Charlotte/Belmont crits

Mixed feelings, dude. I’ve had a solid change of heart in the last couple of years, with my ambitions and excitements within the cycling world switching almost a complete 180.

Gone are the days where I wouldn’t start a road race or would soft pedal a time trial because there was a crit the next day.  I just looked back at this post from 2011, where I was thrilled to be at a weekend of only crit racing, with “not even one foolish uphill TT to worry about”. Rigghttttt. 

Since present-day Ian has been scheming about the uphill Joe Martin time trial all month, it’s fairly apparent that things have switched inside my head. Speaking of things inside your head, did you ever read the Animorph books as a kid? Or recently? I don’t remember too much the premise, but I do remember that the bad guys were some sort of worm-type creatures that crawled into your brain through your ear canal and then controlled your actions. The heroes were people that could turn into animals. This was all based on a true story, which is a pretty neat unknown fact about the Animorphs series.

 

My mission? See if I could “criteriumorph” (see what I did there??) myself for the Novant Health and Belmont crits- taking place in and around Charlotte, North Carolina. These past two weeks were a good opportunity for me to jump in with the crit dawgs and continuously remind myself that bike racing will absolutely NEVER be easy.

There are two major crit series in the United States: The USAcrits series and the NCC. I truthfully have no idea what is the difference or even what these races I did this weekend were, but I know that they were part of some series. To help us both follow along, I’ve included the acronyms for each series:

USACRITS: U Should Always Chop Repeatedly Into Tight Sweepers

NCC: No Cautious Cornerers

Novant Health, formally Charlotte Presby, is the richest crit in the United States. This brings the highest quality field out to downtown Charlotte. This, combined with large primes nearly every lap, makes for a very rapid race. 

The course was a dumbbell shape, with the bar being a road that you go out and back on. So when people were being fast and going in the breakaway, you could see them coming directly at you every half lap!

I was optimistic heading into Saturday’s 7:30pm race. I thought with all the primes there would be ample opportunity for me to slip off the front and in the process win two to seven $500 primes, lap the field alone, and make somewhere around $16,000. Thinking more realistically, I was hoping to be active and represented in breakaway attempts, win a prime, and help Demis in the finish in any way I could.

Things started out poorly when less than four minutes into the race the 15 guys infront of me crashed and I powerslid to stop- allmooossssttttt jumping off the bike at speed. I headed to the pit with the crowd, and they threw us back into the race…. off the front. What! Soon there was some chaos as the field, going way faster than us, swarmed the crowd of lap-one pit victims. This moment also marked my only showing at the front of  the field for the entire 50 mile crit! Soak it in readers, for the next 85 minutes I gradually lost every fight for every corner I was attempting to take. I became the easy guy to pass, I’m sure, because my brakes were my closest friends all night.

I’ve never been incredible at holding position in aggressive crits. This is made worse for me with a field full of crit dawgs instead of stage racers considering the crit stage a rest day. I never really felt in control all race until I had made my way all the way backwards through the field against my will. Soon I was tail gunning and fairly grumpy.

Fitness wise, things were easy. I was nose breathing for the majority of the race, but any time I tried to move up I would promptly begin to ride terribly in the corners. The good news is that races like this give me the practice I pretty clearly desperately need. This sort of experience doesn’t come with any sort of local race “jostling for position” or even road racing. USAcrits and NCC’s are a different battle.

Speaking of different battles, let’s talk about how much more fun I had at the Belmont Crit the next day!

Instead of a completely flat and fast course like Saturday’s, Sunday featured "features six turns and a monster hill climbing toward the finish line". It was marvelous.

I really like these style of crits: ones that are strung out single file for most of the race, reliant on fitness, and have most of the crazy passes happening on the climb. This course was very short, so we did 45 laps in the hour of racing. Short laps creates less rest for the climb, which means that people started getting dropped on roughly lap two.

Much to my dismay, I was the last person on the start line. I don’t really know how that happened, but I used my extra time to ride circles behind the group and pass about 30 people while they struggled to clip in off the line.

