Hat Trick

LA Wings Memorial Day Crit

California had blessed us with another sunny day and blue skies with a little gust of wind.
Lets get right to business. The race started off moderate with a few attacks and they just kelp coming until about 25 minutes in Gordon Mcully attacked and stayed away for 7-10 laps because a few teams sent a couple of guys up to bring him back. Once he was back in the field, I attacked and tried to get away solo, but only to put tension on the 100+ field. My tragedy worked and I group of 6 got away, however before I knew it, 6 turn to 8, 8 turn to 14, 14 turn to 16. Way to many guys.

I did some work at this point, but with this many people in the split its bound not to stick. A couple of laps later Tony Cruz (United Pro) attacked and split the group, when Tony set up, I attacked, once again to keep people on the edge and maybe get rid of some guys in the break. Perfection! After a while, we were 20 seconds from lapping the field. As we got closer guys got more motivated to lap and we did with about 15 minutes to go. What I didn’t know was that all the guys we dropped from the break stuck it out and were also in a position to lap the field shortly after my group lapped.

Now I see 5 to go and I looking good. Staying out of trouble and following the right wheels I hear that the second group has just lapped and now we see 3 to go. With one to go I was caught in the wind after being pinched off the wheel ahead of me. Coming out the last turn I was 3rd wheel right behind Tony Cruz and with 200 meter to go I launched the rockets and with 100 to go I hit the after burners taking my 3rd consecutive win in a row.



pic courtesy of:Kenny Lam "sony pictures"

Barry Wolfe Crit

Barry Wolfe Crit

Well you all know about the track race (read above) and Saturday was the same. The second race of the Memorial Day weekend was also a race in dedication to Barry Wolfe. Saturday race was a new course from the past years. Usually it’s a wide-open 4-corner race with very good roads. This year it was 4 corners with bad roads and narrow streets. This race was all about who can make it to the last corner first for the short 150-meter sprint.

This race was a whole lot better for me than I expected given that I just don’t feel 100% at this time. After a few break went and came back, with about 40 minutes to go, I small group got away and it had 1-2 guys from every team including new Successful Living member Gordon Mcully. I made my move got across to the break and got right to work. I wanted this break to stick because I was the fastest guy in the move. After the break got about 30 seconds I started to pull less and watch for Gordon attacks, which worked out for me because I was able to bring back every single attack that look dangerous.

With 2 laps to go, Gordon attacked and opened a decent gap however Kale from LaGrange had his teammate Marco Rios bring him back giving me the perfect lead out. With two corners to go, I came out 4th wheel knowing it was a race to the next corner. A SDBC rider started the dash to the corner, I quickly jump along with Kyle and now it’s a 3 up side my side dash to the corner. I’m thinking “ crash or win” who ever breaks last and don’t crash will win…first guys to give up was the sdbc rider, so now its Kyle and I and I beat him to the corner going about 38mph. As I make the corner, I notice that I’m going to fast and I run into the center divider rubbing the side of my tires with it. For a hot second I thought I would crash, but remember, I got mad skills and I made it to take the win.

You guys wont believe this. I won two cash primes and when it was time to collect, they said John Wordin went home with the cash box....haha

Track Race

I race the track today out in Encino in memory of Barry Wolfe.
WHO WAS BARRY WOLFE? It was almost impossible to be a part of the Southern California cycling community and not know Barry Wolfe. "Barry" was a top
masters competitor for many years, both on road and track, winning a National Track Championship jersey in 1987. Barry founded the popular local "Simi Ride". A
partial list of pros who were regular participants includes Thurlow Rogers, Roy Knickman, John Wordin, Pam Schuster, John Tomac, Steve Bauer, Chris Horner,
Levi Leipheimer, Harm Jensen, Henk Vogels, Gord Fraser, Jonathan Vaughters, Floyd Landis and Baden Cooke, just to name a few. Wolfe, who passed away in July
2003, was the grand "Patron" of Southern California Cycling. In addition to the Simi Ride, he led a weekday ride, known simply as "The Barry Ride," which is also a
mainstay training ride for local elite amateurs and pros. Anyone from Olympic and Tour de France riders to actors like James Cromwell, musicians like Mike Ward,
Matt Fenders and John Rubano and just people who loved to go for a ride showed up for the rides. Wolfe was also one of the founding members of the famous North
Hollywood Wheelman club that fostered numerous legendary names in US Cycling such as Ron Skarin, Wayne Stetina, Rogers and Knickman. Barry was also
instrumental in the establishment of the Encino Velodrome, bringing the Track Nationals to Southern California and the Warner Center Grand Prix. Therefore it is
fitting that that the Encino Memorial Day Weekend Race should carry his name and be a memorial to his good works for cycling and cyclists.

