Nooksack Racing

Bellingham is a great town; they do however, have a hard time getting organized to do a race. I arrived EARLY saturday morning to do the State Omnium hosted by the little village of Fairhaven just south of Bellingham. I didn't do my homework to know the TT course...so I headed out, thinking wow, I'm usually hitting 20-25 of the flats and my speed is declining. Didn't I warm up? Is there a headwind? Wait, this is a deceptive hill. Crap! As I was 3/4 of the way up this hill, I remembered the profile and I should have spent my wad as the remaining 4 miles of the race was ALL downhill, fast and nearly out of gear. I left too much on the table...got 8th! Crap, I should have been top 3.

Disappointed in myself I was about to call it a race (even after paying $60 bucks)...but a team mate called me and encouraged me to race the crit. I did. Boy did I! Without team mates I wanted to command the race. I worked hard, not smart. I lead the laps for 60% of the race as the climbs were too slow the the descents on this technical 0.7 mile course were too sweet to brake and the gals in front tapped the rubber too much for my liking. So I led. With two laps to go....the official yelled "Preem" and I thought...heck, I'm not going to win the race, I'll win a Preem. Blowing my wad, I lost the Preem by a half a wheel and could barely hang on for the last two laps. Finishing 5th or so...Sile yelled at me after the race in her Irish accent...."do you really need $10 on that Preem? I'll give ya $10 dollars!" I was happy to have finished in the elite group of racers upright on my bike. yes!

Day two, stage 3. A twenty five mile road race in Nooksack with two walls in the middle of it. Yes, the first lap with a double Madrona Hill and the second (larger) lap with a Holmes Point or double Simons road (8%) for over a mile. Ouch. It scared many. It scared me. When we hit the first hill, I found that the gals in front of me had a pace that was too slow and uncomfortable so I weaved my way between them...started dancing on the pedals and found that I was a bike length a head. Could I keep it up? Yeah...but it started to hurt...but it also felt good, because I was ahead. Then I realized just 6 miles into the race...I needed someone with me....so at the top I paused for a select group of 8 that would narrow to 6 (from 20 racers) that would drive to the finish. I was going to lead out Sara, who was higher in the GC...but the finish was confusing and I missed that is was a drop in finish from 200 meters - 4th place.

So....I got on the road happy. Happy that I was strong, worked the hardest out there and felt good that I could easily win a race I rode with greater smarts. That's to come. This weekend I go for my final 3 upgrade points in Carnation and on Sunday its the TTT in Elma. YES!!!! News to follow!