Tour of Lawrence

After the Tour of Lawrence, I bailed to Canada for a week of R&R. So I'm finally getting back to this now.

Leading up to the race, it looked like nice hot temps, but as we got closer, the forecast called for rain both days. I'd anticipated these races to be the hardest two of the year for me. I was looking forward to the challenge.

As we drove to the course on Saturday, we drove right into the storm that had parked itself over Lawrence. At times on the highway I could barely see but for the taillights of other vehicles.

By the time we got to the race, the worst of it seemed to be over, but apparently a lot of debris had fallen on to the course in some sections, causing a delayed start for the Women's elite race.

By the start of our race, the rain had come back, and riders nervously were letting out air in their tires in preparation for slick conditions. I got a fairly decent starting position on the second row.

The very first hard 180 corner, people were slamming their brakes on, and I noticed I was sliding quite significantly. I saw one rider slide into the barriers here, then around the corner, many more were crashing to the right side of the road. Somehow I slid through, but there was another wreck to the left. At the bottom of the big descent, there was a hard left, and another rider slid out here. By the time we were to the first of the two climbs on the course, there had already been about 5 crashes that I saw, and the field was completely strung out.

I was not feeling good about the race at this point. I got in a small group for the rest of the lap, only to have the leader of our group slide out after the descent on lap 2. The front end of the race was completely out of sight now, so I was content to get another group together and ride tempo. I finally got into a group with Adam Mills, Jason Knight, and Matt Baugher and thought I would ride with them till the finish. Just as the roads were starting to dry out, and our little group picked up the pace a bit, I broke a spoke. At that point, I rode back to the feed zone alone, borrowed one of Adam's wheels (I don't think he knew about this), did a lap and got pulled. (Despite other pulled riders getting placed, I somehow was put down as a dnf)

Somehow, I managed to get sick between the Circuit race and Sunday's criterium. After driving over and warming up for a little while, the mind and the body were in full revolt. Despite the course feeling much better than Saturday's even though it was again wet and raining, I decided to just go home. The fact that I even considered not starting told me I was not mentally prepared to race that day.