Given the nature of the course, I knew that it was going to be a day of attrition. I also knew that you had to be smart about when and where you used your energy. The problem with starting at the back is I was almost gapped off by people getting dropped in the opening laps. I did my best to be smooth, steady, and slowly pick my way to the front. It took me about 25 minutes, but I found the front of the race and was feeling great.

The next 25 minutes I followed attacks and made a few of my own, but nothing serious developed. With 12 laps to go United Healthcare was on the front making it fast, and I was feeling pretty comfortable in the diminished peleton. I was trying hard to be aggressive and hold my place, and I think I did a decent job. It was a much better fight than Saturday, anyway.

I mistakenly let myself get too comfortable, watched UHC go even faster, and fell victim to some gaps being opened in front of me. I did a decent uphill sprint, passed a guy, and finished somewhere around 14^th or 15^th. However, I was listed as DNF on the results like most of the rest of the field, which is inconvenient because I was in the money!

Way more fun.

Side note, if I were an Animorph I think I would be a puppy. I know that you were probably expecting me to say a fierce and awesome animal like a gorilla, mountain lion, phoenix, Vin Diesel or a giant polar bear. I guess those last two are pretty much the same, but yes I still choose puppy. They live a great life! Speaking of puppies, while I was staged directly last for the Belmont Crit, I was able to watch a very lively Aussie Shepherd pup instigate then play fight with a MASSIVE Great Dane of sorts.

Now you can see why I chose puppy: Loveable, approachable and brave. And SOFT. Wooooow.

Minus tough-guy points. Whatever.

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Foothills RR

After a late night and a hard crit, our 9 am start and 7:15 departure for the Foothills RR came too soon. However, it was easy for me to get out the door because I was very excited to get to do a road race. The weather forecast looked foul, so as I giddily put on booties, a rain jacket, and wool gloves, my Argentinean teammates shoved manila envelopes down the front of their jerseys. It was 57 degrees.

I knew almost nothing about the 41 mile race course that we would do twice, but I figured that the best way to race would be to attack until I was off the front and then just go from there. If it started raining, I was almost certain the early break would stay away. 30 minutes into the race I found myself solo off the front after attacking over the top of a little roller. Good news: I was off the front. Not as good news: I turned the corner to what I discovered was the hard part of the course. The steep, one-mile long climb was rough alone, but I figured that the best climbers would attack up it, bridging across to me, and then I’d be in the break. So I kept on the gas and as I crested the climb a group led by Chris Butler of Hincapie came across and just like that I was in the break. There were 7 of us, all equally motivated. No one skipped any turns for an hour, and I was sure that we would stay away. Then all of a sudden we were caught, and I was confused and grumpy.

I rested for a couple minutes then started scheming again. We had just completed one lap, so now I was an…expert… on the course. I knew the hard climb came 13 miles into the lap, so I decided to not do anything till that point so I would be fresh to follow the inevitable attacks. Sure enough Butler and Ryan Knapp, two guys who were in the first move with me as well, took off and I followed. It was just us three at the top, and we set about pedaling hard.

After a couple minutes, several more riders came across the gap and we were a group of nine. After what felt like too long at 25 seconds, our gap grew up to above a minute and I figured we were gone.

This group wasn’t as smooth as the first lap breakaway, but we worked well enough together. I was trying hard to not be the hero of the break and ride super hard, but I also wanted to make sure we stayed away. I was confident in my sprinting out of the small group, so I decided early on that it would be best for me if we all stayed together. Conveniently enough, the course got easier as you got closer to the line, so there weren’t any obvious launching points.

I was maybe a bit over excited as the attacks started going with a couple K to go- I was always one of the first to cover to make sure that nothing got away.  My biggest mistake came at about 2 k to go. Maybe it was 3 k to go, I wasn’t really sure where we were on the course compared to the finish line. I’m not sure if I would’ve played it differently if I knew how close we were, but at some point near the finish I covered an attack and had maybe 100 meters on the group. I should’ve attacked all in here and tried to go solo the remainder of the race. Every tactical switch in my brain was flipped to “ATTACK NOW” but my pre-determined plan of sprinting won out in that split-second of decisiveness. That is something that I really need to work on in bike racing: following my gut instinct instead of being so tied to a plan that I can’t adapt based on situations. Who knows if it would’ve worked, but a large part of success in bike racing is being able to respond to the situations that unfold on the course and capitalize on them.

