My wife and daughter drove 6 hours up to Fort Worth where we would leave the little one, we hooked up with Colton and the next morning we drove another 6 to the race. Stage 1 started Thursday evening so we decided to get a late breakfast, and go for an easy 30-45 min spin that afternoon.
Stage 1: Hill Climb TT
The stage is only 2.5 miles with about 1.5 of that being an actual climb, much of it is flat to false flat. In my memory it always seems like a real climb until I am on the course, then I realize that it isn't as steep as I remember when I first did it as a cat4. I don't really have a good excuse to as why I wasn't top ten here. My legs felt ok, maybe a little stale from the lack of racing. I did 380w (5.7w/kg) for 9:16min, only good enough for 14th. Much of the top 20 were with in 1 second of each other, which eventually carried to the final GC.
I was mostly happy with the pacing, controlling the early parts to under 400w, but I think I should have opened it up a bit more in the middle and held on instead of waiting for the last 3min to hit it hard.
Stage 2: RR #1 110miles
We rolled out under clouds and cool rain, not ideal, but it quickly cleared and we had a pretty nice race. Thank goodness I now have the time to put in solid miles every week, after 75miles my legs felt very fresh. Brant Speed and I had a go on Mt. Gaylor, we caught a small break on the way up and then we attracted a few more from the pack, but before we got to the top most of the pack was back on. The run back into town was acutally pretty fast, lots of attempts that eventually led to Metro/VW countering solo and finishing about 20s ahead of us in the lead pack. Last year I lacked the miles in my legs, so much so that when we reached the last hilly miles I was cooked, this year I was able to sprint (if you can call it that) and finish in the top 20 fairly easily.
Because of a few people getting popped toward the end I moved up to 12th in GC
Stage 3: RR #2 96miles
We rolled out under cloudy skies again but no rain. My legs felt great and I was thinking if there was a break I would definitely try to get into it. When a break goes it usually happens after the steep climb as there is a couple miles of false flat after that and it can get pretty hard. I marked a few breaks but didn't commit as none of them really got that far. By the last lap it became obvious that it was going to finish together unless someone was able to get away at the very end again. I was still feeling pretty fresh so I fought to stay in the top 15 for the last 10miles. I saw a break go that had Carrey in it and a couple of other riders. I jumped off of the front, bridged up to the rider in the back. I took a deep breath and was going to get ready to rotate when I realized that the rider I latched onto had lost the wheel in front of him on a hill and I wasn't able to jump again to the group in front.
The group stayed away and at that point my goal was to finish with the group without any time gaps but also (and this is the trickey part) not get into a crash on the decent to the finish. There is usually a crash, and we are doing 40mph+ so its not my favorite finish. There was some bumping and sketchiness at the end but all stayed up and I finish unscathed.
Stage 4: 60min Criterium
This course has been a thorn in my side as long as I've done this race. The hill on the start/finish is very punchy and I'm the complete opposite of that. It is hard for me to stay in the pack when you have to jam it hard on every lap. Thankfully my legs felt great going into the final stage and I was able to stay in the top 15 the whole race. I figured staying with the front I was going to at least get 13th GC, if not move up into the top 10 as the splits were still very close. With a half lap to go a rider when down, took out Fawely, and opened a large gap on the rest of the field. A couple of riders made the split by the very end of the lap but the rest of us were given a 6sec split. Wolhrobie made it across and his GC time ended up the same as mine. Since they go to the last stage to break ties he moved into 13th and me into 14th. Also, the rider that caused the wreck, went down and didn't finish but was allowed to use the "3k" rule and he was put back into our group, further moving riders down.
I'm fairly happy with the result, I would have liked more climbing and/or more stages. Hopefully Tour of Arkansas will be back next year and maybe I can finally make it back to Gila.
