Catching Up

Sorry for not keeping up with my blog. With school and everything else going on it's been hard to find time for this. Right now I'm half way into a two week break before I start to train for next season. Speaking about next season....A couple weeks after I got back from Nationals I was asked to join the Hot Tubes Junior Development team. Hot Tubes is an extremely successful six man junior team that is directed by Toby Stanton. They take multiple trips all over the world during the spring season giving the riders on the team a real taste of life as a cyclist. For these reasons I have decided to accept the offer starting with first cyclocross race.
Now for an update over the past couple of months....When I got back from Nationals I took a nice break from the bike, so I could start training again for the P12 State Championships at Chappel Hill (aka Dave Chappelle). Unfortunately, Hurricane Ike caused the race to be postponed. When the race was rescheduled I decided that the best choice was to skip the race and just get ready to start training for the off-season. But, about a week before the race I was talking with best friend, Alan Ting, and I thought "What the heck?" I might as well do it. With my parents not being able to drive me to Dave Chappelle, the plan was to meet Alan at a parking lot so he could drive me out there. Nonetheless the race didn't go so hot. This was the longest race I had ever done. I was feeling pretty good for the first 60 out of 86 miles, but it started to go downhill from there (actually with Chappelle it would be going straight uphill...). I tried to go on an attack with Super Squadra's Phil Wikoff to bridge up to the group of about ten that was up the road. I made it about half way there then my legs completely exploded. I saw Phil pull away from me as I turned around to see the pack starting to pass me. I managed to hold onto the back for about another mile until I completely blown right before the feed zone on the last lap. At first I decided to get a ride back to town with Alan Ting Sr., but I saw another Super Squadra member, Ian Dille, ride by and decided to tough it out and finish the race with Ian. I ended coming in 40th with Super Squadra's Steven Wheeler winning in an early breakaway that contained Master's National Champion, John Korioth. After the State Championships I just tried get some time on the bike which included some cyclocross riding. I attended the last two weekends of the Alkek Velodrome winning the P12 omnium on October 10th. The next day was endurance night. It included a 30 lap scratch, a 60 lap points race, and a 75 lap scratch. Due to this being a TX Cup race, some Dallas guys had come down to race. I ended up placing second in everything behind Andrew Armstrong. This past weekend was full of racing. There was the usual Friday Night Racing, a TX Cup race, and the Jr. Regionals. On Friday, I ended up third in the omnium behind Daniel Walker and Alan Ting. On Saturday, the schedule was a keiren, a Miss & Out, and a 50 lap scratch. Being in a keiren heat with Andrew Armstrong, Ron Huijsman, and Andy Weathers, I wasn't that disappointed that I didn't make the final. In the Miss & Out I attacked hard with Alan and Michael Carey on the first lap. We ended up staying away the whole time with Alan taking the win and me getting second. For the last race of the night the plan was to attack a lot. With about 10 laps to go I attacked all out with Alan on my wheel. We built up a solid lead of about 1/3 of a lap. With about 3 laps to go Andrew Armstrong launched an attack from the field. I immediately started going all out. Due to a problem with with his back wheel, Alan lost my wheel only to be caught by Armstrong with about a lap to go. I somehow was able to hold of Armstrong to take the win. The next day, I ended up finishing second in the omnium behind super-stud Daniel Walker.