It is also really easy to look back on decide where you could’ve been better. I didn’t attack, and waited to sprint. The problem with this tactic was as I followed the wrong, slowing wheel into the last corner, Thomas Brown from Astellas jumped hard and came out of the corner with several bike lengths of a gap.

I did a decent sprint, but had done myself no favors with how I set myself up. Brown was gone, and I was closing on 2^nd but ran out of room.

Bike racing is cool because every race you can learn something. It’s been awhile since I’ve made the successful break in a road race, so I’ll chalk this one up as a mildly successful learning experience. I was happy to finish on the podium, but I know this is a race I could’ve won. It’s fuel for the fire, and even though the Foothills RR wasn’t an NRC or a UCI race, I’m happy to spend thirty minutes in the pack, an hour off the front, thirty minutes in the pack, and then the final hour off the front of any race. That’s a decent way to make your legs hurt in an 80 mile race.

I’m in the van headed towards Charlotte, NC for a weekend of crit racing. I’m just going to disconnect my brakes for this one so I can always stay in the front. Unfortunately, I may have increased my coffee addiction with the ease of the Jura machine at our Anniston host house. I’ll check out the local cafés in Charlotte and let you know where to go.

We’re driving through Atlanta now, so I’ll leave you with these words from a famous poet:

Tell me who’s your housekeeper and whatchu keep in your house,

What about diamonds and gold, is that whatchu keep in your MOUF?

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Sunny King Crit

I’m not in a plane, but I am in the backseat of a van headed somewhere across the lower-right part of the US. We have four people + all of our stuff + my bike bag +exactly 1 million wheels in one minivan so space is somewhat tight. As stated in the name of the vehicle, it is a “miniature” van, so I have sixish sets of wheels on my lap. Here’s proof:

We are headed from Anniston, Alabama to Charlotte, North Carolina. Before I get into that, let’s rewind to which I am going to talk about as Thursday but I really don’t remember what day it was.

Thursday I got on an airplane in Seattle to make my way South for the bicycle tournaments in Alabama. My flight took me through Vegas, where instead of blowing all of my money gambling, I blew all my money gambling. On airport food-because my flight to Birmingham was delayed by somewhere from 2-5 hours. The airport wasn’t quite sure. The delay would mean I was set to land in Alabama at midnight, which is exactly when the shuttle to my airport hotel stopped running.

After spending almost thirty dollars on two meals and two coffees, I left Vegas. Based on this blog, it’s now apparent that what happens in Vegas does not stay in Vegas, it goes on craneimal.blogspot.com. I’m fairly angry at myself for making such a basic joke about Vegas but I’m in a van, not a plane. I’m not in my optimal thinking zone.

The best part of my 3.5 hour flight was the free TV that was accessible through the normally extremely expensive airplane WiFi. For some reason you could watch the TV without buying the WiFi, so I watched the Mariner’s game. Which was dddope.

Southern hospitality started almost immediately after I got my luggage in Birmingham. I found a taxi at almost the same time as another person, and since it was well past midnight “there shuuure aint gon’ be another taxi for awhile now”. Since I was now 14ish hours into my travel day, I knocked the other guy over the head with my bike bag and took the taxi on my own. Just kidding, can you imagine? We shared the taxi, and I got out first. I pulled out my wallet to pay my part of the fare, and my cab-sharer said he would pay my fare! I love saving $7.

Demis picked me up in the morning and we drove the hour to Anniston. Here I met my friends for the next couple days:

 

We had great hosts who made sure we had everything we needed all weekend. They’re the owners of the local Mellow Mushroom pizza establishment, which before this weekend I had a different impression of. I thought it was fast food, similar to Little Caesars. From this thought, I had always avoided Mellow Mushroom’s while traveling in the South. I was wrong! It is good pizza. Now you know.

