Stages 1 and 2

Stage 1: St. Paul Riverfront Time Trial, 6 miles
I was excited (and nervous) about the time trial this year. It's 2.5 miles dead flat out and 2.5 miles dead flat back, with a sensible (ahem) finish of a GIANT climb. I ask, why ruin a perfectly good time trial with a little rise in the road? Our team director John said the hill might "bother" us.

So I showed up to the start line on time, I freaked a little because I had gotten my bike approved about an hour before-hand, but then they made me get measured for my arms. I think I cheated, but I also think the lady was just nice. She said, in her cute little Minnesota accent, as I sat on the bike, "Ohhh I can just see the power!" Thanks, lady. I was set to go off 30 seconds in front of LVG (Laura Van Gilder for those that are acronym challenged). Perfect, I'm going to get passed a mile into the TT. It began. I found my rhythm. I felt good, got to the turn around, and almost peed my pants when I realized LVG was maybe more than 30 seconds behind me. Maybe then I relaxed a little too much. I passed my minute person. I went up the "bothersome" hill. LVG blew by me about 1/4 through the climb, as did Jo Kiesanowski. It's okay, I tell myself, they're reallly fast. After that I didn't lose too much time and finished good enough for 77th, of 119 starters. I'm happy enough with that, 14 seconds faster than my last year's time.

Stage 2: Downtown St. Paul Criterium
The Ryan team got to warm up in the "Athlete Village" which means a lot of things, but mostly that you can't change into your chamois while standing around and looking at the crowd. The idea here is to give out signed trading cards and motivate little girls to ride bicycles. We warmed up and got to the start line a good 35 minutes before the start. This part of these races in highly unfair. The fast people get call-ups, meaning they automatically get to start at the front of the race, and those who don't get call-ups end up fighting for their position. These crits are less about fitness and more about positioning, so your place on the start line determines alot about your race. So all the fast people get to warm up right up until 10 minutes until the race starts. And the other people stand around for 35 minutes, legs getting stiff, worrying about the start. Perhaps this is why it is so hard for everyone except for those fast people.

Anyway, enough about call-ups. The race: fucking fast. 28.8 mph average. Kristin Armstrong was on the front probably 1/4 of the race, just HAMMERING it. As my team director says, "This race will never be that fast again." Apparently, this is Kristin's last year before retirement. Those Armstrongs, always threatening to retire.

I had a great starting position, but fucked that up the second I started feeling like I was dying. I lost a lot of places, settled in, kept wanting to drop out, but finally got over that feeling. For this particular race, you have to finish 33% of it to move on to the next stage, so that meant 14 laps or so. In fast races I like to set small goals for myself. First goal: make it to the time cut. Despite my thoughts of dropping out at this point, I decided to set a new goal. Second goal: Make it to halfway. Upon reaching this goal, I realize if I haven't gotten dropped yet, I'm probably not going to get dropped. This type of mentality enables me to think more positively about the race and realize I should be doing better. Third goal: Do better. So at about 10 to go I made a huge jump up the hill and gained about 10 places, trying to make it up to the top 50. I succeeded and ended up with 46th place! That's my best finish yet at this race, so I'm pretty stoked about it. I'm sitting 10th for the Best Young Rider (which is everyone under 26) and something like 60th overall. You have to look hard, but this photo is from Velonews and you can sort of see me! I'm wearing green shorts with my Whitman jersey (a winning color combination, I know).

Tonight is the first road race, 66 miles starting at Cannon Falls. This race is pretty flat the whole time and includes a 2 miles dirt/gravel section leading into the 5 finishing circuits. The race truly begins about 2 miles from this section, as people want to be the first into the dirt and the first into the following steep descent on shitty, wet road. I'm excited. Stay tuned for more updates. I'll leave you with a photo of Sinead doing a television interview yesterday morning at 5:35 in the morning!