I guess I’ve been doing a pretty horrendous on keeping this updated-so here comes a brief update since I last wrote about our ride up to the cabin.

Summer was focused on racing bikes, preparing for Spain, working hard, and enjoying Minneapolis the sun, my roommates, and my friends. Working two jobs I took a few trips down home to Wisconsin and two to Chicago (one for business, one for pleasure). I had a little back issue which lead my bike racing season to end with a whimper.

And then, after an incredible final camping trip in St. Croix State Park with most of my best friends, I moved out in a stressful 8 hour period, and got dropped off at the airport by Liza.

The first week involved me buying a new laptop (I lost mine in the Newark Airport but it was remarkably returned), orienting myself, getting a phone worked out, trying to learn some more Spanish, learning little Spanish. I stayed in town the first weekend. I figured out the night life spots and the layout of the town.

Living in a different country is completely insane-stuff is just different. I’m so fortunate to have a great host family (a nuclear family, Paola 9 and Javi 14) and a beautiful and comfortable house. My life would be so much less pleasant here if I didn’t feel at home in my apartment.

One of the first few weekends I stayed with a few americans and a few spanish ladies in a house in the pueblo near Sevilla. We ate well, drank the local beer, Cruzcampo, and swam a lot in the pool. Some barefoot soccer and some sun were well warranted.

The next two weeks were filled with an intensive Spanish class-the incredible Vanessa Jiménez taught us. I would wake up, work out, eat lunch, have some lunch, and head to class. Afterwards, tapas followed by some dinner. Somewhere in there I got a bike and got the wheels stolen, then bought a new set of wheels. That was an adventure I won´t get into, involving 3 hours of waiting, calling, bribing a lottery vendor to watch my bike so I could buy a lock at a department store-practically everything here alternates between adventure and wanting to pack it up entirely, which makes one develop a remarkable patience along with a ‘screw it´ attitude-I think it’s why kids who study abroad end up coming back confident and a bit more casual.

We went to Cadiz one of those weekends, the oldest city in western Europe. We toured the old roman amphitheater and the cathedral, then hung out at an incredible beach. Later, a light lunch of fried octopus and tinto de verano, an only-a-little boozy red wine/lemonade concoction.

And then real life hit. Classes stopped my once liberal sleep schedule in it’s tracks. 9 am obligations every morning keep my bedtime reasonable. The first day of class I woke up at 8:57 for a 9am MANDATORY class-took a taxi and met my teacher, who ended up being remarkably more sympathetic than most Spaniards had been telling me.

This summer, I committed to an internship for a small Spanish business in Seville. That week, we had a speed date interview round. I interviewed with a few companies, and I wanted to work at a restaurant group here in Seville but ended up choosing an agency that manages Flamenco artists. I just started and it’s plenty interesting navigating a multilingual workplace.

My classes are pretty light on workload but the fact that I have two Spanish classes and I’m motivated to learn the language makes me work hard every day. I like my professors and feel like I’m learning a lot.

After school kicked off, I went with my good buddy Jake to Málaga. We dropped in for a night at a hostel there and had an incredible time. Amazing seafood, an Argentine named Andrés went dancing with us and a couple of british girls. We visited the cathedral, the historic Alcazaba, the port, and convinced some street sellers to let us ride an electric scooter and a segway, achieving a lifelong dream. We also watched our first La Liga game (3-0 Málaga) and ran into an incredible powerful procession of hundreds towards the church. To return, we took a BlaBlaCar (one step away from hitchhiking) with a Sevillano military man, Adrián.

Another week of school, another Sevilla fútbol game, a 100 names and a thousand milder adventures later, and I booked a last minute ticket to Paris. I had 3.5 days to do as much as I could with as little money as possible.

I dropped in and didn’t want to spend the 8 euro to get to the center, so I hopped a transit bus to the the center so I could take a metro stop. I walked/trained hopped my way to a couple of espressos, croissants, and a falafel lunch until I made it to the Eiffel tower. I made it and it was one of my favorite parts of the trip-Paris from up high is just unlimited urban sprawl punctuated by famous monument. Notre Dame here, Sacre Coeur there. I spent a few hours and called my parents from the the third deck.