Anyways, bike racing. Saturday was the Sunny King Criterium. It is a long rectangular course on a hill, so the finish stretch was uphill. It’s always shocking doing twilight crits after doing races in the sunshine, so I chopped my shadow A LOT. I felt good in the leg area of the bike race and tried to be active and present, but I was struggling with the game of chicken that happened every lap on the downhill, narrow-fenced corner. This game = who will brake last! If you won the game, you went into the corner with speed and didn’t have to reaccelerate hard leading into the climb. If you lost the game, you were all of a sudden 50 guys back going 10mph. If you really lost the game, you ran into the fence. I never really lost, but I did lose most times which made most of my race a mission of pedaling my way back into the important part of the bike race, rather than pedaling my way off the front of the important part of the bike race.

Naturally, one of the laps I used my brakes too much was just about when UHC decided to start pedaling fast. As the field strung out single file, I was the happiest I’d been all race but was too far back. Gaps were opening everywhere, and I did essentially a 4 lap solo time trial effort to try and get back to the front.  This meant my sprint at the end of those four laps was a massive 12 watts, and I finished 17^th on the day. Crit racing is splendid though, because for 17^th place I made $240.

Saturday night included many of the joys of twilight crit racing: Home at 1030, eat, shower, in bed at 1115, and not fall asleep till 1AM. This isn’t normally a problem with crit weekends, but instead of a crit Sunday there was a road race!

I just realized that this post is too many words and I haven’t talked about the road race yet, so I’ll do two posts. Cool. I’m talking to myself right now, so get out of my mind.

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San Dimas Stage Race

After a whirlwind two-day return to Seattle, I am back on the plane and heading South-east towards Alabama and two weeks of crit racing: Sunny King and Charlotte.

It’s easy in this profession to always be moving forward- always focusing upon the next race or the next trip. Often times experiences or moments get left in the past, simply a hazy memory in our relentless journey towards... something. I think that’s one of the reasons bike racing, as well as bike racers, as a whole exists. We have short-term memories: often choosing to forget the pain each race brings, the shuffle of travel on our daily lives, and the really bad moments. You always remember the good moments simply as a snapshot and the bad moments as something to build upon. What happens to the details? One of the reasons that I started this blog was to have an excuse to do something involving funny pictures. Another reason was I wanted to have a record of all the experiences that I get the pleasure of having while doing this racing thing.

San Dimas Stage Race was a late addition to my calendar, and one that I was very excited about having the chance to do again. After throwing up/away my Tucson Bicycle Classic, I was ready for an early-season stage race to get a chance to help the team in any way I could.

I’ve done SDSR before, with mediocre to average results. Although the road race is sketchy and the time trial is uphill, I’ve always enjoyed racing here. The punchy climbs in the road race suit me well and although fairly steep, the time trial is a time trial. And I like those.

Friday morning started off with me spending money, which seems to be quite standard for life on the road. We didn’t race till later that afternoon, and I needed coffee. Again, this is something quite standard for my life. However, the Motel 6 had no means for boiling water, so Carson and I purchased a $20 kettle at Target, effectively turning our room into AeroPress party central. After somewhere between 3 and 18 AeroPresses, we rode to the race. Then we went right past the race and headed for an hour-long spin. I schemed heavily here: things like pacing tactics, last minute weight loss methods, and which flavor drink mix would best bring out my crazy. I settled for lemonade flavor, and got about my warmup.

For those who haven’t done the TT up Glendora Mt Rd, it starts off with about a minute and a half of false-flat heading into the first corner, and with that the first pitches of the climb. The overall effort is 4.25 miles, or if you want to make your race seem longer, some amount larger than that in Km’s. The first 90 seconds are the only time above 20mph all race.

Time trial reports are boring. I rode hard, was happy with how I paced it, and finished feeling like this:

You can choose which one I was, because truthfully I felt a bit like both.

Results came in and I was very pleased to finish 6^th on the stage. This was my best result in a time trial at this level and I was content, for many reasons. I’ve put in a lot of work this winter on the time trial bike, so I knew I had the practice at sustained efforts for an extended amount of time. However, this wasn’t really a time trial as much as it was a hillclimb. I was on a road bike, not a time trial machine. Sure they are different styles of races, but in the end it is still a matter of focus, brain disease, and desire. Our team stacked the top 6, with Gregory in 2nd by a second and Daniel not far behind in 4^th.

Then, something amazing happened. We went to Olive Garden for dinner.

