Ridin Dirty, and Racing Eleanor

(Great race photes taken at the King's OVCX by Jeffery http://jjakucyk.exposuremanager.com)

The cross set up is all but done and good thing as I have now had 4 cross races in the books already. Its been a crazy long time since my last post, and I guess that shows how busy I have been at my real profession and barely making all this happen by the grace of God. I hope things will settle down at work in the coming weeks, but I'm still very thankful to be able to do 2 things I love very much in professional ways. So let me update on the builds then a little on racing thus far.

Its funny to look at the simplicity of a cross bike after it is built up and think back about all the planning and prepping that it took to put the bikes together. I'm pretty sure I started thinking about building these bikes a couple weekends before the racing stopped last season, and entertained myself doing so while recovering from that nasty ankle surgery in December. True, a cross bike is a thing of beauty and simpleness to look at, but it seems like I need some sort of chart system to put it all together every season. Anyway, as you can see I have went with Ridley this year and have been really loving the bike so far. My A bike is being run as a single ring front set-up and she's very elegant in my eyes. Weighing in at 15 lbs and 11 ozs, she a true lady. Her name is Eleanor Ridley.

(Introducing Eleanor)

My B bike is also very cool and is the work horse during the week and has a quarq powermeter. Dirty Harry has a big job this year as he's gonna see a lot of dirt and mud before it's all said and done! Before I go any farther I really have to give some love to one of my mechanics, Aaron Hawkins (www.winstonsbrand.com) who has spent huge amount of his personal time planning the set-up, building, perfecting, and gluing tubies to make this happen for me. I seriously could not have all this happening without his help! Thanks you so much Aaron, and to Barry McManus for a great fit and David Coar for being an all around help with product! You guys are awesome!

I also feel the most prepped I have ever been with Zipp wheels, tires, and bikes than I ever have and I'm slowly moving away from the getto set-up I once had before. Now I just need to put that equipment in motion!

(A little sampling of the Zipps this year. Thanks Zipp!)

So here's a 4 race break down: 1st at Kisscross. This was a totally fun night race I used as a practice race. Good thing I did as I spent 80% of the race unable to clip my right foot in as I was trying to use a new cleat (which is now no more). As a result, I busted my leg up repeatedly trying to clip in and even managed to get my ankle (the good one) caught in my front wheel. I don't recommend that. It was a frustrating night, but I managed to beat a few guys and felt my legs were strong.

The feeling quickly faded as I headed to the OVCX kick off in Cinci. The King's event is a ton of fun and they do a great job and I like to go here, despite it not really being my type of venue. I continued my clip in woes and found myself having to work thru the pack at the start only to discover I had a crazy loose rear hub that had me babying every corner. This left me having to kill it out of every turn power wise and somehow I managed a 2nd place finish in a greatly improving ovcx elite field. Sunday, was a better race for me technically, my shoe and bike wasn't an issue and it was sweet to ride things that were working. I ended up a disappointing 3rd, but in retrospect, I had one to many nights up at the hospital that week and spent up way too much energy on Saturday to keep up with some really fast ladies. Being up at all hours and having a 22 hour day didn't do much for recovery. Fatigue and a hard effort was not a good combination. Congrats to all of them and I'm really excited about the quality of the women we have racing the ovcx races this year. I can't really complain much about being 2nd and 3rd for feeling so horrible. It is just a bike race and I feel I kept a positive attitude during the race depsite being out of my norm.

I was able to get a little more rest the week after that, but still had a few days of late nights and early mornings with work and training. See a theme here? Sorry to carry on about it... but I can't stress how important it is to be able to sleep and rest in order to have things go right as a bike racer. When I can rest I never take it for granted and thank God every morning when I have been able to sleep pager free throughout the night. Anyway, so I'm blogging from Madison, WI currently. I am chillin in the RV after finishing the first USGP day of the season. I knew it was going to be a tough race by looking at the all-star list that was signed up. The women's fields in these races don't really have anyone you can write off and it's like having a box of chocolate with all the good flavors. The elite men may have more numbers, but I feel like the quality of the women's field is very high. With that self-justification, I finished 20th out of 23 today. I was kinda bummed, but then I kinda remembered and was reminded by my DRT coach that I'm only 2 months after having my emergency appy, and we are still building the base fitness up. You can't really put the star on top of the Christmas tree until you put all the fancy decoration at the bottom. My star is still in the box, but I figure I'll get it out later in the year. The good news is that, despite not having any high end training yet, I felt like I had a much better race today and may be getting my groove back some, bit by bit. I truly did have fun and it was cool to have so many people out there cheering for me, and the Wisconsin people know how to make a cross race a good time. Of course, I'm looking to improve tomorrow, but I'm really happy to be able to line up with ladies who cycle for their jobs, are Olympic athletes, future stars, and who are world champion contenders. I'm just a little nurse anesthetist during the week, playing with the big dogs on the weekends and that's pretty cool.

So that's a quick update thus far, tomorrow will be day 2 of the USGP and then its back to the ovcx series before hitting the UCI3 races in Cinci. Hopefully I post a little more regularly, since that means I will have a little more time in my days to come.... we'll see. Right now, I'm humbled.

James 4:10
Humble yourselves before the Lord, and he will lift you up.