I figured out how to metro to the hostel with only one wrong turn, then made it to the hostel. A quick dinner later I made it back to the hostel in time for the wine and cheese hour, where I met a chilean, german, australian, british girl, more I can’t remember. The cheese is incredible, the wine is at the very least well above average, the people are mean and look unhealthy.

The next day a girl from the hostel accompanied me to Versailles, an hour train ride away. We stopped between the palace and the garden for a lunch of cheese and bread, and then toured the gardens. Versailles is ridiculous. It´s beautiful, but simultaneously feels overindulgent and disgusting in regards to the history.

Although I was blown out, already, Beth, the brit, made me to go to the Lourve (it’s free on Friday nights). I met a mildly famous mumble rapper, Nessly, and took a picture with him a room over from the Mona Lisa. We did a quick tour before hopping back on the train to the Jewish district to grab some falafel. It was godly. When we made it back to the hostel, the bread, cheese, and wine was already flowing, and when that quieted down, I was roped into attending a rave at the Moulin Rouge. I couldn’t say no to that.

The next day I took the metro down to Ile de la Cite to visit Notre Dame. There are a lot of churches here, and the Notre Dame isn’t particularly different than any other. What I did enjoy was the museum below, on the history, foundation, and growth of Paris. After I walked around the rest of the island, where Paris originally started, and ran into a techno parade.

Dinner was pizza since I was feeling broke and I ate it talking to a Cote d’Ivoire bracelet vendor/scammer. He wants to move to the US to become a taxi driver-it’s good money, he told me. He said he makes 10-20 euros a day.

The next day I made it to the Arc d’Triomphe, where I teared up a little over the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier-a hundred years later, fresh flowers appear every day over the tomb. Then to the Musee d’Orsáy with some Rembrandt, Van Gogh, Picasso, Goya. The train to the airport is below the museum, and I made it to the flight with about an hour to spare. The flight into Sevilla looped around the city once before it landed-incredible to see the city that ‘ve grown to know.

Paris was solidly great, but I don’t feel like going back very soon. Everyone I connected with wasn’t from France (which could be my fault as I don’t speak french). The city was a bit gray and scammy-no one was friendly, everyone was gray, and everyone wanted all of my money. They have tourist prices and local prices, as I learned about halfway through my trip.

And last weekend, I went with a new group to Lagos, Portugal, a small tourist beach town. It was mostly beach days, with some karaoke. Saturday we visited Benagil, a famous cave where you visit by swimming about 100 yards to turn the corner to see a huge cenote type geological structure. Sunday, I walked down to the center and had 4 hours to kill, so I walked into an fish grill that was a little off the beaten path- a french couple invited me to dine with them so I ate with them and chatted. They’re big runners and have both ran the Chicago and Boston Marathons.

After, a went down to the Marina and tried to get a boat tour. Unfruitful except for a french guy who let me peek into the cabin of his 36 foot catamaran-mission accomplished.

And that brings us to today, I guess.

I can’t say the good without the bad. My biggest problems so far-Spanish comes slow and every time I get a little more confident, I have a horrible conversation or try to talk to someone who I literally can’t understand.

I haven’t met as many Spanish people as I would’ve liked to, so I’ve been making more and more of an effort to reach out-at the bar, mostly, but other places as well.

I’m tired often, I miss my bike, my friends, Liza. I’ve been having problems getting on a team for the spring which is frustrating and feels entirely unfair. It’s been hard to be president due to the workload and the timezone. I spend tons of money.

But, for now, I’m happy, and I can’t wait to travel and learn more Spanish. I also can’t wait to get home. I also have a lot of problems. And my back sometimes hurts.

 

I do a horrible job of taking pictures of things and an even worse job of writing things down, but hopefully since I have just written the last 4 months off of my conscience, I might do better of just jotting down a quick few facts of the trips I take while here. For you as well as for me.

Jack

Nats was a big target for all of us this year. Logan and Chase have been on pretty good form all year, I’ve gotten in shape the last month or so. Calder has been working hard all season and upgraded to an A after the first race. It was rough for him at the beginning but he’s turned into quite the formidable rider-it’s a school of hard knocks but I’m so glad he upgraded. He’s become such an important part of the team both on and off the road.

