the good, the bad
second stage of the tri-peaks stage race. 92 mile road race with three climbs.
pace was rather brisk on the way out to petit jean, the first climb of the day. on the climb however, it wasn't so bad. i was hurtin', but i'm always hurtin' on the hills. its what i do! after that climb i flatted. got a wheel change and got back into the pack rather quickly with some help from justin.
i don't know when, but a big (20+ riders) got off with solomon in the mix. woulda been nice to have andy in there, as solomon was down on time from the crit. ah well. the pack pretty much chilled out after that. the mercy team chased for a while but didn't really put a dent into the lead of the group. tough to put the hurt on a break of 20 that's working well.
a few miles from the penultimate climb we made a right hand turn. i was on the outside left. the guy just behind me and to my right failed to turn and ran into me. i mighta kept it up from there but i hit some gravel and i lost it. i pitched over the bars. i got up and dusted myself off. checked myself out, checked out my bike and i was just fine. hopped back on and started chasing. got to the caravan and picked my way through. got on just at the base of the climb, in the back. damn. i suffered until cracking just shy of the top where i lost quite a lot of time. i stayed in front of the caravan and planned to use it to get back in. no dice. there were but three caravan cars. damn. suffered the 20 miles back to the finish. too bad too, cause i was feelin' alright until i went down.
guess my fall looked bad too, 'cause lots of riders where asking my teammates if i was ok. they all thought i did a major face plant. aparently i'm reasonably good at crashing as i really came out of it just fine although it could have been a collar bone break or a major face road rash. ouch.