I had NO legs. I don’t feel good and it’s making really nervous. I should be on top form right now getting ready for Philly Week. Well it’s really nothing special to talk about but I do have one pic to share with you.

photo courtesy of : Stefan

Have a good healthy and safe Memorial Day weekend.

This weekend

So I have three races this weekend. Starting Saturday night, ill race the track at Encino then sunday and monday ill race these crits. Should be fun and I just pray to be safe and the rest will fall in place.

ill keep you guys posted on whats going on.

peace

Back on the Bike and Racing

So I finally felt strong enough to get out of bed and go train Saturday morning. So I head out to Pasadena to do a slow group ride and at about 30miles in I get a flat, I fix it and I get another flat. I ride to my friends house Josh that lived near by in San Demas and I got another tube and cl2. We get about 10minutes into the ride and I puncture again. My day is over. His wife Carla came and took me to my car.

I felt really bad and didn’t know about racing the next day, but I had a gut feeling that my legs would be okay.
So, I wake up Sunday morning bright and early and go for a ride and once again my legs felt sluggish and flat. So my ride is over and I get home and start to get ready to drive up to the race.

It’s a Simi hard circuit because it’s pretty hilly. It has a long 700mm hill and a bunch of false flat before going back up hill to the finish.

The race started off really fast because they gave as a prime a set of $340.00 wheels to the leader of the first lap. With 100mm to go to the last turn, I hear a puncture. I jump up and down to see if its me and its feels fine so I take the last corner at regular speed with the pack…. my tire was flat and I almost crashed. However I’m sitting like 5-6 wheels and no one is sprinting for the wheels yet, so as we get to about 200mm from the start finish line, I start to sprint. Can you believe I beat those guys on a flat tire? So, now the two guys I beat for the wheels are laughing at me because my race is over right? Wrong. I find a guy that I knew in the race and offered him some money to give me his wheel and he agreed. We did a wheels exchange and after a lap of chasing I got back on and game was on. I know I made people nervous when they saw me again.

My legs never really came around but I did put some people in a whole by riding aggressive. I made a lot of the breaks but not the right one. With about 1minutes to go a break went and I didn’t cover and they stayed away. The picture is of the break and the main field on the last lap going up the final climb. We where so close.

Well, it was a good race for me even though I didn’t win. I recovered well, but didn’t have the good legs and that’s only because I didn’t train for the last 10 days.

So…I feel ready to hit it hard this week and prepare for Philly week along with Captech, CSC and some race in Canada.

Being home

I got home and I came down with some type of virus. We thought it was just normal cold, but it seems to be much more. I feel like throwing up every thirty minutes and it doesn't feel good.

I did a good 4-hour ride yesterday and about 15minutes from my house, I got this nasty cramp in my stomach to the point where I couldn't pedal.
ill give it one more day and if I feel the same, ill take myself to the doctor.

peace,

Tiaa-Cref First North America Win

Tiaa-Cref First North America Win

It felt good to sleep in past 8:00 today. The crit didn’t start till 3:15 so we had all day to guff around and go for an easy spin before the evening crit. On the ride this morning, my legs felt pretty decent and I was really shocked, I mean this is my first stage race all year.

After getting back to the hotel, I took a shower and had a sandwich before taking a 2hr. On the ride over to the race, my legs felt horrible and I started to think…what happen?
So, I figured when the race start, ill chill for a minute and see what happens, but they felt worse and worse so I went to option 2, do a couple of sprints to open up the legs. Well that worked and I won two money primes in the process, a $50 and $100. The $50 prime came really easy. The second one…wow, I came from like 300m back to nip Curtis Gunn at the line.

