Chasing Dreams, Wild and Wonderful West Virginia Weekend!

For all this talk of winning, it is nice to have run that elusive W down last weekend. 

First time on the top step after a paved event for me.

Victory at last

Whats better than winning? Crushing it, killing it, all time conditions! All with good friends, teammates or not its fun to ride and go hard with some good people. Not to mention I had 3 new VT B team guys to race with! Quinn Giroux, Wyatt Lowdermilk, and Kyle Johnson all stepped it up and upgraded for this weekend.

Also better than winning, victory lap wheelie brigade after breaking away all day!

Double Wheelie Bros!

 Results from Saturdays Crits:
(yeah this weekend was backwards, but just like my cross mounts, opposite just works better somehow)

Mens B 2nd place to that monster from State after quickly breaking and almost lapping the field, decided not to mess with a field sprint since we had less time between us and the field than they had on us with 6 laps left.

Cat 3/4, those West Virginian's take their State Crit Championships seriously, 13th place. Attacked on the line for giggles, WVU A rider Chas McFarland bridged up and we went for it. The two of us held off the field around 20-30 seconds gap for over 30 minutes, getting caught with 10 laps to go. Sat up for the sprint after rubbing bars in corner 3 on the last lap. Contact while apexing a corner around 50 km/h takes the motivation to stay at the front right out of me.

Congrats on that victory Richard, of everyone in the ACCC B field you deserved that the most. Go big or go home right?

Red and Orange just killing it

Downhill, down wind and all power, Richard definitely got the better end of the sprint 

I missed crushing it with THE SQUAD but thanks for not showing up Cater and Gene, it was nice not to having to nearly die just to hang on your wheels.    

THE SQUAD, during the VT crit, Cater Harris, myself and Gene Taylor
Coined by Cater due to the three of us always being on the front 

Good riding with you Chas, too bad we couldn't make lightening strike twice. 

It was a damn good run at it though!

Going for it in the 3/4s

Road Racing or Something Like It

Feeling awesome after such a solid performance in the crits I was feeling pretty confident during the road race. The course was a lollipop with, 5km out the stick 5 laps with a solid climb and super fast descent each time around, a little bit of "flat" in between. After going in circles it was back on out.

The first lap and a half went very smoothly and easily with the entire mixed Men's B and Women's A field agreeing to take it easy and stay neutral. 

The B-Team

Smartly sitting towards the front of the field I saw it all unfold. Half way up the second lap's climb, about 25km in, a Navy rider went off the front, shortly followed by a teammate. Quickly recognizing that two strong guys off the front would be hell on this course I followed getting the second rider to pull me up to his teammate. A quick glance behind reviled that my teammate Quinn Giroux was on my wheel and a sizable gap had opened on the field. Cresting the top we hit it, going to the front for the descent I sent it, the rest of the break in tow. Throughout the rest of the race I was the guy for the downhills, guess it comes with the territory in racing XC and Cyclocross the rest of the year. The four of us called a truce until the base of the climb on the last lap. Working together well we established a lead of well over 2 minutes on the next chase group, ended up being the rest of the VT B team. Before the 4th time up the climb one of the Navy guys, Kevin Lee, dropped off, mixed feelings ensued, he had put out a lot of work and deserved to stay with us but now it was two on one in Quinn's and my favor.

Sunday's Course

Quinn, being the best teammate he could be, put out the entire time giving solid and long pulls even has he was tiring. Feeling very strong ans still pretty fresh I knew that a big gap was safer than a sprint finish. Seeing hints of struggling during the remaining Navy rider's (Ben Walter) pulls I thought I could make something happen the last time up the climb.

Quinn ended up as one tired teammate 

The climb, consisting of some steeper stuff and two nasty switch-backs we went 3 wide all looking at each other trying to see who would jump first. At the steepest part of the first switch-back I exploded out of the saddle instantly opening up a gap, checking back to see the damage done I knew I should just go for it solo. Cranking it up, full gas for the last few miles I opened a large gap, somewhere upwards of a minute by the line. Took the descent as faster than any sane person would, getting the KOM on the strava "Gnar Descent" segment. As a side note strava KOMs are only cool when one: they have a rad name and two: you didn't know they existed prior to riding them. Checking my six a few times going back out the stick towards the finish, no one was in sight.

Now the big questions started to pop into my head, what do I do with my hands? Wasn't sure so I made something up.

What do I do with my hands again?

You ask how do I win a road race now? Sandbagging is the easiest way to go. An upgrade will be sent before next season starts up, but going for the conference points win in Bs with just one more race weekend left.

The rest of the team did excellent this weekend, Quinn rolled into 3rd with Kyle and Wyatt taking 4th and 5th. Sean Gardner won the As with Taylor Pearman taking 3rd after winning Saturday's crit by lapping the field. TJ took 4th in his crit right after upgrading to Cs. Great work guys!