For better or worse, it's been one hell of a year

I’ve finally had the will and the time took look back on the past year and how it’s been. So much has changed since the start of the year. Have you ever looked back on old times and not even recognized the person you were in those memories? That’s a bit trippy I’ll admit, but that’s how it feels for me right now. But then again I’ve kept making the same mistakes, so I guess I haven’t changed that much, for better or worse.

The big positive is definitely the riding. I don’t know if I really made the leaps in racing I was hoping to make. One thing I know for sure is that my entire mind set has changed, and so have my legs. I went from doing 200 watts average to 250 watts average on my hard rides. I have even had some crits with powers over 300! I’d be silly to really think that all that was stronger legs though. Some of it is from learning how to suffer. There’s a difference between going hard and going deep. So it’s good to know that when I go deep, there is a lot of power in these legs.

But as far as racing goes, my results while good could be better. I had a lot of opportunities to win races where I just let it go. Melon city, a few collegiate races and most recently at New Year’s. Those races are hard to live down for me. Most people get down when they have bad legs or crash. I know those things happen, and while you can stop it, nobody’s perfect. But to have no one between you and the finish line is something special and it kills me when I mentally can’t pull through. This happened to me way too much this year.

I also am amazed at how I didn’t see some of the bad things coming. In retrospect it’s easy I guess, but still. After re-reading some of my earlier post, I literally would say I don’t think I’m going to do well here, and then I seemed surprised later when I failed. That’s got to stop. I need plan better than that. I’ve had this sense of urgency in the last year because I feel like I’m getting too old to race bike professionally. I’ve been putting everything into it, and it’s bit me in the ass. Even though I was one of the people who were balancing school and racing, plus work, looking back I don’t know how I dealt with it all. Actually I do know how, I did poorly in everything just to get by. Not the way I want to live. It’s time to start looking for quality, not quantity.

So I have started working on next year, and there are a lot of changes coming for me this year as well, hopefully I can grow up a little more because I need it. I’d like to think I’ve got this whole life thing figured out, but I distinctly remember saying that before, and I was wrong. I think J-pow said it best. Everyone is human, and we all make mistakes. The best thing you can do is to wake up every morning and try as hard as you can. I’d like to add on to that with work smart and work hard. Hopefully 2012 is full both those and some success. I’ll take the little victories, but I want to succeed at something that matters.

I wish everyone the best of luck in 2012.

#CXnats!

Wow, it’s hard to believe it’s all done for a while now. As much as I love riding and racing, I was getting to the point where it didn’t seem to have an end. But I will tell you something, it sure went out with a bang!

After a great weekend in Chicago, I was feeling good and motivated to kill it at nationals. I didn’t really get any serious riding in the week before because I was busy, but I think I did enough to keep things feeling good and I spent most spare time either resting or cleaning and preparing for the weekend. We had some guys from Idaho come and stay for the race with us and we went to a few bars on Wednesday. Probably not the best idea, but we had a good time anyways.

But then it came, Saturday morning. I went early to see Dave race. He was riding pretty well, considering that the mud was so frozen it was like riding a rock garden. Guys were going down all over the place, 2 huge pile ups happened on the first few corners. I was glad I wasn’t out there. He ended the race with a tough crash that gave him a bump on the head and some sore joints. Sad to see his season end like that, but he’s a tough guy, and I look forward to watching him race next year.

But once that was over I started to think about my race later that day more. I had talked  to some teammates and had a pit bike for the muddy conditions and was running Dave’s awesome aluminum wheels with those Challenge Limus’ I love so much. I ended up putting my Mud2s on some wider rims so they were actually pretty good as well. So the gear was all set up.

As the time got closer and closer my nerves got worse and worse. I usually handle stress in a very specific way. Most people have to pee all the time, or shake, or act really nervous; I just a funky stomach. It doesn’t really mean anything, but it makes it difficult to eat. I was trying to eat at the right times to make sure I had the fuel I needed, but it was tough. I was able to stomach some bars and gels. But nerves were getting to me.

Once I started my warm-up things got a little better. I had a good friend Nick helping me in the pit and he did an excellent job. Not just taking care of the bikes, but also keeping me calm and making everything worry free. That helped a lot. It also got better once I hit the start line. Just talking with some guys helped to relieve the stress it think. Lined up second row behind Cody Kiser and felt good.

The start was furious! Much more aggressive than I’m used to, but about what I expected from a higher level of racing. I held my place and got what I’ll call a pretty good start. But the legs were just not there. After the first time through the pits I was falling back from the top 10 to top 20, maybe. I didn’t quite have the pop I wanted to start. But the muddy conditions made things unpredictable and a lot of guys were having to put a foot down or getting into the tape. After the second lap started I got comfortable in the pace I was setting so I started to focus on passing. I was surprised at how many passes I was able to make. I never really got into a group either. There was a lot of movement from people moving up or down.

It wasn’t until the last lap that a little group formed through the start line. When one of the riders attacked I responded. But I wasn’t able to make the catch, but dropped the rest of the guys in the process. I put the pedal to the floor for the next half lap until the stair section when I had a chance to look back and had a sizeable gap. I kept it hot, but focused more on catching the rider in front and less on staying a head of the rider behind. But after the sand pit I just couldn’t see myself bridging the gap so I knew I had done all I could do. I ended up in 13^th place with a sizeable gap back. I was super excited to have a good result to cap off the year with KS/TW.

The next day was Collegiate racing action, super stupid early in the morning; 9am. I can’t really remember the last time I raced that early. It reminded me a little of racing citizen in WORS when I was little. The big difference here of course was that instead of a muddy race like the day before, the ground was totally frozen, so just like the masters race the day before, people were all over the place.

I had a second row start again, and got in pretty good. I had the pop in the legs to stay up there and was top 5 maybe going into the pits. The legs felt better than the day before and I was able to hold somewhere around 5 place until the stairs. I tripped on the stairs but quickly got up, then kept going. But when I put the bike down the rear wheel was dragging! I didn’t know what was wrong; I checked the chain, the brakes, the spokes, turns out the wheel had come out of the dropouts! With people running by me I did the best I could to put the wheel back in quickly. But at least 10 guys had run by me. After getting back on the bike it felt sloppy under me, when I looked down the wheel was way out of true. I limped into the pits for the pit bike. After that it was tough to keep the pressure on. I rode with a teammate for a lap or two and eventually dropped him. The legs felt good, but each pass was just so much effort that I didn’t max myself. I rolled in for a respectable 18th place. Certainly not what I was hoping for, but without really knowing what to expect, I’m pretty happy. Oh yea, 5th PLACE IN THE TEAM D1 OMNIUM!!!

It was a pretty good way to end the year, and I’m glad to have some time to take off for the next few weeks at least. Big things are starting to happen already for next year, and part of that will start with a good reflection of this past year, so look for that soon.