Sucking at a level that surprises even myself (aka the day I took a free lap in a road race)

Three weeks ago I finished in the winning break at the Cumming Series 7 race....amateur style. The field turned right instead of going straight, and the pro-heavy "real" break got disqualified after amassing an approximately 45 minute advantage to the field...so the chase group of 8 that I was in suddenly became the winning break. You can either do it the hard way, or the easy way. We chose the easy way, and the amateurs got paid on this day.

Fast forward a couple weeks to the Tour of Atlanta. 7 stages in 5 days. I managed to get dropped on both my road bike and my tt bike, all within one race. Awesome. I started 5 stages and (kind of) finished 2. Never done that before. 0 for 2 in the crits, and even got destroyed by my own teammates in the TTT. Even better.

On the single road race stage and managed to blow out my rear tire after narrowly avoiding the 3rd crash in the first 5k. Fantastic. Two of those crashes happened in the first 500 meters. One of those crashes had Ron W. (the most dangerous one-legged man on two wheels) launched over the bars and literally running down the road in cycling shoes. Perfect dismount. Anyone else with two legs would've died. Not Ron though. He gets it done with one.

So now it's time for a free lap. That's right...I took a free lap in a road race. I've seen it done by some seasoned pros, turned down the opportunity myself, and wasn't going to make that mistake twice. I just needed to know what it feels like. The race promoter loaded my shit up in the van after waiting for the ambulance to take away an injured rider (Friday the 13th style gore) and took me to my car to change my wheel. Not the wheel truck, but my car...in the parking lot. I picked up a king size rice krispie treat, something to drink, and a fresh set of brake pads. If I had some football gear for the remainder of the race, I would've suited up.

Now he takes me straight back up to the race. Fair enough. At this point...now officially a lap down in a road race...I rolled into the back of the race and hung out with the Mainstay while we ate, drank, discussed his intestinal problems, and dodged a few more crashes. When it was time to bring the break back, an unnamed pro team that happened to miss the break organized at the front of the race and motorpaced the lead van to pull back a 6 minute advantage to the break. Thad was the last rider left up the road, and was brought back in the fold just inside 500 meters from the line. Those guys timed their motorpacing perfectly!

What the hell was I going to say? I was IN the van for half the race....they were just behind it. Chalk that one up as another lesson learned...free laps in a road race, and motorpacing the break back into the field for a field sprint. The pros have it figured out, and I'm catching on. Moral of the story for this weekend- bad days are bad days, but a bad season just isn't funny. Especially when you just had one last year. Time to get this donkey turned around before the Def Leprechaun starts asking me when I'm going to start finishing races again. The Mainstay might be ok with that sort of thing, but I'm just not going to have it.