Poopy Methow

This might be the third time I've used the word "poopy" to describe a race this year...not good! Ok, first off, I had a BLAST at the Methow SR this past weekend. The area is gorgeous and the courses were beautiful, fun, and challenging. We had a lot of Zoka teammates there and even had three of us ladies in the stage race!

The TT course was really challenging with several steep climbs and as usual, I did pretty shitty. I ended up 33rd out of 35 I think. I never even looked at the results because I really didn't want to know. I honestly didn't get enough of a warmup in and I really need to work on that. I have such a hard time being on the trainer that I find lots of ways to burn time so I don't end up on it. I really need to work on my time trialing skills this fall and really force myself to get on the trainer and get in a good warmup.

After the TT a teammate and his fiance hosted a sandwich bar at their rental cabin, which was awesome. We all got to hang out for a little while, talk about the courses, look at photos of the TT, and eat some grub. The time went by a little quickly though and we had to take off to get ready for the afternoon crit.

The cat 4 ladies lined up at 2 and again, I got there a little late and didn't get in much of a warmup aside from pre-riding the course. The first few laps around made me nervous and I wasn't particularly thrilled about the course. Corner three had some loose dirt and gravel inside and bad pavement outside. The first two laps I slipped on the inside line, so I tried moving outside and then bounced my rear tire up on the bad pavement. After three near incidents in as many laps at a fraction of race speed I got a little spooked and just lost my nerve.

Again, I was a victim of bad positioning. I'm frustrated because I keep making that same mistake over and over and I really need to work on it! Argh. I started too far back, hit the brakes way too much in corner 3, and had to work way too hard to stay on the pack. After a few laps I finally got my rhythm, laid off the brakes, and started working my way through some carnage, but it was too late already. I held on as long as I could and got pulled with about 5 laps left. I was pretty pissed but that's how it goes. I realized shortly after I was pulled the field was down to 10 still together and around 6 gals in a chase group half a lap behind. Considering nearly 40 women started, that's some serious carnage.

JoAnne got pulled shortly after me and we were both pretty annoyed. Our teammate Alyson was still out there looking strong with the chase group so we were cheering her on. She did a fantastic job in her first crit and won the group sprint for 11th place.

Saturday night I was pretty irked with my performance so I set my sights on a top 15 finish for the road race Sunday. I wanted some points!! The rollers and small hills on the course suited me so I had a good chance. The wind was horrible on Sunday and we heard tons of stories from the men's fields coming in from the morning races. There were times during our race where we were working hard just to go 11-12mph. Shortly before the turnaround there was an open area where the sidewinds were gusting so strongly it practically pushed everyone over. I nearly got blown into the gravel a few times, which was a bit scary.

I felt great the whole race, my legs felt good, and I was climbing well. At the midpoint turnaround (around mile 22) the woman in contention for the overall win went down. I'm not sure what happened but there seemed to be a lot of confusion over the course and she said she wasn't sure which way to go. Luckily she got right back up and to the front of the pack and didn't get hurt too badly. Shortly after that there was a small riser that started to split things apart and I got gapped off a bit. I was working with a group to chase back on when we hit the base of a small climb and I dropped my chain. I'm always able to get my chain back on quickly but this time I kept shifting and shifting and just couldn't get it back on. Then all of a sudden I couldn't pedal anymore and I looked down and noticed I had wrapped my chain around my pedal. Are you kidding me? Who the hell does this?

The follow car came up and I hopped off and a guy helped me get it back together. I saw the pack about halfway up the hill and thought I still had a chance to get back on if I really worked. The support guy gave me a push and then I tried to draft off the car for a few seconds but they sped away. Drat! For several miles I could see the pack not far ahead but just couldn't get there. Damn! At that point the sobering idea that I had a 17 mile solo ride ahead of me pissed me off so I decided "F...., if I'm riding 17 miles solo I might as well practice my f**** TT skills". I pretty much hauled ass as best I could to the finish and thanked the cycling gods that I had a nice tailwind most of the return trip.

So...all in all, a great weekend with crappy results! The good news is that Alyson managed to stay with the lead pack in the road race and might have gotten a top 10 GC finish. JoAnne hit a wall pretty hard towards the end of the road race and she and I were both a little irked about our lackluster results. But hey, we had an awesome time and can't wait until next year!