Back home from the race site and about to head out for some Comfort TexMex for dinner, but before I dash out and quick synopsis of what went down today:
Before I start I need to congradulate Stevo Kilshaw on a FANTASTIC performance at the LifeSport Shawnigan Half this weekend. What a race man, you are the man of men. How does that feel baby?
Ok, on to my race today in southern Texas yip yip. Temp was 33 i think for the start. Light winds and clear skies. The water temp was just right at about 22C.
Light warmup besides a good swim before the start as to not get too hot before the start. As for the start, well this was perhaps the only thing the race staff slipped up. It was changed from a dock dive start to a deep water start. The rope however that they had strung between two canoes was only long enough for about 20 guys to line up, not the 55 that were chomping at the bit while treading water.
Horn went off and I had a great start, avoiding most of the contact. I started right beside Barrett Brandon and pretty much swam beside him for the entire swim. It was a swimmers field here with 4 guys including AMac coming out with about i think 20s on the next group which I was in. This might have been one of my best swims to date.
A decent T1 and I get rolling right away on the bike. Over the bridge with Brandon, Limmkeman and O'Grady from NZL I took the first corner agressively and gapped them. I then proceeded to pump it H'Core up to Ethan Brown who was on his own as well. The two of us worked like clockwork to catch another group of 3 including Collins, Fernandez and Darling that had splintered off the front 4 of Fleishmann,Dye,Van Akkeren and McCartney in T1. With Collins the group had added horsepower but the other two were not much help. We rode for about 1 lap before catching AMac who had fallen off the lead 4. We weren't able to gain on the front 3 and were eventually caught on the 3.5 laps of 5 by the main group of about 20. Once caught I took a breather and regrouped. The remainder of the ride was not bad but then things got nasty.....
ON the back stretch of the final lap, complete straight a-way, someone 5th or 6th wheel rubbed and went down. Unable to avoid the carnage that ensued I proceeded to ride over the guy in front of me and then have 4 guys ride over my back as i skidded on the tarmac.
....get up see 8 or 9 carbon bikes on the deck, look around...nope not that one, nope , nope, ahhhh there you are. Put the chain back on and remount. Open up the front brake cause the wheel is now rubbing and get rolling again. Determined to make this race count I rode into T2 probably about 45s off the guys who avoided the bedlam.
On the run I built it each lap, reeling in 6 or 7 guys in front to finish somewhere around 11th or 12th i think.
Tough day for all, but am really happy with how things went here today.
2 comments:
rought crash, sorry to hear about that, sounds like you were having a great race before this happened. Glad to hear you were able to finish though.
epic race ARuss
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