TGI ... Oh, wait - it's friggin MONDAY.

I would have written a blog on Friday when I arrived at the hotel prior to the Tour of Washington County Kick-off Criterium. Would have, if I would have had any semblance of a decent internet/gps/phone connection. Hagerstown and it's outlying areas are apparently unworthy of Verizon cell towers so I was walking around the hotel trying to find one bar of signal to even send a text. So instead of a TGIF, this is a CIM - Crap, It's Monday. 

The kick off crit in Hagerstown was a blast. There's just something about twilight crits - a different energy in the air, the crowd seems more amp'd, the blasting music sounds more intense ... add to it the colorful commentary by Joe Jefferson and the dramatic effect of the lights around the technical course and wah-lah! This wasn't a race, it was an EVENT.

I was surprised that the teams didn't attack the race straight off. Things stayed relatively safe until about 3/4 of the way through, when ABRT cooked the first turn. A couple girls went down but everyone was ok and got back into the race. Afterward, I spoke to the ABRT rider to inquire on her condition. She didn't make excuses, didn't place blame - she simply said she was following someone through the corner pretty fast and couldn't cut the same line. "I cooked the corner". Just like that.  THANK YOU.  Thank you for owning it and moving on. No drama, no issue.  How freaking cool is that?!?!?

Photo Credit: Gwenn Afton - Cool shot!

The race came down to a sprint finish and while I was in great position at various times during the event, I was not for the last corner.  I rolled in at the back of the pack, tired and spent - yet relatively happy with the race.  Even happier after the Evo girls pointed me to the ice cream shop around the corner (not before I stole a bite or three of their yummy chocolate ice cream!). We rationalized it as the perfect recovery after a hot and fast race.

Saturday brought near-perfect racing weather - bright, sunny skies with fluffy clouds and a slight breeze. Seriously, I'm not exaggerating. I was happy with positioning overall and I found myself in the front group on each climb. Again, I think everyone was waiting for the teams to light something up but aside from a couple of flyers, we pretty much raced defensively. The one bit of excitement was when we were neutralized coming into 2 laps to go. The men's field overtook us as we were getting to "the" hill. I thought - great, we'll just go up this at a reasonable pace and I'll have some time to recover. They kept us neutralized on the downhill leading to the next uphill. This was the one hill you never had to pedal over-the momentum from the downhill always took you 3/4 of the way up. Not this lap - they set us free right at the bottom of that hill so we paid a price for that recovery.

Come into the finish and the girls just seemed to have one more "turbo gear" than I did. As we hit the last hill, I imploded like a 7th grade chemistry experiment. Evo started to pass me and I mustered the breath to say "Go get it!". Later she chastised me for wasting the breath to cheer her on.  I promised her that it wouldn't have mattered. A few of us sat in the feedzone for our respective boys, dodging bottles and generally yelling (mostly encouragment) each time a field went by. A nice dip in the pool afterward was on order, along with a fantastic dinner to fuel for the next day's races.

Sunday's start times were in the 0700 hour -ouch.  We arrived early, set up camp and the boy went off about 30mins before my start.  Nice warm up, plenty of time.  Got on the bike, made myself look like an alien to fit in with everyone else (the helmets - they just crack me up).

Rolled out with Evo, who led us to the start listed on the flyer.

(Red and bolded text added for emphasis)

 
And on Bikereg.  

And on the flyer included in the tech manual.   

And it was wrong.  It was the OLD starting spot.

I finally arrived a cool 3 minutes AFTER my start time. Fashionably late does NOT apply in time trials. Needless to say, I was pedaling angry, which probably helped me pull out a decent time of 26:29.  Would have been 5th on the TT (I believe) and would have moved me up significantly on the GC.  BUT, add 3mins to that and ... well, lets just say things did not work in my favor.  YES, I realize it is the rider's responsibility to be on time for the start and I can own that. But when 2.5 of the 3 sources note the wrong address ... how is that fair? If I were the only one, shame on me ... but from the stories I've heard, that was not the case. Poor form and nothing I can do about it but whine- so consider yourself whined upon.

Photo Credit: Jim Wilson. 

We arrived to the crit early to secure a decent parking spot. I couldn't stand the thought of changing wheels to sit on the trainer so I hopped out on the roads for a few mins and then waited to start the race. Made the mistake of checking TT results and, I won't lie, there were tears when I realized no one was going to do a damn thing about it. So, I started the crit pedaling angry. Which, it appears, does kind of good things for my racing performance. First, a good TT time (sans the 3min penalty) and now, in the final crit, where it was a race of attrition and I did not get attrished. Ok, maybe I made up that word but you know what I mean and, who knows, maybe it'll catch on.  Anyway, I apparently finished in the top 20 and in the $$, and you are warned not to make me angry before a race. 

The one halfway decent result does NOT reflect a pretty decent weekend of racing for me. I've been racing since 2004 and while I've made plenty of mistakes, I've never been late for a race, much less a TT start time. Some will use the argument that it is the rider's responsibility and I'm just whining. That's usually applicable but in this situation, there are mitigating circumstances.  Again, nothing I can but suck it up, call it experience and move on.