We left Wednesday evening and drove to Omaha (which we found out has a bigger population than the city of Minneapolis) and stayed at some host housing there (Thanks to Kevin Limpach.) We got up early the next day and drove the rest of the way with enough time to spare for a ride in the early evening.  We checked into our room but had to switch into only a marginally better room because they hadn’t cleaned the first one. We finally got out for a ride where I dropped my chain and almost crashed. We went to bed in time for a healthy 9 hours of sleep in advance of the road race start at 1 pm the next day.

I was the protected rider for the four laps of the hilly and exposed course of 66 miles. The race started off pretty easy, with no moves going. The first time up the couple of kickers, the race split up a little but came back together. By the start of the second lap, the race had seriously separated with a break of 3 Colorado riders up the road (always dangerous at altitude), and a seriously diminished group (30 riders?), who all had either teammates up the road or only had a couple of riders left in the field. I floated back to see if any of my teammates had made the split and no one had. Coming around into the kickers, I felt my wheel rub on the pavement once, and asked the guy next to me if I had gone flat. It was a slow leak, so I decided to wait until after the descent to get a wheel.

At the bottom I pulled over but the neutral support guy couldn’t get the wheel into the dropout, which caused the neutral wheel to rub really seriously on the brake pads. He finally got the wheel in, and I took off, passing one of the dropped groups and drafting off of the car for a minute. I heard I had over three minutes to make up, and decided to pull out at the beginning of the lap, where I saw Calder and Logan had pulled out as well. I found out via my Garmin that I had been stopped for 3.5 minutes trying to sort the wheel out. Chase finished the race just inside the top 50, the rest of us were bummed. We got dinner and then drove to recon the TTT course.

I asked last years TTT bronze medalist, UW-Madison Alum, and Collegiate Omnium Natty Champ Max Ackermann for some advice. He told us to burn a rider before the turnaround because of the altitude. After the recon we finalized our pacing strategy, determining that Calder would take his last pull around the turnaround.

It was an early wakeup for a 9:45 start time. We warmed up independently the next morning and all got in a good headspace. We knew that it was going to hurt if we were going to do well, and we all knew we could suffer for each other, We went over to the line, starting 4th out of the 11 teams. The last preps happened quickly as they always do, and before we knew it we were away into the first rolling section. We were working great together, I tried to pull up the hills as much as I could while still being effective in the rotation and Calder and Logan would try to pull down them. We had already passed the team that started in front of us. The last 3-4 miles before the turnaround were a pretty brutal headwind, and we all went really deep. We made it around the turnaround quickly and cleanly and Calder dropped off. Only three left. We were committed.

The ride back was screaming fast due to the tailwind, I was in my biggest gear almost the whole time. We hurt, but if someone needed to take a shorter pull, the next one of us was ready to go and drill it. we reached the turn to the finishing stretch, which was up a pretty steep 2km hill. I went to the front, knowing this was my strongest part.

So I pulled. Harder than I ever have-it honestly gives me chills writing this. I was thinking about how bad it hurt. I was praying Logan and Chase were still on my wheel. Chase yelled a few words of encouragement which helped. A guy on the side of the road cheered for us, then winced, which helped too. With 500m left Chase and Logan came around me and started sprinting. I did all I could to hang on.

When we crossed the line: “And with that time, Minnesota goes into the hot seat.”

We all collapsed on the side of the road. Logan sat against a rock. Me and Chase lied down in the road. We all smiled at each other. I was crying/laughing a little bit but I had to stop because I couldn’t breathe. Even if we hadn’t set the fastest time, we all knew that we had done one of our best efforts.

As the teams rolled in, none of them bested our time. Another team we had our eye out for, CSU rolled in second to last without beating our time. We knew we had the silver locked up. Then the defending champs, CU Boulder rolled in. We listened for their time: a minute faster than us. We all deflated a bit, but in no way could be disappointed by our tremendous result. That afternoon, we celebrated with some coffee before getting some pizza financed by my mother. We went over to the Nationals Banquet for a podium picture. The CU Boulder team has 2 pros on it. We were very happy.