Besides that, there was an earthquake. My favorite part of this earthquake was when every questionable character outside smoking at the Motel 6 became an expert on natural occurrences like these- trying to make conversations about the epicenter and wavelength frequencies.

The earthquake caused some concerns for our road race course, as the loop circles a large dam.  Our start was delayed, and our race shortened as a result. Luckily, the dam didn’t break because I don’t like swimming that much.

Luis got up the road in the breakaway, taking the lead in the KOM and Sprint jersey competitions. Myself, Gregory and Daniel all tried our hand at following moves across to the break, but had no success. I finished comfortably in the front group (for the first time at SDSR), but the break had stayed away. It was an unfavorable move for us, and as a result we all lost several spots in the GC.

Going into the crit, we had Luis in 4^th, Gregory in 8^th, Daniel in 9^th, and myself in 12^th on the GC. We had two goals: 1) protect Luis’ lead in the sprint competition 2) be active with Greg, Daniel and myself, forcing a difficult race which would hopefully allow Luis to get away in the final moments gaining precious GC seconds.

Both Carson and I wore a long sleeve skinsuit, which means we meant business. Also hilarious, it was warm out and pretty much the only people wearing long sleeves in the race were Carson and myself- the two dudes from Seattle who in theory should have been way warmer than anyone.

Also, Tela came to watch me, and since she doesn’t get to see me race much anymore I knew it was important to not suck.

For the two intermediate sprints (60 min to go and 30 min to go), we had to make sure that either Luis won or one of us scored points to keep the closest threat from moving into first in the competition. I was in great position for the first sprint and won it- taking the 15 points and a 3 second time bonus. The second sprint came soon enough, and I found myself second wheel with Luis behind me. I started my sprint with 800 m to go, cornered hard, and dug to the line. Luis stayed on my wheel, letting me win the sprint while still securing points for himself.  With the sprint competition locked up, it was time to start thinking about the finish.

Luis towed me around, providing by far the smoothest last five laps of any crit that I’ve done at this level. I lost his wheel with one to go, made a big surge to get it back, and went into the final corner 5^th wheel. This is also where I finished, which makes it my best crit result at this level since 2011. 

The time bonuses from the intermediate sprints moved me back up to tenth overall (take that Kennett!) and into second in the green jersey competition. I was happy with how I rode, but also needed to keep the weekend in perspective.

This is my job. Our team’s job is to win races. We didn’t win any of the stages, so although my personal results were strong for where I’ve been in the past, there is still room to progress. Because of that, I am happier with winning the intermediate sprints than I am with the 5^th in the race. I did a job that helped the team achieve an objective, and as I continue to develop in my first season as a professional, I need to continue to do what I can to help my team and teammates achieve their goals.

San Dimas was a good momentum and confidence builder for myself and I plan on growing as a rider with every opportunity I have to race.

This post was long, sorry. There also weren’t any jokes, and most people probably didn’t read this far. That’s fine though, because this weekend is something that I want to have record of. I was able to look back at my first trip to San Dimas in 2011, and I plan on looking back on this post when I win San Dimas in the future.

Reflection over, NOW I can start thinking about the next races.

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This is interesting to me, part 2

I’ve been watching a lot of cinematic explosions lately. This confirms a fear of mine: that I am not a “cool guy”. Simply put, cool guys don’t look at explosions. They turn their backs and they walk away. And walk away in slow motion. With diamond covered boots. Or something like that. TM

Again, I was misleading with the text that I am creating on my backpack robot. I made it sound like I was watching explosions within the cinema, but that hasn’t necessarily been the case. I also was writing from memory some of the lines from the song “Cool Guys Don’t Look at Explosions” by Josh Groban.

I know what you’re thinking, and I want to ease your mind. I can be trusted because I HAVE been watching movies and television. They were symbolic explosions for two reasons. Ok, three reasons: 1) The movies I was watching were terrible 2) They were mind-blowingly good 3) There were actual explosions in them.

