Early Racing 2015

I was nervous and skeptical about racing this year despite all the plans of a quick upgrade to Cat 2. I hadn't raced in a long time and as I began the season, I realized it was not going to be as easy of a feat to win and upgrade quickly as it was to upgrade to Cat 3.

Racing on 5-6 hours of training a week with minimal base mileage was pretty different from racing on 12-14 hours of training a week with a solid 6 day a week base mileage to roll off of in the early part of the season.

I was finding out quickly that I couldn't just show up to the race and expect to walk away with a win like I could in 2013 as a Cat 4. The team dynamics played a much bigger aspect to the racing now. The teams were stronger and smarter than ever before.

After finishing 8th and 5th in my first two road classified races of the 2015 season, I was feeling pretty discouraged and wondering if I was wasting my time with so little of it to commit to training. Then I showed up to Sunny King, a race that had been favorable to me in years past. It is a typical crit with a four corner course without any steep inclines or wicked nasty corners.

I barely made it on time and without much of a warm up (about 10 minutes on the trainer). I started at the back of the pack and stayed there for the first part of the race. The first 15 minutes felt like crap. It was extremely hard and I felt like I was about to pop off the back at any given moment. The horrible thought of getting dropped from the field and pulled from the race even crept into my head. It was hard.

But then all of a sudden, things began to change. Maybe we slowed down or maybe I was just finally warming up. It didn't seem quite as hard. My legs weren't quite as dead. I made some moves to edge myself up the group to make sure I didn't get separated from the field. Then I found the group counting down from 5 laps to go with me in the top 1/4 of the racers.

The laps continued to count down and I made sure I knew who's wheel I was on and tried to keep my position so people didn't swarm the field and shoot me way down the pack.

Video of the race can be seen here: http://www.annistoncycling.com/videos/
Starting at 3:20:00 and the finish is at 4:01:00.

On the final lap I knew the race was mine to lose. I was in perfect position for my skill set. The only thing I needed was for us to not get swarmed by riders heading into corner 3 of the last lap. To prevent that I pulled off onto Croome's wheel as he gave a little acceleration into the corner when feeling the peloton coming up the inside. Once I had that matched, I was able to roll through and into the last corner of the race in about 5th wheel position.

Once we straightened up out of the corner, I laid down the power and went for the line. I opened up the gap but still stayed strong on the pedals for fear of anyone creeping up on me at the line. Once I had it secured I set up to celebrate for the first time since TN State Crit in 2013. It was an amazing feeling and for it to be at Sunny King and the first race my girlfriend got to see me race in made it all the more special.

A great day in Alabama.