't getting anything done. Plus, it was a beautiful day. It felt great to roll along at 27 mph with the sun on my face, while someone else unnecessarily toiled at the front.

About an hour into the race it became pretty clear that the race would be decided on the climb. And sure enough, a small group hit the throttle just as the climb started. I jumped to keep them close, waiting for a bigger group to swarm past me at the place on the climb where this kind of thing typically happens. Not today though. I turned around and was all alone in no-man's land. Great.

Quicksilver jumped out of the group and made his way up to me and we wheezed our way to the top of the climb. It felt horrible. Thankfully two others caught us soon after the crest and we started working together on the 7-mile rolling run-in to the finish. 

We started taking even pulls, but that unfortunately didn't last long. I ended up behind a rider who kept winding up the speed really quickly, then pulling off and accelerating even more. So it would take me a good 20 seconds to get by him. Eventually I sat out every other pull. Then I started cramping. Remember that bottle I lost at the beginning of the race? 

We picked off a few guys that were dropped from the front group. We also lost Rider 2 and one other rider from our little group of fun-seekers. At one point I also got gapped until I came to my senses. Somehow I closed the 10 meter gap I let open and made it back to the wheel in front of me.

Have you ever noticed what being completely cross-eyed with pain and suffering does to your bike handling? I'm a pretty smooth rider, but I'm pretty sure I almost took myself by running into the rider in front of me at least once. 

In the end my group finished 30 seconds or so down on a group of 6. So I rolled across the line in 9th overall, and the 2nd place Master. Quicksilver ended up as the 3rd place oldish guy. 

We cooled down and somehow made it to the cars. I snarfed down 2 packets of the new PowerBar Gel Blasts we got last week. This will be a topic for another post, but I really like them. At that moment I would have eaten a scab and been happy about it though. 

Sunday's race was a bit of a surprise. Held at Spokane Raceway Park, it's typically a fun circuit on the car racing track. Unfortunately though, someone at the County started demolishing a piece of the track for resurfacing on Friday without telling anyone from the race. So Sunday morning as 300 racers were showing up, the organizers were busy getting creative, looping the course through the infield and across a series of service roads. Rough pavement, confusion and a 180 degree hairpin 800 meters before the new finish were all part of the fun for the day.

From Team Two Wheel

The hairpin before the finish straight. 

The racing was fast, but uneventful. Small groups attacked pretty frequently, but none had the horsepower to stay away. Rider 2 and I patrolled near the front, mostly stayed out of the wind and chased when we felt like we needed to.

Plans to give Quicksilver a lead-out evaporated when he flatted in the hairpin turn on the last lap, but I hung on for 5th in a very long and windy field sprint. I picked the perfect wheel and was in the right position, but my tank was empty. In hindsight it's easy to say I could have done better, but really, I couldn't have.  So I was the second Master across the line again, and finished second for the weekend. 

Despite his untimely flat Quicksilver still finished fourth overall for the weekend. Good stuff. 

All in all it was a good weekend. This sport is so hard. But could it be any more fun or beautiful?

Quicksilver Speaks

I was told I have to do a blog. I guess that the other guys have done most of them. Okay. All of them. But if you look who has been on his bike, that would be me. Sure, those guys have done a few miles, but when we talked about racing Frozen Flatlands, those guys starting getting pretty nervous.

I don't really know why the Baddlands Cycling Club has its biggest race of the year so early. In Spokane it was still snowing a couple of days ago. In 2009 we have only had two or three days where it was above freezing the whole day. We haven't hit 50 degrees yet. Despite that, our biggest race of the year is a month away. It's an Ominium that starts on Saturday, April 4, with a 12-mile time trial in the morning and then is followed up by a 48-mile or 70-mile road race, depending on your category. Sunday morning there is a 50-minute or 75-minute circuit race on a 2.5 mile race-track that winds around except for the 1/4 mile drag strip and run-off area. It is almost always windy out there, so it is usually a tough race with the pace high and half of it straight into the wind.

In any case, Rider 1 and Rider 3 can keep on being the chatty-cathy's of the group. I'll keep riding my bike.

Till next time.
Rider 2