The benefit to flying on airplanes again is that it gives me time to do my best thinking. So far this post has been far from my best thinking and instead is about 200 words of mindless rambling. Actually, that kind of reminds me of how I survived some classes in College. I did this by continuing to demonstrate my point while evaluating the responses of the studies that portrayed no significance, relevance, importance, implications, meaning, weight, consequence, value, or magnitude to the thesis at hand. As you can see, this is still not my best thinking- but I already have 260 words written- who’s the real winner now? You are.

OK, back to movies and TV. Craneimal faithfuls may remember a certain post I did where my mind exploded when I saw Andy Dwyer from Parks and Recreation be one of the heroes in the film Zero Dark Thirty. The contrast was hilarious to me and I quickly thought of several more examples of actors or actresses that stepped out of a known role and into something completely different.

Let’s look at some more!

Andy Samberg- Known for SNL and The Lonely Island music group, Andy Samberg is a comedic and often times sophomoric actor. Never fear with Andy, for a fart joke is near. In fact, the song mentioned at the beginning is an Andy Samberg special! Then I was watching a heartbreaking movie with excellent acting and lots of drama, and Andy Samberg played one of the main characters. In Celeste and Jesse Forever, Andy plays Jesse, a victim of heartbreak. It’s actually super depressing and dark at times. There are few fart jokes. I was confused. He’s actually a very good actor, so you should watch it.

Steve Carell- Oh, The Office! That’s funny, right? Or the one where he’s suicidal and runs behind a VW bus a lot? (you know the movie, I can’t remember the title and I’m on a plane and the internet is $8.99 and they won’t accept Jelly Beans that Steve gave me as payment) Well that movie is still a comedy. Once a goofy actor, always a goofy actor, right? WRONG. If you want to see Steve Carell as a verbally abusive and cheating “father figure” you should watch The Way Way Back. This film was actually delightful and despite Steve being a bit of a meany, I highly recommend it.

Ron Swanson- OK, that’s not his actor’s name, but if I say Ron Swanson you know whom I am talking about. Nick Offerman has portrayed the mustachio’ed manly man who runs the office on Parks and Recreation and eats all the bacon and eggs.  Let’s flip away from TV and into a starring role as the father who isn’t really there for the main character in The Kings of Summer. Watch it. There aren’t any anti-government or breakfast food jokes, but Ron Swa, sorry, Nick Offerman plays a very convincing mean guy.

Every once in awhile I like to step out of my normal movie interests and immerse myself in a different type of cinema-culture. To translate, sometimes we watch movies that Marissa chooses as well. I am proud to admit it that I have seen Love Actually several times and find it quite enjoyable. You may think that I am going in the direction of Liam Neeson playing the wonderful father in that film and the violent hero in the Taken movies, but I’m not going to focus on that. There is another contrast that is MARVELOUS. Maybe it’s because I don’t normally watch Romance Dramas. When I see actors in those films I instantly think of their other portrayals. That’s my curse, I guess. The best character in Love Actually is Mark, a love-struck dude stuck in the friendzone with his best friends wife. Classic. He is so hopelessly in love with her and there is nothing he can do about it! It’s a true Beauty and the Beast story. Andrew Lincoln builds up his courage and confesses his love in the moment shown below, and everyone smiles.

Then, because she’s already married, he’s punished by getting sent into an almost apocalyptic world overtaken by zombies in The Walking Dead.

Sherriff Rick has a tough go at it and he is constantly reminded that he shouldn’t have gone for Keira Knightley- because much like Orlando Bloom in The Pirates of the Caribbean, she already had plans. Tease. This comparison allows us to analyze Johnny Depp, a pirate in that film. Johnny captains ships, which is a similar role to being a driver. Jason Statham was a getaway driver in the Transporter movies. Jason Statham and cars connect with the new Fast and the Furious movie (that I’m sure will be amazing) and that film stars Dwayne Johnson. Dwayne also acted in Snitch, where he worked in an office like Steve Carell. Working under Steve at Dundler Mifflin was John Krasinski: a man who battled Matt Damon for a City Government position in the movie Promised Land. City Government brings us back to Ron Swanson, who acts along side Amy Poehler, an important part of SNL. With that irrefutable sequence of connections, you can now assume that Andy Samberg will be the next hero in this season of the Walking Dead.