The final day was the crit. We were all committed to a singular goal-win. It was another hot day, quite sunny in Grand Junction. We got to the course well in advance, got some coffee, tried to stay cool and out of the sun. We were all trying to emulate our own ‘in the zoneness’ from the day before, and all got there. Then we were off. Logan was the team leader, me and Chase were going to try to infiltrate any dangerous breaks.

I started next to Logan towards the back and it took us only 2 laps to work our way to the front. (#critlife). Five laps in, Chase, Logan, and I were all active at the front. A slightly dangerous move escaped around then for 6ish laps, but was pulled back by the Colorado teams. Their recapture kicked off a flurry of attacks, one strong move escaped with me,CSU, CU Boulder, and UCLA. We were dragged back a couple of laps later, and then the real move went. It started off with fiveish riders, then Chase rolled off into the move behind Road Race national champ Eric Brunner. 9 got up the road, and Logan pulled up to me a little while later “it’s gone,” he said. I agreed. We had both been in the box for the first 30 minutes of the race and were hot, tired, and content with the fact that chase made the break.

We looked around and realized there were only about 30 people left in the main field. 10ish riders made vain attempts at chasing and attacking but failed to bring back any meaningful time. The group trickled down to 25, then 20. One to go Logan got on my wheel but I was swarmed. Two corners to go I got back up front, but someone came into me hard in the final stretch and I was passed by probably 10 people, almost going down in the process. Chase had attacked in the final lap but was caught, ending up 9th. Logan got 12th, I rolled in for 21st. A solid day for any team, but a little disappointing given our expectations.

We sat on the curb for about 30 minutes. Calder bought us all sodas-he had crashed out 20 minutes in and broke his bike. Somehow he was still happy he had come to nats. I was happy he tagged along.

We got milkshakes and sandwiches after the race. Then we started the long drive home. We stopped in North Platte, Nebraska for 7.5 hours of sleep after a traffic jam and an 11,000 foot, high altitude, outdoor pee stop. The next day we arrived in time for me to work a Monday evening shift at the ramen shop I work at.

36 hours driving. Four medals. 2600 miles. A few tears, a little blood. A great nationals. Next year it’s in Augusta, Georgia. We’re not messing around this time.

Reflecting on this experience I am so incredibly grateful for the graduating seniors, the new members, our sponsors (TNR Tape, HED, Hollywood Cycles, The Fix Studio, more), our school, my parents, my friends, my job, so much. This wouldn’t be possible without the support and love of so many people. It’s incredible how much support we’ve gotten from our mentors, competitors, teammates, strangers, U of M alums. I truly can’t list them all.

Lastly, I’d like to thank Logan and Calder. You guys are tremendous leaders and do so much for not only the team, but each individual inside of it. I’m so sad to see you guys leave, but I know you have big plans.

Logan: congrats on your marriage, your imminent Cat 1 upgrade, your graduation, and your exciting future. You’ve been an incredibly influential individual not only on my development in bike racing, but also as my maturation as person. You’re an incredible role model. I mean it.

Calder: I’m so glad we have had the chance to become friends. You are a jack of all trades in athleticism, hobbies, travel, cooking, so much more. You are an inspiration to me. Sorry about the bike. Can’t wait to adventure with you this summer.

I really love these guys. I really love the team. This shit makes me so happy.

Jack

P.S. Louis, Chase, and Liza: glad you guys are my friends.

 

 

 

Joe Martin was one of the early season targets that I had lined up, with a lot of winter training dedicated to the 10ish minute time trial that had been switched from Stage 1 to Stage 3. Last year was a tremendous learning experience, where I did really well the first day and then progressively got more and more exhausted until I was dropped about halfway through the crit the final day. I guess you can read about it here.

We woke up early on Wednesday so we could drive to Fayetteville and arrive in the early evening. The drive was fine, I slept a lot, and we got there pretty uneventfully. I had fried rice for lunch. I stopped eating meat a couple of months ago, so that’s been an interesting transition, especially when traveling, but it’s been wholly manageable. We rode the finish for stage 1, a new, summit-ish finish.

