we're really pumping the coffee before today's road race.?

Ready for Camps

This is what I'm usually doing before and after each ride I do here. At this point I think I've got a really good grasp on almost all the riding in the area. This is key with the upcoming camps. We'll be able to take off and then do a lot of different stuff on each ride. It's a bit different than your pro job camp that involves tons of hours sitting in the saddle. These camps involve a lot of drills, intervals and work on controlling and evaluating efforts. Should be a good time

We're off to Valley of the Sun tomorrow. The timing is just right, it's supposed to rain while we're gone. With that it's time to clean bikes before the race.

First Race

I raced over the weekend for the first time this year. For the 16th year in a row I filled out the form and pinned on my number. There is definitely something ritualistic about that process. After all these years I still get a bit nervous during registration, especially at the first race of the year. I don't know why but for some reason I always have this fear that something radically changed for the worse over a few months of not racing. Anyway, that was not the case and things went well. In typical teton form I got very frustrated sitting in the group so I attacked the last 3/4 of the race. I knew it was futile but it was fun to push myself for the first time this year. My last move got absorbed with 3 to go and I went straight to the back and waited for the final pile-up. I was actually a bit surprised that it didn't happen.

Yesterday I did one of the sweetest climbs I've ever done. It was 15 miles and 3000ft of really consistent and smooth climbing. The only problem was that it's 2 hrs away and that made for a pretty long day (3800kj's). Needless to say I'm a bit tired today and it's going to take an extra cup of coffee to get going today.

It was nice today

Most people know I'm a big fan of over-dressing on my bike and keeping "rugged up" almost all of the time in the winter and spring. Today in Santa Barbara it was warm enough for shorts and short sleeves. Not only was it warm enough but I was sweating.

Getting excited to see how my form is at the first crit of the year on Sunday.