#spoiler

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Jamis Hagens Berman Team Camp

Despite cultural differences and language barriers, bike racers are all the same. The last several seasons, well actually my whole racing life, I've been on a team composed of people my own age and background. One of the things that excited me the most about Jamis Hagens Berman is the range of cultures and backgrounds that the team is made up of. For the first day and a half of camp, I was here with three teammates and a mechanic- from Argentina, Cuba, and Spain. There was some english spoken, but the group speaks spanish.

Before coming to camp, I was quietly confident in my spanish speaking skills. "I have a Minor in Spanish!", "I practiced a couple times on Dualingo" and "I meant to watch some Pixar movies in spanish" were all some thoughts that I had leading into camp. In fact, I even acquired Buscando a Nemo, Los Increibles, and my favorite, Ratatouille, to watch prior to the season.

It turns out that my Spanish education experience was far from enough to prepare me for real-world speaking experiences. However, I think that my base level of understanding was huge in making me a bit more comfortable in this new world. As the week went on, I was already understanding more, having full conversations in spanish, and feeling more confident with the language as a whole.

I always knew that I'd have to throw myself out of my comfort zone and into the deep end in order to fully grasp the language, and here I am. In the middle of the ocean, and I didn't drown. I look forward to being able to swim in the future. Voy a practicar mas!

My trip to Arizona was broken into three parts: The early part of the trip, which involved the Old Pueblo GP and some training ; shooting photos and videos with the entire team when they got back from Vuelta Mexico ; and the unfortunately timed illness that swooped through our hotel.

First, I got to start my season off with a twilight crit. I did the Old Pueblo GP in 2012 and it was a far from memorable experience, so I was excited to have another crack at it. Guido, Ruben, Tyler and myself lined up for the 75 minutes of darkness ready to officially break in our new bikes, equipment, and clothing. Hopefully without actually breaking any of it.

Photo from Cycling Illustrated, Rebecca Reza

Although the end result from the race wasn't what we were hoping for, I was happy to get some snappy efforts in the legs and have a pretty decent race. The first crit of the season is always a bit of a shock, and having it be a twilight race adds to the experience. I only chopped my shadow once, which is a victory in its own sense.

Sunday and Monday were some big training days. Monday took us to Mt. Lemmon, where the general consensus was that although we didn't reallllllyy NEED to climb for 25 miles, we did NEED a large cookie. The cookie cabin at the top of Mt. Lemmon is something I've heard legend of, so naturally since some of my favorite things involve bikes and cookies, I was more than interested in a long climb with a mission.

Great success!

Click this picture to see it bigger. This is about the halfway point.

It's about a 25 mile climb, but never very steep. That's nice because then when you descend for 45 minutes, you can actually pedal most of the way down.

Tuesday and Wednesday were photo and video days. We had a photographer as well as a videographer from Jamis following us in the van for our rides. Wednesday was the fun day, as it was the first time that I've ever gone training in a skinsuit and an aero helmet. We were riding the time trial bikes, so naturally I was excited, and I think the footage that we got will look very cool.

We were doing a TTT behind the van, and our "gentle photoshoot day" turned into a bit more real of an effort. You see, the draft is huge behind the van, which means that the speeds are high. In order for the guys behind not to be coasting or on the brakes, the speed has to be HIGHER. Our TTT turned into a fairly brisk 15 minutes- one where no one wanted to say that they were hurting, but everyone was. Hopefully. Maybe. This was my type of fun.

We took some more photos on Wednesday, including head shots and team photos.

And thennnnn I got sick. Not much more to talk about, other than I had a very rough Wednesday night. I woke up on Thursday and found out that three others had a similar night. I was scheduled to race the Tucson Bicycle Classic, but with San Dimas right around the corner it didn't make sense to push it on a weak system. I went home a couple days early, and slept until this morning.

Although not entirely the best ending, my first camp at the Professional level was a great experience. I'm glad to get to know my new teammates and staff, and am really excited to get to race with them soon. Seeing Gregory in the leader's jersey at Tucson Bicycle Classic was a bit of a stinger, because I would love to be riding the front for him this weekend. However, with San Dimas starting off with an uphill time trial, I think my chances of a long day of tempo aren't too far away.....

Hasta luego.

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