Track Nationals

Finally, I have decided to write up an update the the track part of Jr. Nationals. I would say that it was a pretty successful trip. I am coming back with two gold and two silver medals. The races started out with a 200 Meter TT to qualify for the sprints. Surprisingly, I qualified in fourth. The first round had me racing against Houston Comrade Jameson Tomlin. The two of us just kinda rolled around the track until one to go until Jameson jumped. I quickly got into his slipstream and was able to come around him for the win. In the second round I was up against the promoters son, Jesse Marans. In the first round he jumped in the sprinters lane with one and a half laps to go and when I tried to come around him in the last lap he accelerated very quickly and I wasn't able to come around him. With this being the 1/8ths final I had another chance to redeem myself. At the very start of the next race I jumped hard at the very beginning to try and "kilo" him. He ended up catching up to me on the last lap and flew right by me to advance to the next round. I then went into the 5-8 round to try and earn a point for the omnium by getting fifth. Leigh told me to get to the front of everyone and stay there. I did what he said and stayed on the front the whole time....except until about 100 meters to go when everyone passed me. I wasn't too disappointed about this because I wasn't all that excited about doing sprints and didn't have that great of expectation for them. The next race was the 500 meter TT. This was the first time that I had done a 500 since the last time I had gone to track nationals, which was two years ago. I surprised myself once again and ended up fifth. This gave me one point for the omnium. Unfortunately, Benny Swedeberg had won both the sprints and the 500 which made it impossible for anyone to catch him overall. With the scratch race up next I had only one plan. Attack...a lot. During the race I attacked many times, but nothing would stick. When I would attack someone would come with me, but they wouldn't pull and I was forced to sit up because I wasn't going to drag someone to the line just so they could out sprint me at the line. With about four laps to go someone attacked and no one reacted. Thinking that I didn't want to waste my energy and chase him down I decided to sit in the pack. Then, the person in front of me got into the sprinters lane and put in a heroic effort to bring the person back in. It was the perfect lead out. With about half a lap to go I started my sprint and was able to hold everyone off for the finish. With the seven points from the win that put me up into third place, one point behind second. The next race was my speciality, the Points Race. The qualifying was kinda scary because I ended up crashing in the heat, but still qualified due to an early point that I got in the first sprint. During the final my plan was the same. I attacked right at the start and got away with one other. After the first sprint I found myself alone. I then put it into time trial mode and stayed away for another 15 laps or so until a group of two bridged up to me. We all worked evenly with me winning the next two sprints. This had given me a total of 20 points with second place with 5. The pack then caught us a few laps later and I counter-attacked my one move. I was quickly chased and ended up fourth in the next sprint. I then kinda just chilled for the rest of the race and sat up with one to go. The final points standing was me with 21 points and second with 8 points. With this win it put me up into second overall. After collecting my medals I then started my warm-up for the Team Pursuit with Alan Ting, Jacob Rathe, and Austin Stewart. We ended up placing second for that which gave me my second silver of the day and my sixth medal of the whole trip.

Memorial Park Crit

After returning from a fairly successful Jr. Nationals, I decided to go out and give the Memorial Park Crit a shot. I had no pressure at all to do well. My main goal for the race was to go out and get in a hard workout to try and keep my fitness level from dropping too dramatically. The race started out pretty easy with the usual break going off from the beginning. Kremke then got to the front and rode tempo for about 20 minutes until the break was finally brought back from a flurry of attacks. With a few counter-attacks going that never got more than five seconds ahead of the pack, we ended up rolling around from 23-26 mph for about the next 15 minutes. Trying to get the pace back high, I tried an attack with about 30 minutes left. I quickly built up a good gap, but trying not to completely blow up and get dropped, I rode tempo until I was brought back by a two man break. I quickly jumped into this group and we worked together pretty well until we were caught by the field with about 20 minutes left in the race. After some more failed attempts at attacking I was forced to sit in when we came around with five laps to go. An attack went with about three and a half laps to go with no one really chasing. Over the next lap many people tried to bridge up to the break, but they ended up just reeling it back in. When the break was caught the whole field just sat up, and I found myself shooting past everyone of the left side. Just like before, I quickly built up a large lead. I then buried myself for the last two laps. Coming around with one lap to go the gap had grown to about 15 seconds. I made the mistake of looking back too many times, and found the gap quickly shrinking with about half a lap to go. I then went around the 90 degree turn and looked back about halfway through the long sweeping turn to see a yellow blur/Ronnie Strange fly by me. I then sat up to see Kremke take yet another win, and rolled in at the very back of the pack. This was the second time that this exact thing has happened to me in the past two weeks. The first time being the Nationals Crit. Oh well, it’ll work one of these days.

