Parkview Cycling Festival was put on by Men of Steel Racing last weekend! I was also my last race before the dreaded foot surgery and after the race was over I knew for sure that it needed done, it has been a tough, painful experience. If you haven't done this race, keep an eye out for it next year. The venue that the FW Tincaps play at is available to us racers and the crit course is really fun with a S-curve and nice roads. What more could you ask for ? I mean NO port-o-potties, just a baseball field restroom... which make it extra sweet!
(Couldn't believe I recovered from my toasted legs from the day before, but I was so happy I did!)
For me, I was completely in an unknown fog of how the legs would respond with my increased training load leading up the race. I was especially worried since my ride the day before had me sitting on the side of the road begging for mercy, and had to have my friend Anne draft me back home at a 60 watt average. Yikes!
Somehow, I turned it around on race day. My legs didn't have snap, but I could motor along fairly normally. So the race got underway and we had a good sized field for the women's race!
The newly married Bri Kovac Clark and I put on a little attack a couple laps into the race and never looked back. We wanted to get a lap gap on the field and we agreed to fight it out after that. We ended up overtaking the field a couple times and with that Bri wanted to try to gap me a little with no luck. I was able to match her each time with ease and we remained in the front to the end.
(Bri and I found ourselves with an easy lead on the group and enjoyed our time out front)
It was a fun race and I was excited to come around the last corner in prep for a sprint finish... who doesn't love a sprint finish? However, I knew that unless Bri cracked in the last few meters that I probably wouldn't be able to gain the advantage with my legs pretty much being fried from all my training prep for surgery. This was a decision Coach Mark I made to train thru and have a better set-up for Cx. Sometimes that's just what has to happen in order to reach you bigger goals later. Anyway, I gave the sprint a little go, and the legs just didn't have it, so I pretty much resolved myself for 2nd and Bri got the V. I was happy with second since I was right there and especially since I knew my circumstances (High's). It gave me good hope that I will be able to come back from surgery and get back to form in no time with the help of Coach Mark. Congrats to Bri and also to 3rd place Sharla Berger for almost bridging back up to us!
(Sitting in while rounding the baseball field- the weather was so nice!)
Next, I jumped into the cat 3 men's race to get some extra efforts in. That ended up being a bad idea since some dude beside me got a little squirrelly and landed his pedal into the spokes of my Zipp wheel exploding the spokes right out the rim. Busted (Low's)! Thanks dude for getting in a hurry in a 60 minute crit right at the start. So.... my lesson learned: never ride expensive wheels in men's cat3 race. Regardless, I gave the race a go after a pit wheel from master mechanic Tim Wagnor from Summit City Bicycles (summitcitybikes.com) got me all hooked up. Thanks Tim! I lasted about half the race before calling it a day.
It was great to see all the Men and Women of Steel out at the hometown race. I can't thank Mylein and Jim Kruse enough along with John Martin and the rest of the team that volunteered to make this race safe, fun, and well run! Like I said, mark the calenders for next year and check out the In State RR that we will also run.
"Obviously, I’m not trying to win the approval of people, but of God.
If pleasing people were my goal, I would not be Christ’s servant."
Galatians 1:10 (NLT)
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