I picked up some kit from the Borah Factory Racing guys, the Minnesotan team that I was guest riding for, and we talked tactics a little bit. We went to bed early and got ready for an 11am rollout the next day.

The course was brand new, with two pretty serious climbs and one in the last 40ish kilometers called ‘Hell’s Kitchen,’ a really painful and selective climb. The first miles were anxious, no moves going, and then there was a mad dash for the front as we hit a technical descent about 30 miles in. Then we started climbing. It was a hot day, and bodies were popping off. I got to the top in the second group, and bridged to the front group of 15 with fellow Minnesotan and collegiate racer Sam Fritz. I thought the selection had been made, but the group was unmotivated to work and we were caught by the second group, swelling to about 40 people. There were some probing attacks that went and were brought back before Hell’s Kitchen, but everyone was prepping for the fireworks on the climb.

Hell’s Kitchen popped a few people off but didn’t affect anything dramatically. The group coalesced on the descent into town and about 25km out, my teammate Peter Olejniczak attacked with a few others. I covered a lot of moves until they were clear and then more or less sat in. Ones and twos would go, and I would cover some of them, but I was pretty fried.

Up the final climb I was in a group of 7 or 8 representing everyone who made the lead group over Hell’s Kitchen but hadn’t yet attacked. I cramped up the summit finish and was the last out of that group, finishing 24th. Peter ended up 3rd, and I feel like I really contributed to that finish. It was a good day, really hot, and proved that I was ready to be a factor in the race.

Day two I flatted before the 20 mile mark. I rode with 3 others who flatted on the same stretch of road for the last 90 miles. It started raining. It sucked. It was the hardest day I’ve ever had on the bike. My GC hopes were flattened, but we made the time cut to ride the next day.

Day three was the TT. I was tired, but felt ok. Thanks to a less-than-stellar race commissar, I almost missed my start time. I raced without looking at my power meter, and caught three guys during the race. I ended up with a time of 11:02, 30 seconds slower than last year. I was happy with the result and my execution. I ended up 19th, a very strong result, but I was upset with what could have been.

Day four we stayed most of the morning in the AirBNB-the crit started late and we wanted to rest in advance of the race. It was a really cold day and I was nervous about what to wear. I was also nervous since I had gotten dropped the previous year, and was dedicated to finishing and helping Peter get the stage and maybe claw back a couple spots on the overall. We got to the course well in advance and watched the finish of the pro men’s race. I didn’t get that good of a warmup in, but was excited to race. Peter told me to cover moves and be at the front of the race.

The course is really technical and a lot of people DNF each year. Lap by lap, the field pared down and I continued to do work for Peter. Two to go there was one guy off the front and I ended up first wheel. Peter told me to keep it steady, so I did. I was just happy to be there. The last lap was chaos, and Peter ended up second, pipped at the line by a quick and skinny U23 rider. But it was a good day, and I had proved that even if I wasn’t stronger this year, I was a better bike racer. I had been valuable to the team. I had finished in the to 25 3 of the four days. Without my setback on stage 2, I would’ve finished 17th in GC. I was so happy. Sunday nights driving home have been some of my favorite moments this year.

Getting home was a mess, with a 6 hour sleep stop in Iowa and a lost car key and an Uber from Bloomington to Carlson. I was out of shirts by then.

Thanks for reading. Below are a couple pictures of me taken by Brooks Bixler, who’s site is here. Check him out!

 

 

 

This winter I’ve started getting coached by the UMCT team president, Logan Grace. We’ve had a casual relationship so far, and he pushes me to work harder than I might if I was self coached. I started training pretty late this year, but I’ve found a bit of form this year and am enthused by the first several results of the season.

In other news, I will no longer be racing for Donkey Label this season. I’m disappointed to not be racing with them, but now I recognize that a team that doesn’t honor the commitments and dedication of their riders is a team that I don’t want to be a part of. So I’m exploring my options and considering riding unattached/doing some guest riding this year.

That’s a life update, but lets get into spring break. Every year the team goes on an extended training camp over spring break, and this year we woke up at 4 am to drive the 14 hours to the beautiful city of Boulder. We raced across the Nebraskan country side in a Ford Transit 10 passenger van and arrived the early evening.