National Championships Update

The road side of Nationals is finally done. So far, I am bringing back one jersey and one other medal. Nationals started with the 18 km TT, then the 25 km crit, and finished with a 56 km road race. This year my whole family came to California in an overloaded car with three bikes on top. The drive up here ONLY took about 22 hours over two days. We got here late Sunday night to check into La Quinta Santa Ana. Over the next few days I went out and studied the TT course and Road Race course (which I later learned that I was riding the course backwards). The TT course was uphill for the first 12-13 minutes than downhill for four miles until the turn around, then slightly uphill for another 2.5 miles to the finish. The best way to ride this course was to go all out till you get to the top of the hill and then recover on the way down. I did exactly this and found myself coming into the finish line a minute and a half faster than the second fasteset time. I then sat in the "hot seat" for about another 15 minutes until the rest of the 15-16 riders had finished. The closest rider to me was fellow Belgian teammate Anders Newbury forty seconds back. It took a while to sink in that after fours years of tyring I had finally been able to step onto the top step of the podium again as National Champion. I later found out that I had the fastest time out of the 17-18s as well. The following day was the 25 km crit with 15 laps of around 1.5 km and around seven turns. The race started out fast with many riders trying to get an early break going. Nobody was given more than about 10 seconds before being brought back by the 5280 team. With a little less than three laps to go I attacked after a break had just been caught. The next time I looked back I saw that nobody had reacted at all. At first I was a little hesitant because if I was caught there was no way that I would have enough "juice" to contest in the sprint. When I came through the start/finish line with two laps to go with about a 10 second gap I knew that it was now or never. I then went all out for the next two laps only to be caught 200 meters from the finish line. I then just sat up and rolled into the finish, which apparently took me over twelve minutes and 62 people passed me. My average watts for the six minutes that I was off the front were 415 with my average heartrate being 206. Today was the 56 km road race. The course was 8 km in length with a couple of small hills in it. Right at the start three people got away and quickly built up a gap that hovered around 15 seconds. On the second lap I was leading going into a U-turn when I slid out. Thankfully everyone else had avoided me and we were going so slow around the turn that I was able to jump back up and get back into the race with only about 20 guy's passing me. The only damage done to me was a thin layer of skin off of my shin. Over the next few laps two other riders had bridged up to the break and two of the original riders in the break had been shelled off. The two riders that had bridged up to the break had were both "Belgian Teammates", Anders Newbury and Alex Battles-Wood. With two strong riders in the break the gap had quickly opened up to around 28 seconds. With two laps to go the gap hadn't come down all that much. I then attacked out of the U-turn, bringing two others with me. We quickly built up a gap. One of the guys with us dropped off a little less than one lap to go. With about half a lap to go we finally found ourselves latching onto the back of the break. With no one really wanting to sacrafice their chance of winning I got to the front and started pulling with some help from Anders. With about 750 meters to go the pack was quickly pulling us back with the gap falling down to about 10 seconds. From then on the road was a gradual uphill till the finish. When the sprint started with about 200 meters to go I couldn't match the others and barely managed to roll in for fifth for my second medal of the week. I've included a screenshot of the TT.

HOME!!

