Tour of Galena Day 1

Well it was an early wakeup call on Saturday morning, Bethany and I were up at 5am to drive to Galena for the inaugural Tour of Galena event. It started with a 4.4mile prologue. We arrived around 8am to be registered, get numbers pinned, and meet up with Lou, Paul, Chad, JJ to get set. One thing right away is a huge congrats to XXX racing for putting this race on, it is a great event, and has been run well. Props for sure.

This 4.4mile TT means you have to warm up for an hour or so, to have the engine very hot when leaving on such a violent effort. The course was a rolling course with a .5mile 10% downhill and uphill on the way back, I had a 25 on the back, was happy to have it, what an ass kicker of a hill for a TT. TT have not really been good to me this year, and this was no different. I don't understand why, I am a bigger guy and should be able to put out good power for that long of an effort, but none-the-less, I was caught by my minute man, who actually won the event by 12 sec.....so not horrible I guess. Still very frustrated with myself. 24th out of 30 starters, which I guess is better then I have produced this year so far.....

Anyway, afterwards we had about 5hours to waste before the start of the 90mile RR. We all drove to downtown Galena and had some coffee at a little shop. Galena is full of old style downtown shops, that are skinny and narrow, but full of everything from coffee shops, restaurants, bead stores, etc. A real ladies town if you ask me, it was funny to see the guys in the shop just eager to leave! Bethany and I had a great lunch and I was ready to rock the road race.

35 starters or so started the road race, and this was another difficult course with 4-mile + long climbs on the course, and steep gradients to boot. I was not doing well right off the back, and didn't have good feelings for the rest of the race. The first two laps were pretty chill except for the hills where a few attacks would go. I put on a 27cassette for the race, and used every bit of it. On the start of the third lap, I was not feeling good at all on the uphills. After the progressive 3mile climb with a 300m stretch of about 10+%, I was gaped with 4 others. We chased back towards Galena, but lost sight of the moving peloton. I was gaped from this group going up the 15% feed zone hill and was riding by myself. I don't think I was bonking, but I just had no power for the engine room. Little did I know, I was still sitting in the top 15, from everyone who had dropped out. I did the most noob thing you could do and turned around, tail between my legs, and DNF'ed. I thought there were 20 guys still ahead of me, and I wouldn't have gotten a single point anyway. Little did I know, I would have gotten 18th. What a dumbass, Carson. So I am very annoyed with myself to say the least, I have never dropped out of a race on my own will. Chad and Paul were in the top 15, to keep their omnium hopes alive.

So I am going into this crit out of the omnium, but still able to get some money. I don't know how my form is going to let me do it, but I am going to race my heart out for Chad and Paul. I won't care if I get dropped during this race, but I am going to attack, attack, attack and try to help them out and maybe get a few primes.

I really don't know whats going on with my form right now. After the Tour of Herman, I was weighing in at about 167, but now I weight 175. So do the math, and you realize I have become one tubby fat load. I can tell this is really starting to hurt me. I need to start taking better care of myself and drop some weight, or really increase my power output. Anyway, hopefully I get something sorted out soon. My cleat position is acting up again, and just don't know what is wrong with it....