races #'s 2 and 3, Forest Park

Yesterday was the Forest Park. I entered the Masters and CAT 3's races. I was a little skeptical that my legs wouldn't hold up since I moved a bunch of stuff into our new place over the weekend, but thought I couldn't miss an opportunity to gain some fitness.

The first race was the Masters. I think there was anywhere from 30-50 guys in it. The race was pretty smooth. I chased down a few breaks and tried to catch another group of two up the road. I got caught in no mans land and realized my legs didn't have overdrive so I gave up the chase and fell back into the group. About 2/3's through the race there was several guys up the road a bit. A couple guys jumped and another groups was slowly starting to form. At this point I found myself in front leading our the main group only to watch a few guys jump to catch the few up the road. I saw that Denny was one of the guys that jumped so I held off and just held my ground allowing the group to form. It was at that point the lead break formed. I was relegated to the second group. I think by the end of it we widdled our group down to about 10. One guy jumped before the last corner and I thought he would take our sprint. I was about third or fourth wheel and as we sprinted towards the finish we caught that guy and I ended up getting second out of the field sprint.

The CAT 3 race was right after the Masters. I got one cool down lap before lining up for the 3's. I changed water bottles, but had no gels. I forgot them all in the car. The goal for this race was to just have a respectable finish and get more racing in the legs. I would also try to help my teammates in any way I could having just done the masters race. The only problem was that we didn't communicate anything to anybody and had no idea who was doing what. We basically had no gameplan, well, at least that I knew about. We also had several new faces that I never raced with before. The Dogfish representation was by far the most talented I've ever seen in a CAT 3 race. We had a mix of everthing, sprinters, all-arounders, workers, you name it. This race had at least 50 guys in it. I was a nice sized field and not too shabby for an early season race. The race finally settled after about 20 minutes and I was able to get into a rythm. I started to position myself on the last few laps to get towards the front. I thought the best line would be to stay on the outside on the turn heading into the headwind. I seemed to be getting boxed in on the inside. Well, that was the wrong decision. On the last lap a couple guys bumped and they were swerving from left to right. Finally, the guy absolutely lost it and turned right in front of me. I had nothing to do, but T-bone him. Fortunately for me he broke my fall and I was unscathed, just a chip taken off the paint. I was back on my bike in a matter of seconds, but long enough that the group was out of sight. I checked my bike, jumped back on, and rode to the finish. That's when it got a little embarrassing. After I crossed the line I looked down to check my bike and when I looked up I nailed the curb and fell into the grass. I played it off as best I could, but still pretty embarrassing.

All in all it was a good day. Afterwards I drove to Kansas City and then straight into work.