I'm back!! After an exhausting ten hour plane trip, I am finally at my own house sitting in front of my own computer writing my blog without five other kids looking over my own shoulder. Only sleeping a few hours at the airport after staying up all night after the 64 kilometer cobbled race, I was tired enough to fall asleep standing up. The race course was only like 3.3 kilometers with literally only 200 meters of paved road on the whole course. The race was a bigger race than the day before, there were a few more racers and the prize list was a lot bigger. The race had ten euros to the first rider across the line and five to the second...every lap....all twenty laps. This was a great oppurtunity to earn a few bucks, I mean euros, before the trip home. The race started out extremely fast due to both Alex and Anders getting on the front and pushing the pace for the whole first lap. By the time that we had finished the first lap the people in contention for the win had gone down from around fifty to about ten people with three Americans, Alex, Anders, and me, in the group. After the second lap, where the pace wasn't nearly as high as the first, and a few guys had caught up with the lead group, I decided to try an attack. When I looked back I saw that only one other person had reacted. He was a pretty small dude with some awesome looking gold handlebar tape, who will be referred to as "Goldie". The two of us worked pretty evenly for another lap or so until I looked back to see Alex bridging up to us. When he had caught us we immediatly started to try and work Goldie over. Whenever Alex was on the front and I was on his wheel I would start to sit up and let Alex get a pretty big gap until Goldie would jump around me to bridge back up to Alex and then make him chase all the way back to Alex. After about eight or nine laps of this (about 9 or 10 laps to go), where Alex and I tried to get 1-2 in all the primes, Alex and I went on a flurry of attacks. Alex attack first, and when Goldie bridged up to Alex I attacked. When Goldie had caught back up to me on the worst cobbles of the whole course Alex went on another attack that immediatly did it for me. I couldn't accelerate on the cobbles and lost contact with Alex and Goldie. The good thing was that the gap was so large to the next rider that it took another five laps just to be caught by the single rider chasing. When I was passed I tried hard to try and jump on his wheel, but we were on the bad cobbles again and I didn't have anything at all left in the tank. I then sat back down and tried to get back into my own rhythym as I watched my podium spot ride away from me. After another lap I saw another rider closing the gap to me, but I knew right away that the cobbles had taken it all out of me and that it was no hope for me to jump on his wheel. Riding the rest of the race by myself, just waiting to be swallowed up and spit out the back of the field, I was pulled by the officials. Confused that they had thought I was off the back I quickly found out that they had pulled everyone except Alex and Goldie and I had ended up in fifth. I then sat and watched the finish as Alex took his second in two days by attacking Goldie with about 500 meters to the finish. It looks like this trip ended with success for the 15-16 National Team.

Zwevegem Race Report

Lady Luck finally granted the 15-16 US National Team its wishes today as we were able to sweep the podium on the 62 kilometer circuit race. The race consisted of 17 laps of around three kilometers. The race had a late start so we were able to get a few extra hours of sleep. After waking up at around 11:30 Anders and I walked over to the local bakery and bought some breakfast and "race recovery" food. When we got back and ate our breakfast we then chilled for a few hours before we started getting ready for the race. We left at around 1:45 (oops. I mean 13:45) for the 20 minute drive to the small town of Zwevegem. Arriving at around 14:10 we walked over to the local bar to get registered. When we had all gotten our numbers and had gotten them pinned on we set out on a warm-up/preview lap. When we had ridden the course twice and taken a quick pit stop on the side of the road we rolled up to the start line to get a good starting position. Due to the fact that this wasn't a very big race there were only about 40 or 50 starters, but according to Yogi one of them had already won seven races in the year. After a quick start we slowed down to an easy (and I mean EASY) pace. With a few more attacks, that all got reeled in, in the first lap we crossed the line to see the red flag waving which indicated that a prime was the next lap. This was kinda weird because they said that there were primes every 3rd lap, but oh well! After going another few laps Alex attacked and quickly built up a large lead. With no one really chasing we just kinda rolled around the course for another few laps until the attacks started coming that ended reeling Alex back in. Soon after Alex was caught Anders attacked. Just like Alex, he quickly built up a huge lead. After a couple of laps, with Anders off the front and many attacks going on in the pack, a large group of about 10-15 guys rolled off the front with Alex and me in it. Because Anders was still up the road it gave Alex and me a free ride in the breakaway. With about five laps to go the group had been reduced to only 7 or 8 guys in it. We then could look back and start to see the main field closing in on us due to the lack of cooperation in the break. Alex and I then got to the front on a strong head wind section and "hammered" for a while. The only others that could hang on were the guy who had won seven races that season and some other random dude. When I pulled off and got onto the back of now reduced break the "random dude" got dropped and I realized it to late to try and bridge back up to Alex's group. I then dropped back to the rest of the break that was about 15 or so seconds back. After sitting on the back of that group until about two laps to I put in an attack at the same spot where Alex and I got on the front. When I looked behind me the rest of the break were already pretty far back. I then set into "time-trial" mode to try and catch back up to Alex. After about one lap I looked up to see the light green jersey of the guy who had won seven races by himself. With a "carrot" in front of me now I tried even harder to catch him. With a little over a half lap to go I finally reached him. I then tried to attack him to try and get away, but that didn't work. After just kinda spinning around for a little more. When we reached the section where we had the extremely strong head wind I tried another hard attack. I only gained about ten or fifteen meters on him, but due to the head wind it was like 30 seconds. After keeping that up for a while he finally just sat up which gave me the opportunity to roll in for third place with Alex taking the win over Anders. After rolling around for a couple of seconds we saw Joel get second in the field sprint for 14th. Peter had tried to bridge up to the break, but he was unable to catch up and went "Ffffffwwwwweeeeeuuuuuuuw (exactly Peter's words. It was really hard to spell) off the back" and James ended up getting dropped and pulled off.

