Yesterday was a whirlwind day. I’ll get back to some more interesting posts pretty soon, not just this diary-type thing. I did the 600 miles back to Topeka. It was pretty windy all day, 40+ from the north. It was sleeting in Colorado, then just windy in Kansas. Most people that don’t live in Kansas only know it by the drive through on I-70. Western Kansas and Eastern Colorado do melt into a long section of flatish nothingness. I like it though. I like driving in general.

Anyway, yesterday was my brother’s birthday, plus I needed to get to the Kansas City airport to pick up Trudi, as the BMC camp was over and the riders all headed down to Argentina. I high-tailed it back just in time to stop by the Flying Monkey to meet up with Kris and the gang. I had ordered a small cake at a local bakery, but they gave me just a small sugar disc that said happy birthday. So I ended up buying an assortment of cupcakes. When I got to PT’s, I had a cupcake, a double espresso and a beer. I didn’t realize how late I was and had to go almost immediately for the hour drive to KC.

Trudi was early of course, and had to wait a little, great. We stopped in Lawrence and made it to FreeState at 9:55. They close the kitchen at 10. I just had soup and salad. Bromont was pretty sick of the car trip. He was tired from hiking on Monday in Boulder, so he slept the whole way back and to the airport.

I have a ton of stuff to do here. Maybe two tons. It is supposed to be 60 degrees on the weekend, which will be great. Going out for a road ride at 1 with some guys. Man, is that going to feel great. Okay, kind of busy already, so that is all.

The small birthday cake?

Kris decided he wanted to run a marathon before his birthday, so he just did it. Ouch.

Bromont on the hike up Mt. Sanitas.

He liked the view from the top.

I drove through this crazy storm in Central Kansas.

It looked like a thunderstorm, but was snowing.

I was bombarded with tumbleweeds in Eastern Colorado. This was a small one.

I’ll all for less governmental control, inspections on things, but this guy shouldn’t have been driving around.

Since I was actually watching the Cyclocross Nationals in person, I didn’t really get a chance to see a lot of what was going on around the whole course. The course was great to ride, but not so good for overall spectating. I only saw snippets of the race. And since I am a student of the sport, I decided to go onto the internet and watch a rerun of the event.

There isn’t much to it. Jeremy Powers was just better than everyone. I loved the way he rode all out from the gun. That is how cyclocross “used” to be. Always at Nationals for sure. European cyclocross is more tactical at the front. But if Sven, or whoever, put the hammer down from the gun, it would look much like the Nationals in Boulder did last Sunday. Everyone was on the rivet from the start. That is the reason that there weren’t more groups riding around.

The course made it hard to ride close and get a draft. It was rock hard and bumpy. Following someone too closely created errors. Plus, the cornering and descending was technical enough that it was rare that two riders with the same handling skills and power would be riding together. You can see early on how smooth Powers was riding compared to Trebon. He was well within himself the whole day.

Anyway, if you didn’t have a chance to watch the Elite race and have some time, now or later, you should. It can only make you a better cross racer.

This is pretty unbelievable, it is Cody Kaiser, defining gravity, riding the stairs. Notice how he doesn’t pedal once.