Actually finished a CRIT!

As I‘ve said before, I hate crits with a vengeance! I haven’t finished a crit for about 3 years. Crits in Europe are not “real” bike races and are more of a summer time “show”. They are certainly never included in a stage race. So it was with much trepidation than I entered the second day of the Tour of Ephrata. The morning Team Time Trial I was actually quite looking forward to. We VERY nearly missed our start with NCVC. A few of us went to take a pee and next thing you know they are counting down our start time. We literally only JUST made it. The first section of the TTT was flat, then it turned uphill. The first section went not too badly for us at NCVC. It’s always extremely hard to do a TTT when you don’t know each other too well or how everyone rides. But we did a pretty good job for the first half of the course. Then once the road went uphill it was a little harder to judge everyone’s state of freshness. Especially after a pretty hard race the day before. But we did the best we could considering we don’t ride together regularly, and at the end of the day it was a fun event. The afternoon event wasn’t looking so good… a 4 corner extremely short course Crit… and with US riders who spend 80% of their time riding these kinds of events.

I must say I am actually very proud to say I actually managed not only to hang on, but also to stick it out through the intense boredom of going round in endless circles and seeing the same scenery over and over again… I actually finished a Crit.

They say a picture tells a thousand words. And there is no doubt that this picture a friend of mine send me the other day certainly expresses the pain I was going though in that crit better than any words can. Now that would be a pretty cool pic if I were to tell you I had attacked and was off the front solo going for the win… but truth be told, I was dangling at the back all day suffering like a dog… (see pic).

Thanks again to the NCVC guys for a great weekend of racing!