Univest

Univest was over in the first two miles, at least for anyone who was not willing to get there legs going early on, probably before the race began. That's how it was for our team. Although we can always count on Scottie Weiss to be in the early move. I know that he is strong, and that he can finish races when he attacks early.

Scottie missed the initial move but made a strong attack to get into a fast chase group. They left the peleton behind as we were just bumbling along content to smell the fresh cut grass on the side of the road. The climb that was supposed to break the field apart did just that however the officials sent us down the wrong road so everything came back together. Again we began just putzing along enjoying the end part of the season. I tried to go with a couple of Navigators but nothing was going anywhere.

As we got to the finishing circuits the lead groups had so much time on us that we were not even able to do one lap of them. Bummer! So our day ended early and we got to relax and watch the race unfold in a mix of chaos. We had no idea who had lapped who and who was going to win. In the end they got the results all messed up and I have no idea how they are going to score the rest of us.

Tomorrow we will race a hard crit and hopefully we will all be there to the very end.

Over and out...

US Pro Ends Early

The US Pro Championship is the only race that only Americans can race in. It crowns the national champ for the remainder of the season and can establish a rider overnight. Riders that spend thier seasons in Europe come home for the event filling the field with an impressive list of riders.

This year was going to be my first year in the event. I have had good form and my motivation for was high. Scottie Weiss was our go to guy. On a good day he can be there in the end with the best of them. My job on the day was to help him and if his legs where giving out then he would try and help me. But it wasn't too much a problem of my legs working that kept me from helping him. An early crash took me out of the race.

The opening laps of the race felt very comfortable to me. I was sitting easy on the first lap and was moving up on the second lap getting ready to cover some inevitable early moves that were sure to be launched. As I was moving up on the right side of the peloton I hit a pothole that came out of nowhere and slipped my handle bars down. I have hit hundreds of potholes throughout the summer, gone mtn biking on my bike, ridden dirt roads, hopped curbs and other things that I should have caused my bars to slip but a simple man hole did the job. I got on the radio and had my team car come up with a tool so that I could fix it. As I was hanging on to the car we began to go down a hill and pick up speed. We could not get the handle bar to move back and we where wrenching on it. I didn't want to loose too much time on the peloton so we kept the speed high and things began to get real crazy. The speed was too high, there were too many bumps and holes in the road and right as was all realize that we need to wait to the bottom of the hill to continue work I hit a bad hole that whipped my front wheel right under the rear wheel of the car. My bike went under and I went shooting off towards the curb slidding and tumbling. I got up to find my bike in peices about fifty feet up the road. I picked up pieces knowing that my day was over.

The fork was fractured and in two pieces, the wheel was curved like a taco. My race was over just like that. In the first twenty five minutes I was limping home angry that I couldn't even go over Paris Mountain once. My bike was trashed and my team was out there with out me. They were all brave soldiers and faught as long as they could though.

I'm awfully sore today but alive to fight another day.