Tour of St Louis

Last weekend was the first race of the regular season in St Louis. Tour of St Louis has been growing steadily over the last few years and this year was one of the best fields I had seen. Most of the strong teams that attended came with full squads and there was even a spattering of single strong men.

The race is three stages over two days with a time trial and two crits. Most of our team did not participate in the TT as we do not have the TT bikes to be competitive. Robin was our only Omnium contender and did a good TT but with the caliber of riders there he was coming into the first crit in 11th.

The plan in the weekend's first crit was to try and make something happen. This is a bit different than what we normally do, but we wanted to work on new strategies and you have to do it sometime. We started off throwing attacks pretty early in the race, one after another we were riding off the front or going in break aways. The speed of the race seemed pretty high and anything out front was pulled back pretty quickly by any team or person not represented. This made it tough for us, we have some very strong riders but at that speed, and how many attacks were going off, we were quickly struggling to catch our breath. Near the middle of the race Bj put in a big effort to bridge to a move that looked promising. As he neared the move riders in it attacked and Bj dug again to make it to them. Unfortunately once there that group was already fighting and Bj thought better of it and allowed himself to be swallowed along with all the break.

Our last plan was to line up the team to try and put our sprinter for the day Jason in a good position for the sprint. With 4 to go the team started to come together and we were getting lined up. I remember sitting first out of the team just waiting for the word go. I was hurting but was doing my best to try and hold a spot. We were not on the front and my job would be to move us up once everyone was there. That unfortunately for me, most of the team, and a lot of the field, wouldn't happen. With 2 to go there was a large crash that took me and everyone on the team out by Shane and Grant.

With only about 20 of the field left racing Shane did his best to help Grant move into a good spot for the sprint. Grant waited till the last second and was able to save a 2nd place for the team.

Sunday was on the Forest Park course. Flat with 6 turns and a lot of wind. We decided to go with a plan more suited to our strengths. I was not feeling great, and having a new bike delivered to me by our great sponsor Swim Bike Run that morning was proving a little hard to get set just right for me. I always take a few days to get everything dialed just right and every time I had to put any power into the bike my legs would fill with acid. I told the team I would do everything in my power to be where I needed to be, but the crash from the day before and the new bike was too much for my body to take.

The race was fast from the gun and the team did well to roll with as many attacks as we could. With our numbers we thought we would be able to be represented in just about every move. But that was probably a bit over zealous of us. At about 38 minutes into the race, I could no longer keep the pace. My legs just couldn't produce the watts required and I found myself going backwards. I pulled out of the race and became a fan for the rest of the guys finishing up.

With 10 laps to go the team started to line up for Grant. With the speeds so high nothing was going to stay away and it was best to save it all for one last go at it. With 3 laps to go Bj pulled hard to get Jesse and Grant to the front. This in itself looked like a very big effort and Bj was done. Jesse did his best to keep Grant at the front for the next lap, but they were swarmed when a slight lul came in the speed. They were separated but Grant jumped onto teammate Eric Finks' wheel who was able to get him to the last turn of the race.  Grant opened up his sprint picking up a few spots and placed 8th. Not as good as he had hoped but still a fine showing.

The team learned a lot last weekend and I think we grew because of it. It is a whole new experience for us all and a lot of the new members still are learning how to integrate into the team. The only way to do that is to give it time.

This weekend the Pro squad as we call them is down in Anniston AL for the Sunny King Crit and Fort McClellon Road Race. I am really excited to see how they work this weekend.  I will let you know in a few hours.....