Slow Motion with D

My first cross race of ’08 and last race of the ’07/’08 season felt more like a crit than anything else. Now, I usually love crits, but this just wasn’t my day. It’s no surprise though considering the lead in. Basically, I didn’t respect the race, or anything that went into it. What I mean is this: The first couple weeks after cross nats I only did one short trainer ride and 2 nordic skis in between lots of traveling. The weeks after xmas and leading into the race, I did a few Nordic skis and 2 trainer rides. I think my heart was staying fit, but my legs were starting to forget how to ride, especially how to ride hard. I also didn’t think anyone would care about a cross race in January in southern California. I guess you could say that I didn’t respect the competitors….they sure showed me. Three, I didn’t respect my bike! Poor thing was power washed after Kansas and I didn’t touch it until a few days before the race. I changed the rear shifter cable, but it wasn’t really working right. After the race I realized that my rear derailleur was broke and as a result my chain did this the whole time:

The course was pretty lame. It felt like half the thing was pavement with a sketchy downhill 180 and a super sketchy downhill right turn onto gravel with a sidewalk ramp. The last thing I wanted to do was eat it and hurt myself, so I was definitely feeling timid. The rest of the course was a long gravel section followed by some really tight turns around trees with some more lame stuff in between.

From the gun, I pretty much got whooped. Not much else to report. I just didn’t have it and to do a top 5 (which I thought was possible), I would have had to have a great race with more consistent training beforehand. Molly finished up 4th (her best UCI result ever) and Sager got 6th after killing everyone for half the race, then paying for it just a bit. After the race it was food time. We ate at a vegi restaurant that serves the food in a huge boat. We had a fleet of vegi boats. It was sweet. This first full day in Cali proved to be the only nice full day of sun.

I learned a few valuable lessons from not respecting the race that I will take with me into next season. Big goals and big plans ahead…stay tuned!!!!

My national numbers were still on the jersey!!!!