Well this crazy semester is finally almost over. Hopefully I will never have to balance 21 credit hours, 2 jobs, and racing 3 national championship events in one semester ever again. It has had quite a toll on me, both mentally and physically, and so it is time for a quick little break over Thanksgiving before this semester is wrapped up.

A few weeks ago I raced the Storm the Greens race in Louisville, KY. I hit my brakes a bit too hard going into the first turn and was dead last… great start like usual. I spent the whole race jumping up from group to group until I was only chasing the last 3 lead riders. I got within 30 seconds of the leaders and 15 seconds of 3rd place. 2 of my teammates took the top 2 spots and I ended up taking 4th. It would have been cool to sweep the podium, but unfortunately the curse of constant 4th places continues..

The following 3 weeks consisted of maybe 4 or 5 training rides, none longer than an hour. I was crammed with school and work, which was really starting to take a toll on my riding time. Daylights savings making it get dark at 3pm certainly did not help either.

I decided to leave school a little bit early so I could make it back to Michigan for a longer Thanksgiving break which, and it’s been a great trip so far.

Of course, my first stop was visiting my friends in Ann Arbor to watch the Harry Potter midnight release! After that, I went back home to Rochester Saturday afternoon to check out the Bloomer cyclocross course and make sure I still knew how to ride my cross bike. I had only done one cross ride since the Storm the Greens race so I was a bit nervous about racing. Luckily for me, the course was fully marked and I was able to get some good practice in.

My family’s house backs up to Bloomer park, which is really convenient for when races are hosted there. It was great to see familiar faces from the Michigan and Tailwind racing community. It’s been so long since I’ve done a Tailwind race and it was such a great feeling to see the old usual crowd. The temperature was a bit colder than what I’m used to in KY, but It was perfectly comfortable for racing. I’m always a bad starter and this was no exception.

“Cruise missile is launched!”

Anyhoooo, I managed to work my way up to a group for 4th place and I tried to conserve my energy there for most of the race while watching them attack each other. I would get gapped a few times, but I just kept my own steady pace since I knew I would blow up if I did all of the accelerations with my current fitness. After the halfway point passed by I decided to do an attack of my own and went in pursuit of the 3 people up the road. I was able to close more than half of the gap to the leaders in a short amount of time. To which, the race announcer was screaming “THE CRUISE MISSILE HAS BEEN LAUNCHED!” Unfortunately, I wasn’t able to maintain that pace with my current fitness and while I managed to get frustratingly close to Burke for 2nd place, I then proceeded to blow up and go into survival mode. I fortunately managed to recover a little bit after easing off my pace and was able to hold off the chase group to take 3rd. Thank you muscle memory!

A little history with this race/venue..

Bloomer Park was actually my first mtn bike race (beginner men 15-18 in 2006) and my first cyclocross race (Cat-4 in 2007). I actually haven’t done a cyclocross race in MI since 2007, so this was a very special day for me. This was also my first cyclocross race in MI on an actual cyclocross bike.. It truly felt great to be around the old crowd and I’m glad that I was still able to be somewhat competitive considering my lack of training recently. Mark P is a great guy and has been super strong this year. Tom is always an insanely strong rider and for me to be able to finish up there with those 2 means so much. I always dreamed of making it to the podium one day in elites in MI when I started racing and I’m glad to have finally accomplished this goal. It’s just not the same when you race out of state, it is such a special feeling to come back to where it all began and see how far I’ve come.

2010 Bloomer CX Men’s Elite Podium