Stars and Bars!!

Read about it here.

SICK Gila crit!

T-minus 11 hours until the start of tomorrow's queen stage, and I'm wired! The Gila Stage 4 Criterium just finished four hours ago, and it was a blast! SUPER windy, awesome course with a good-sized hill and fast descent, and an amazing crowd. The entire town of Silver City came out, and we wanted to give them a show. I was super happy to find my legs once more, and I made sure to spin for an hour this morning to flush them out and get the juices flowing. It's definitely nice to finally race in the afternoon instead of NINE AM.

For a full race report and some sweet pics, as well as my TrainingPeaks file from the race, check out my TwoWheelTales author page! And you'll really like this one.

I'll be writing another post tomorrow afternoon, post-Gila Monster. During the stage, check out the team's Twitter feed--Rob will be holding his phone up high to get some reception and give live updates! I've got my work cut out for me, and let's just say I'll be trying to get some serious face time for Ciclismo Racing while helping our top GC boys Ben and Rolf!

A true tale of suffering: the Gila TT!

WOW, I haven't felt that slow on the TT bike in a long time!! The lungs are so toasted at this point that I can barely pedal the bike. It was a hot and windy ride, and the Gila TT course is infamous for destroying rhythm and forcing riders into submission. I definitely understand now!

Check out my new TwoWheelTales post for a detailed description of the race. Long story short, let's just say that the power file is going to look like a decent tempo ride! At this point I've realized that the altitude is going to make my life worse and worse throughout the race, because the legs feel very strong but the lungs are giving out earlier and earlier. Tomorrow's criterium should be very fun because I can probably go hard for short periods, and our fast-man Phil is riding really strong and is revved up to finally show his stuff in his specialty event. I know the team is going to be showing well tomorrow!

I'll be doing my best to finish the race well and help get Ben into position for the climbs on the final stage, the Gila Monster. Feeding throughout the 105 mile, three-climb stage is crucial, and I'll have my work cut out for me. I'm really excited to have a guy on the team riding so strongly and fighting it out for a top GC spot!

In other news, the Keller Center Dedication has made it's video available on the Center for Innovation in Engineering Education website! Check it out:

Another TwoWheelTale

CHECK IT! Also, look for me in any pics with Lance/Levi/Horner through the valley mid-stage . . . I made sure to ride just behind the Mellow Johnny train! Legs are still feeling good, lungs are not finding any more oxygen, and the team has really come together--I'm STOKED for the rest of the Tour of the Gila. Keep reading more at TwoWheelTales and our team's live Twitter Feed, written by our in-house extrovert, Rob Noble, the Ciclismo Racing Director of Communications.

Ciclismo on Twitter!

Rob Noble, our Communications Director, is riding along in the team vehicle handing up food, dishing out encouragement, and updating the Twitter feed live with race goings-on. CHECK IT OUT!

First Gila stage down, four more to go!

An excellent day for Ciclismo Racing!!! We got Ben Kneller and Rolf Eisinger into the top-30, placing 18th and 28th, respectively. Here is a detailed review of the race at TwoWheelTales.

I'm fed, massaged, and putting the legs up . . . tomorrow is going to be a good day. Look for me in the breaks!

Also, look for me along/behind/in front of a certain boy from Texas.

Racing with Lance after all!

Apparently he will be racing with Chris Horner and Levi Leipheimer in the Mellow Johnny's jerseys.

Check out TwoWheelTales for Tour of the Gila and on!

I've just begun writing for TwoWheelTales.com. I'm flying out to Albuquerque at 9AM tomorrow morning for the Tour of the Gila--it should be a blast! After that I'm heading back up to Fort Collins, CO with the Ciclismo boys and will meet up with Nick Bennette and Austin Roach (of Princeton Cycling fame) to bring it to the other collegiate cyclists at Nationals.

Point is this: I'm planning to keep diaries for each big race I do this season, and these diaries will be written on TwoWheelTales.com. It's an excellent site where you can look through and read about the goings-on in other professional cyclists' lives.

Do not fret, I will still be writing for get on your bike and ride! This will be my personal blog, where I talk about anything I want related to what I've been doing in life, what my plans are, etc. My TwoWheelTales blog will be much more race specific. The two will obviously be interconnected!

Time to pack up, tie up some more loose ends with school, and get some sleep before THE BIG SHOW BEGINS!

Keller Center video

http://www-dev-edit.princeton.edu/news/media/keller/

ARMY!

After a ROUGH week at school (Nuclear Physics paper followed by an Automatic Controls 24-hour take-home midterm and a full-day video shoot for the Keller Center opening) I was pretty wrecked going into the Army race weekend at West Point, New York. No worries, the weather turned out to be better than expected on Saturday (no rain, only 30+ mph wind to deal with!) and Sunday (INCREDIBLE sun and 70s!!).

We had MANY Princeton cyclists, with almost the full team racing, so it was a blast--only Austin "The Roach" was missing due to a mandatory plasma physics geek-conference. No TTT for Men's A, but Bennette and I got in plenty of training outside of the races. My legs were FULL of crap in the very tough circuit race on Saturday, but I made it into the break with some serious heavy-hitters: Jamie Driscol and Vinnie Scalia of University of Vermont, Josh Lipka of University of New Hampshire, Chris Ruhl of Penn State, and Derek Merkler of Army.

We worked well together, and it was apparent that we had made the winning move after just the first few tough laps. The gap soon balooned to well over a minute, but I also knew that things were going to explode with the two best UVM guys in the break. With three laps to go of a two-mile circuit, Vinnie launched a HARD attack up the finishing hill and Jamie got a free ride for a lap. Josh, Chris, Derek and I worked well to slowly reel him in, knowing that Jamie would then launch his attack. Sure enough, just one lap after Vinnie made his move, we were about to catch him on the finishing hill and Jamie blasted off with Josh hanging on for dear life.

With just two laps to go, the situation was now 3 vs. 3, and Chris, Derek and I knew we had no chance of both catching Josh/Vinnie/Jamie and beating them up the climb. I especially knew my legs had some governors on them--whenever I went over 90% on the hill, they just locked up and had no fluidity to them. OUCH.

We kept them within spitting distance, but it didn't matter--I ended up going my 90% maximum up the hill the last time and getting last in the break. I was happy to have made the right selection and fought it out, but I also knew my legs were wrecked from a tough week and not being recovered. I knew the next day would be much better and the legs would be opened up . . .

Army Hill Climb Time Trial power file

Sunday started off with an early-morning BANG! in the form of a hill climb time trial on West Point's campus. A nice little 10-minute climb with 650 feet of elevation gained on excellent roads was made much harder by the incredible headwinds and crosswinds. I was very happy with my performance, getting 4th and posting a very good power number: 399 for just over 10 minutes, equating to 5.4 W/kg. I'd say that's not much above my threshold power when I'm completely fresh and ready to race, so that's really encouraging!

The team hung out, enjoyed the beautiful weather, and raced all day long. We had some brilliant performances (Becca and Rocco mixing it up right at the front of the Women's B and Men's C) but also some sad events (Brian running over a guy on the last lap and breaking his bike, the second year in a row at Army!).

Army Criterium: not the hardest race I've ever done ;-)

It was a great vacation from school, and I'm very happy my form came around and the team got to hang out and bond. We're going to finish the collegiate season strongly, and I am on track for the next three weeks of school, my final three weeks of Princeton!!

Check out some sweet picture from the racing this weekend!!