Lawson Craddock – The Dude is Good

This entry was posted in Racing on by .

I’ve been following Lawson Craddock for a while now. He popped up on my radar screen a few years back racing in Texas. One of those young kids that could rip people’s legs off. He was very good then and just keeps getting better in leaps and bounds.

A year ago in Laga Vista, Texas, it got down to a small group of us on Sunday. It was towards the end of the 85 mile race and Heath Blackgrove had shelled us. There were only 5 of us left. Stefan Roth, Andrew Dalheim, Christian Helmig, me and Lawson. Lawson put in a crazy hard dig at the top of the hill. So hard that he nearly shelled everyone. The thing about it was that he was sitting on his seat. It is steep, probably close to 15% and he was attacking us seating while we all we going 100% off our seats. He went a little too hard, as it ended up, because Stefan countered and he, Christian and I rode away from the other two. But, that isn’t the point. The point is the guy has unbelievable power on his seat.

This last month he’s been on top of his game. Winning the hardest stage at Gila a couple weeks ago. He has finished twice in the top ten in field sprints at the Tour of California. Then to top it off, he was 12th in the TT today in Bakersfield. What can the guy not do? If he climbs as well in California and he did in New Mexico, these next three days could be interesting. He’s currently in 2nd in the young rider category, but I’m thinking the Australian that is winning isn’t going to be so good on the longer, hard climbs. We’ll see.

Anyway, he is progressing pretty rapidly. My only complaint about the guy is that he never, ever updates his website. (I’m going to leave a link on the column on the right, just in case he ever does.) I guess he’s just too busy becoming a superstar.

On his way to finishing in 12th today in California, with the big boys.

Harrison Arkansas – Crawdad Kermesse

This entry was posted in Racing on by .

I drove down to Harrison Arkansas yesterday, to do the Crawdad Kermesse. I got down here with just enough light to ride one lap of the course. It is hard. Really hard. There is a 20% pitch at the top of one of the climbs. Other than not being pretty flat, it is nearly a true Belgium Kermesse in the sense that it is being run in conjunction with a carnival and that the course goes out into the country and comes back through town each lap.

This town of Harrison is pretty neat. I’ve never been here before. It has around 15,000 residents and seems progressive and backwards simultaneously, if that can be. A lot of Arkansas is like that. It is a beautiful state. The Ozarks are wonderful. The whole state is nearly hills and mountains, with a lot of natural water too.

Jasper Arkansas is just a stone’s throw down the road South from here and it is said that some of the best rock climbing in the country can be had here.

We’re staying in a historic Hotel, the Seville. It is awesome. They put 3.5 million dollars into a renovation a few years ago. The town seems to be trying to do things right. With a bike race associated with the Crawdad Festival along with a goat show, this weekend is pretty full around here. It should be interesting at least.

I’m pretty bad. In a lot of ways. My shoulder isn’t even the worst part right now. I guess I’ll see how bad today. I’m thinking about racing the Master’s race first at 9 am. It is only 26 miles. That really shouldn’t be an only on a course like this, but it has been taking me the better part of an hour to get going recently, so I’m thinking that it should help for the Pro 1-2 race at 1. Okay. This is going to be a long day for me I think.

It starts getting pretty hilly south of Springfield Missouri, toward Branson.

This is a photo of the top of the course close to sunset.

This is looking the other way. Pretty nice country.