The next days were a blur of training, gravel, snow, ice, rain, heat. Boulder is 10 minutes by bike away from the start of the mountains and because of that, each day, we biked west into the mountains for thousands and thousands of feet of climbing. I won’t get too detailed but below are a few pictures of the highlights of the trip.

Boulder was great. Beautiful people, good food, Guy Fieri endorsed restaurants, an awesome downtown, beer scene, and cool college campus. I want to move there but I checked Craigslist for apartments and it’s not cheap.

Friday we packed up and drove to Fort Collins for a 67 mile road race. It was an intense, windy Kermesse style race with a 2k gravel section that was won by way of gradual attrition. We didn’t make the break but all made the chase group, with me and Logan making the final selection-Logan ended up 6th, I think, 2nd behind the break, and I rolled in last in the chase group for 11th.

The legs are good. The weather is looking up. I don’t have a job lined up, unlike most people I go to school with, but I have faith it’ll work out. I’m still deciding on my bike racing priorities but I know one thing-I want to be fast. And I want to do a lot of things this summer.

Jack

With plans to leave early Monday morning, January 8th, me and Chase were well prepared. The car was ready, the bikes prepped, the AirBNB reserved, and the routes and distances roughly planned. We had been monitoring the recent colder weather and were prepared to pull the plug, but things were ready to go coming into Saturday night. Then we both got a text.

WILD BILL: I’m good to come with you guys?

JACK: lmao what

WILD BILL: I’m coming to Arkansas

I guess, in retrospect, we didn’t have a choice. So 5 AM Monday morning rolled around, after my employee holiday party the prior evening. Chase and, inexplicably, Wild Bill pulled up to my apartment. I guess this was really happening.

Chase was the brains of the operation, driving nearly (maybe all) the way to Arkansas as we pulled up. Chase is both indestructible and impossible. Have you ever heard of the sled dogs that love running so much that they will pull a sled until they die? They’re Chase’s spirit animal. Chase had a bad crash during cyclocross season, which made him start up late in training 2017, to set up for a few midseason spring goals, namely JMSR 2018 and Collegiate Nats.

Wild Bill née Alex Turner was the last minute addition. He just upgraded to Cat 3 last season and trains incredibly inensely. He’s blustery, sometimes abrasive, but supremely friendly, willing to chat with everyone. He was in Arkansas for the same reason as the rest of us, looking to get in some base training miles.

We were hosted a little further South this season by two southern gentlemen named Jarrod and Justin. They have 4 pets, 3 dogs and a cat, and are working on adopting a child from Missouri. It’s taking a little longer than expected, so their Christmas decorations are still up. Super nice folks and incredible puppies.

After a day 1 spin, day 2 we had a slight river crossing due to a bridge being out. There was a 20 foot gap and a 15 foot fall, with probably a 6 foot deep 20 foot wide patch that needed to be waded, but that didn’t initially deter Chase. He was 1/4 of the way across before me and Wild Bill told him ‘no way.’ It resulted in a 7 mile detour.

Chase and me shared a room, we’re getting to be experienced bunkmates. I’m excited to announce that next year we’ll be on the same team again, with a new group of folks. Logan, recently married, is making the hop across with us as the rest of the Apollo Velo boys head over to Minnesota Cycling Team. We’ll be racing with Donkey Label Racing this year, which will give us access to some incredibly strong and experienced teammates along with several new domestic elite races. I think a Cat 1 upgrade is on all of our minds, with an eye on Northstar Grand Prix in early summer. We’re stoked and Arkansas is just the first part of this adventure.

Days 3 and 4 were a blur of political arguments, waffle house, miles, pedal strokes, and Chipotle. We were bracing for a cold snap Friday, and it happened. We decided to cut the trip short and ended up heading up early, with many miles in our legs, and a few new experiences to write about. A good part of the trip ending early was that I managed to make it up to the cabin with Louis, Emma, Jordan, Waverly, Hailey, and Tony. It was a great time near St. Croix State Forest. Always a good time with tons of physical challenges and games. It was chilly this weekend but an excellent way to wind down winter break.

