Today’s race in St. Louis was in the Italian section of town. The race wasn’t until 6 pm, so I spent most of the late morning/early afternoon, putting a new vacuum line from the manifold to the MAP sensor in my van. Man, talk about cramped quarters. The backs of my hands are toast.

Anyway, the Italian area where we race is called The Hill. The course is good. It is on a hill, but not really much of one. Big ring for sure. The course is less than a mile around and is really just uphill on one long side and then downhill back to the finish line. I finished 2nd here a long time a go. It is sort of a good course for me, other than the sprint being downhill.

I guess the biggest issue of the day was for about 5 laps, it was spitting down rain. This course was much different than the previous 2 races and there were crashes. Lots of them. I personally didn’t witness anyone fall, but they were throwing riders in from the pit every lap, lap after lap. Lots of them.

During this time, I got to the front and took off with Menso de Jong, a Jelly Belly guy, who was pulling virtually the whole time. I just wanted to stay out of trouble. If it would have kept raining, then I would have put some real effort into the move, but it wasn’t to be.

One weird thing that happened during the race was when I was going for another $200 prime. I jumped into the third corner and went by a Jelly Belly guy who was leading Pat Lemieux, Kenda. Pat yelled for me to go, which I already was, and I had a 30 meter lead heading down the 400 meter hill to the finish line. The problem was, I have this sinus infection thing going and just when I thought everything was good, a big glob of snot dislodged from somewhere high and got stuck in my lungs. I started coughing and was pretty much done absorbing oxygen. I looked back and a couple guys were coming, so I just kept coughing and lost. What a bad time for that to happen.

The last few laps got kind of crazy. Jelly Belly put their whole team on the front and did the normal control thing. Ride the inside of the course not fast enough, thus making us all glob (there’s that word again) behind, braking and then re-accelerating. I wasn’t too worried about getting into position to sprint. I’ve done this race a bunch and knew how to get to the front the last lap. So, again, like the day before, I was concentrating on saving energy and having enough air for the last lap.

I started probably around 20th and then made a pretty big effort up the last 1/2 of the hill. There were maybe 5 Jelly Belly guys in line and I went into the next to the last corner in 4th or 5th. The problem was that the finish is really downhill I sprint like shit downhill. If I have to sit down sprinting, it is pretty much over for me. Plus, I’m not going that good anyway. So, I was passed by 3 or 4 guys before the finish line and ended up 9th. Jelly Belly had 4 out of the top 5 at the end. Here’s the Strava link for the race.

Trudi is heading to Quebec City this morning, so I have to drop her at the airport. The last race here is the hardest by far. And it is supposed to be hot and muggy. It was muggy yesterday, but not that hot. It is going to be hard to fake it this afternoon. We’re heading back to Topeka after the race, so it is going to be a long day.

Results, courtesy of Shadd once again.

This is the 1st corner of the course. Kind of gives you a flavor of the area.

An artsy shot Trudi took when I was off the front in the rain. This was about the only time I pulled through the whole time.

Okay, last “race report” for a bit and we’ll get back to more fun stuff. Yesterday was Benton Park. It is a super cool race in a up and coming area in St. Louis. The course is really challenging. It is maybe the hardest criterium of the year in many respects. I’m not sure what the deal with the course is exactly, but it is like a M.C. Escher drawing. The course seems like it is uphill the whole way around. Plus, headwind the whole lap too. In previous years, only like 30% of the field finishes. And the race is only 80 minutes long.

I knew the break would be gone instantly, within the first 15 minutes, it always has. I got into a move with the right combination on the 2nd or 3rd lap. I didn’t hardly warm up a pedal stroke because it was already super hot and muggy out. But, that didn’t matter. The break never got too far ahead and we got caught in just 2 or 3 laps. Brian, who came the to St. Louis the day before to join us, immediately attacked and rode away. There are lots of guys in the field that know how strong that Brian is and the best of them followed.

Eventually a huge group of nearly 20 guys formed off the front. That wasn’t good for just about anyone, so it had death written all over it. The stayed away for 4 or 5 laps and right when we reabsorbed that break, Brian went again and it was done. It was exactly the right combination with Jelly-Belly, Kenda, Harley-Davidson, Mercy and us all represented.

And that was it. There isn’t much more for me to write about. The break of 7 stayed away. Brian ended up 6th, which he wasn’t good with at all, but someone has to end up in that place. He started attacking the break, maybe too far from the end, with 6 laps to go. It pissed one of the Jelly-Belly riders off enough he kind of mocked Brian and asked him if he thought that he was Lance Armstrong. Brian asked me after the race what I thought that meant. I told him it meant that he was hurting them and they were trying to use intimidation to slow him down. It might have worked some. The year before, Brian was in nearly an identical break and the sprint didn’t work out so well for him, so he decided he wanted it split up. So he made his best effort into doing just that. It didn’t work out so well for him, but that is bike racing.

Back in the field it kept splitting into small groups off the front. Eventually nearly all the places were up the road. I was tried of the race and just wanted it to be done with.

With 2 laps to go, I noticed the race leader, Brad Huff, Jelly-Belly, go over to the edge of the course, on what seemed to be the only downhill section, which was pretty abandoned of spectators. Brad proceeded to pee off his bike. It surprised me for a couple reasons. It isn’t like I haven’t seen or done it myself before during a race, but never during a criterium. And 2, I couldn’t understand why he just didn’t wait the 5 minutes and we would have be done. Whatever the reason, it was very impressive.

So, the weekend is over. I don’t feel any worse, illness-wise. Not any better really either. I’m not sure if the racing is going to help for Chequamegon two weeks from now. I needed to race pretty badly and that is just what I did – race sorta badly. I’m planning on doing my heat training thing and ride back and forth to Lawrence, super slowly, this time on my MTB for the next few days. It is supposed to be in the upper 90’s most of this week and I just need some slow miles to hopefully reset. If not, Chequamegon is just going to be a tour in the woods of Wisconsin.

Trudi getting a little last minute Bromont time before having to head off to Canada.

The architecture around Benton Park is super cool.

The race goes right by the Budweiser brewery.

This isn’t a very good photo, but the women’s races were great. Laura Van Gilder had a hat trick, plus one, winning all four days. Skylar Schneider, Sam’s little sister, from Tibco, finished 2nd yesterday, and 2nd in the overall, to Laura.
It was her birthday yesterday and she just turned 14. Pretty unreal.

The sunset driving back yesterday was unreal.

My friend, Paul Biskup, was driving through last night and his kids were camped out in my living room.

M.C. Escher is one of my favorite artists. His drawings always make you think.