Friday, June 17, 2011

First race done


Last weekend was my first race as a pro cyclist and there was a lot of nerves about heading into the races. It was about a 10 hour drive to Tulsa Oklahoma for 3 day of NRC crit racing. We arrived in Tulsa Wednesday evening and didn’t race until Friday night so we had a little bit to meet and ride with our new teammates and get use to the bikes and gear a little bit. The first race was Friday night at 9pm and with the race being delayed 15 min due to lighting and rain the tensions were high to just get underway. The race was very sketchy with crashes just about every lap in the first half of the race due to slick roads. I stayed near the front all night long and with about 5 to go we lined it up for our sprinter Ben, and we all got caught up with a crash 1.5 laps to go. That’s bike racing and we all were undamaged for the most part and the bikes were still in one piece. Sunday night was the same with a 9pm start and a fast course didn’t have the same legs as I did the night before but hung in there. Sundays race I will remember for a while with it being a 4pm start in the middle of the day with the heat beating down. It had a good climb in the course called “cry baby hill” and the crowds on it were unbelievable. It was something you would see on tv at the tour on the final climb.
Now I am in Denver for a couple of days then off to Grand Junction next week for a little bit then off to Boise Idaho for the summer!

Thursday, June 2, 2011

BIG News!!


Well I have been out of school for a couple of weeks and it’s been so nice just to relax a little more than normal. However I have been stressing out a little bit about Grad School for next semester. I just took the GRE test (Graduate Record Examination) it’s a 4 hour computer based test covering all materials and you are not able to use any other resources besides your brain not even a calculator. I will find out in about two weeks my final score and if I get fully accepted into the program. Keeping my fingers crossed.
Other than that I did my first race back since Collegiate nationals a couple of weekends ago and I did pretty well considering I only touched my bike three times prior to the race and I was still on antibiotics. The race was a USA cycling sanctioned race so pros were allowed to show up since they are unable to race anything but USA cycling races now? It was a crit downtown Aspen Colorado which is a VERY NICE and the people are rich and walk around like it. Other than that it was a 10 corner course under 2 min laps. I ended up 3rd which I was happy with and walked away with all my skin and some extra cash. Since then some BIG news has come up.
                Both Conor and I were unable to secure a team this year which would be able to fully fund us at the races we wanted to go to. Up until now we have been flying the colors of LiveTrainRace.com and it has been a blast. They are a local team based out of Grand Junction Colorado and they have helped us out as much as they could and we both really appreciate that. However we got an unexpected call from the manager of Team Exergy Pro Cycling Team a few weeks ago asking us if we would like to ride for them. It came out of the blue for me and I said YES right away. Exergy is a first year Pro cycling team based out of Boise Idaho and they already have some horsepower on the team. Both Conor and I rode for the team last year when they were an Elite team and learned a lot. We both are really excited to make the jump to a Pro team. We have our schedule for the most part for the rest of the season and it is looking fun and hard. Our first race will be next weekend in Oklahoma for Tulsa Tough. Its three NRC crits with two of them being Twilight crits. I am so excited to get this opportunity to ride for a Pro cycling team and it has been my dream for a long time and I have worked super hard for someone to give me the chance to show off all my hard work and the time is now. Follow along for my first season as a Pro Cyclist!