Lastly, Apollo Velo is using the influence and notoriety we developed last year by pivoting into a bike accessory business with  Louis and I taking the reins. We won a University of Minnesota business competition last month and have some great momentum heading into 2018. We’re looking for beta testers and brand ambassadors, so let me know if you have any thoughts or are looking for some free product in exchange for some feedback. We’d love to work with you.

I hope to get a little more back into the blogosphere as I continue to travel and study and live life. I had a big semester this fall but didn’t adventure too much beyond Minneapolis and that’s been the main reason for the lack of posts.

I hope all of my family, friends, and maybe some readers I don’t know are well going into 2018. I’m excited and I hope you all are too.

Jack

My girlfriend Cassidy and I had been contemplating another trip ever since Gooseberry Falls, but as college students on a budget we had to be a little choosy on our destination. After a few ideas (New Orleans and Montreal) ended up impractical for various reasons, some cheap $160 tickets to Los Angeles came up and we pounced. After a couple Airbnb arguments and subsequent relocation, we had a rough itinerary, and lodging and airfare combined for both of us ended up around $600-not horrible.

Wednesday

We left very early (4 AM) Wednesday morning and took an Uber to the light rail station to get to the airport. We were flying Spirit, and each had packed a very small bag that we could carry on with us so as to not spend unnecessary dollars (did I mention we were on a budget). The bags were packed pretty tight but not horribly so, and we made do. I slept through almost the whole plane ride and we landed almost 30 minutes ahead of schedule in LAX. With no bags to claim we walked about 100 yards and were thrown into the chaos of the surrounding LA airport, which is practically a self-sustaining economy itself. We rode a shuttle to the bus station and subsequently couldn’t find a bus to take us in the right direction. Thankfully Venice beach is only a few miles north of the airport. We hopped in another Uber and pulled up to the boardwalk itself. Our trip had begun. I looked at my phone. It was 9 AM.

After caching our bags at a hostel, we brunched at a nice vegetarian place called The Butcher’s Daughter. Everyone was beautiful and the guy (an actor) at the table next to us was talking to his date (a screenwriter) about how he had gone to Bali with his father to reset and unwind after his latest project failed. But he could still pay for avocado toast. I had the egg sandwich and Cassidy had a nice breakfast burrito and our waiter had extraordinarily good looks. We walked the boardwalk at Venice, changed and went swimming. Cassidy wouldn’t wander out far but I went into the 8 feet waves fearlessly and bravely. I left with moderate whiplash and approximately 1 pint of water in my sinuses. Although it doesn’t really have a reputation for a swimming beach, it was really fun and the boardwalk has a cool rundown ambience to it. After the swim we tried to hike a short ways to a coffee shop further away from the beach, which turned into a hike a long way from the beach because all the coffee shops had no seats, or no seats available, or a cup of coffee cost $13. We found one and hoped to charge our phones, but alas-no electrical outlets. Get it together Venice.

After deciding that we’d rather take a 30 minute car ride to the AirBNB than spending 2.5 hours on public transit we hopped in a car and arrived at a house with a thatched fence near an Armenian grocery store, a 7-11, a Thai Restaurant, and a Laveria.

We ate at the Thai Place (delicious) and went to bed at like 8 pm since we had been awake since 2 AM Los Angeles time.

Stuff I couldn’t mention: Hole in the wall weed dispensary witch doctors, sunburnt tourists, free canvas buzzfeed bags from a friendly Buzzfeed employee, spending too much on an Uber to North Hollywood

Thursday

After I woke up we got a feel for our surroundings- we were in a room with a concave mattress made completely out of tarps and cloth. Cassidy insisted it was ‘nice’ but I thought it was more reminiscent of camping than your typical AirBNB. The house was a typical bungalow and had three bathrooms, but in the backyard there were two campers and maybe 8 of the huts outside-they were perhaps 8 feet by 8 feet and all were under a tarp that stretched across the whole backyard. It was unusual but not poorly done-it did feel glamorous, and no one seemed turned off or intimidated about the situation. It was reminiscent of a hostel or a commune. We made a few friends at the house and don’t have much bad to say about it, but if I had to guess it breaks more than a few zoning laws. Me and Cassidy did the math and estimate that they have about $9000/month coming in from this setup.