Astana Team Warehouse

We had a fun day today as we were able to go and visit the Astana Team Warehouse. Due to the long drive to the house we had to wake up farely early so that we could make it to the house by 9:00. When Tim came into our room at around 7:00 we all jumped out of our beds like little kids on Christmas morning and ran downstairs to get some food in our bodies before the trip. We left the house in the big blue USA Cycling van at around 7:30 with Yogi as our guide/GPS. As we pulled onto the street that the house was on we all started looking for a sign or something that would let us know which building it was. After driving for about a kilometer we saw the huge baby blue bus with ASTANA written on the side behind a fairly large building that was also used as a furniture store. We waited a few minutes till it was 9:00 then we walked over to the door and rung the doorbell. After a few seconds a lady answered a door and after a few words with Yogi in Flemish she invited us inside like she had known us her whole life. When we first walked inside my first impression was that it was just a small house where all the Astana people hung out at when there were no races going on. There was a small office and little kitchen. THEN.....a kinda oversized English man walked through a door in the kitchen and invited us to come see the rest of the house. We walked with him through the door and you could hear thumps on the ground as all of our jaws hit the ground. There had to be probably 150 bikes in the room that were all worth over 6,000$ and about 300 wheel sets that were 3,000 Euros a set. We also got to witness the bike that Alberto Contador would be riding the 2008 Olympics. The bike had been painted so that it resembled the Spain flag and where the bike usually says Trek it said Spain due to the rule that at the Olympics you can only have the bike manufacture's name on the bike twice. After wondering around the room, where we got to see the bikes that had been raced on by Levi, Kloden, Contador and everyone else on Astana, the English man walked us into the next room that had all the team cars and two of the team busses, and another billion bikes. As we were touring that room we got to see the new forks that are on the Trek bikes. Instead of having the speed sensor zip-tied to the fork they built the sensor on the inside of the fork. It was amazingly awesome. We also got to see the bike that Contador had won the Giro on. After examing the awesomeness of the bike we set off outside to witness the two other busses that drove the riders to and from the start/finish line. We then went back into the small kitchen and walked down a secret hidden stairway into the cellar where they kept all of the tubular tires. The tiny room might of smelt like rubber, but it sure was pretty awesome seeing about 1000 tires stacked all the way to the ceiling. We then walked back up to the kitchen where we were given some Cokes and Astana swag. After talking to the English man for about another hour we made our way back home and went for an easy one hour ride before we had some dinner and "hit the hay."