Danny Pate and all the boys road really well but also really smart. We didn’t use too much energy because tomorrow will be a very hard day. Mike Lang and Danny Pate were in a break that was about 50seconds at one point during the race, however Health Net and other teams brought it back just in time for a field sprint.

We had the numbers to do a killer lead-out, but I felt confident that if I just followed Gord’s wheel I could take him. Chad Hartley had to do the dirty work by keeping everyone off my wheel going into the final laps…and he did a great job putting his ass on the line for me.

Going into the last two corner Chris Wherry (united pro) once again gave Gord a lead out only this time I was able to hold the wheel and contest the sprint. I gave Gord a gap entering the last corner so I could take a run at him and maybe I gave him a bit too much. As we started to sprint, I made another mistake by taking the inside line where the street was really rough and as I torque on the bike, my bike wheel was going no where but left and right. I moved left with about 50m to go and I took off like a rocket. At this time Gord has his hands up, not knowing I was going about 4-5mph faster than him and I took the win.

Thanks Gord!

Stage 3 Tour of Gila

Opportunity Missed

Today was a bit nervous for the Cref boys and me. Not because we didn’t have a good enough team or we were scared to race, but the concern was, will I be able to get over the 2 major climbs and the hard rollers coming into town for the flat finish.

From the start we had 4-5 big rollers before hitting the first main climb. Attacks started right away and a small group eased away to get a 1-2minute gap on the field at the base of the climb. Team United Pro set a high tempo early in the climb but riders where so excited they attacked and made the pace even higher. I started the climb about 20 back and when the temp slowed, I quickly moved to the front and made it over the climb in the top 10. Sigh of relief.

From there its pretty much down hill with some rollers and one last climb through the feed zone and then you get this crazy decent, which half of the field wanted to be the leader down the hill. I did the decent about 6 riders back and I felt super safe.

In the middle of the race, we where going pretty slow and my body started to shut down and I needed something to get going again. So I went all the way to the back of the field and slowly worked my way to the front just in time for the race to the final bog climb into Silver city. At this point in the race the two leaders are about 5min up the road and the boys (TIAA-CREF) started to help United Pro chase. They did an outstanding job bringing the gap down and it wasn’t easy. I had the whole team rallying around me and they gave me 100% so I can have a chance at the stage win.

With about 3k to go, the leaders are only 30 seconds ahead and that’s when Danny Pate took this killer pull and split the field from 70 to about 20 guys. I was sitting perfect on Gord Frasher will going into the last corner with 1k to go, Danny pulled off and I took a huge breath because he really hurt me (but he had to do it, to bring back the two guys). At this point, I’m thinking, just hold on and you can win. Well I held on as long as possible. I was sitting 5th wheel and it was a nasty cross wind and I was out of the draft. Chris Wherry (united pro) was giving Gord (health net) a lead out and when he punched it, I had nothing.

I rolled in somewhere in the top 15 maybe (have not seen official results yet). The team was content. The DS was happy that I made it over all the climbs in good shape and I was really upset. Its not fun putting you team on the line and you don’t close the deal. It truly sucks.

Tour of Gila Stage 1-2

Stage one: Tour of Gila

After I saw in the schedule that I was doing tour of Gila, I was actually pretty happy. I mean I spent about 4 weeks here in late January and we covered pretty much all the roads the race covers, so the confidence was pretty high.

The TT yesterday was just a ride for me to open my legs up for today’s stage. The TT was 16 miles out and back and pretty much all up hill.

Today’s stage was a 96-mile road race with a mountain top finish. The goal for today was just to ride for a break and see what happens at the end. Well we did get that. Mike Lang and Chad Hartley made the early break at 10miles in and we never saw them until the final 5mile climb. Our best result was Lucas at 6th place.

Overall I felt pretty good and I’m looking forward to tomorrow’s stage. It’s a bit tough in the beginning and the end, but it’s a finish that I can do well in.