We hung around and got our bearings at first, and I went for a walk around the neighborhood so that I could get a feel for what was going on in the neighborhood. We had our leftover thai food for lunch and then took an Uber to Griffith Observatory. It was hot and super sunny and we had initially planned to do a short hike but ended up bailing on that and just walking around the observatory for a while before going to a shaded roped off deck to hang out until the observatory itself opened. The observatory was excellent and really beautiful, and provided an awesome view of Griffith Park (which is actually really mountainous) and the Hollywood sign. We paid $5 to attend a planetarium show which was worth it and then took a few pictures before we argued about which bus to take down. But we made it down, upon which we had to take another bus that we subsequently missed. Fortunately, Griffith Park is not too far from Hollywood Boulevard so we uber’d there for like $5 or something practically as cheap as bus fare.

I was surprised to see that Hollywood Boulevard wasn’t quite the zoo I expected it to be. And then it was. The sidewalks were packed, people were everywhere, I saw spiderman, wonderwoman, and a lot of homeless people. We stepped into the mall for a second and were swarmed by thousands of tourists just like us. As we had seen a bunch of Hollywood stars and weren’t really impressed. We sat on a bench and tried to find something to do. We tried to get into a showing of Jimmy Kimmel but didn’t make it in time, so we went to Zara where Cassidy played dress up with me. I got a shirt.

Dinner was at a vegan chain restaurant called Veggie Grill where we tried all of the house-made juices and sodas they have (just $2 for a cup!) and had a good meal. We ended up at a donut shop and walked from there to the Hollywood bowl, where we hung out outside for 30 minutes and then went inside. The venue was awesome and a nice old man named Art loaned us some seat cushions while bemoaning the state of the outdoor concerts for the LA Philharmonic (poor acoustics and subpar guest conducting.) I really enjoyed the pieces, especially Brahm’s first symphony, a classical reflection on love. A German trumpeter featured in a Hummel piece and we heard about Art’s corporate career at Xerox over the intermission. We headed home after that and slept wonderfully.

Stuff I couldn’t mention: Overpriced Coca Cola, no recycling, Hollywood Tour guides, wiping off cans before you drink out of them, Grumpy Cat Hollywood star hoax, donut salesmen

 

Friday

Friday was one of our least busy days. It was our first foray into public transit from the door and it was pretty easy and pretty time consuming. We rode a bus to the train station and the train station bought tap cards so that we could use bus transfers.

From the first train we switched to a second and ended up somewhere Northwest of USC’s Campus. We ate at a big food court at an Ethiopian-Vegan place and it was very delicious. We shared Horchata for desert. We walked to the California Science Center after that, a free children’s-oriented museum. It was fun but not awesome, so after an hour or so we walked across to the USC Campus to explore. We looked around the beautiful, mostly brick campus. It’s super open and none of the roads are accessible by car, so it’s an awesome campus. We hung out in the library to beat the heat and charge our phones. I read about communist spy librarians. It was interesting.

 

We hopped on a bus to Downtown’s Grand Central Market, an open air collection of restaurants on the ground level of a building. Known as the epicenter of LA’s food scene, it was awesome to walk around the place-from sushi to carnitas, it was incredible to take in. We went with ramen at the end of the day, at an all vegan ramen shop. We scored a spot outside and enjoyed delicious ramen. The bus ride home was eventful, where we almost missed the train, and when we got off at Burbank Station we realized the bus didn’t come for another 45 minutes. We got on a bus that got us closer to the Airbnb and Uber’d the rest of the way.

Stuff I couldn’t mention: Hog Maw Tacos, Alfred the squirrel, Air horn wielding teens, no-touch tide pools, nice train conductors

 

Saturday

Saturday we got on a bus to someplace near Hollywood called Café Gratitude. Our server (Nicholas) didn’t greet us until we had been there for over 10 minutes and we didn’t get our food until 30 minutes after we ordered it. It was delicious, but we complained to the kitchen manager Ernesto who was really disappointed in the service and offered lunch on him next time we came in. 1/10 service 8/10 recovery and I really liked Ernesto.

While we were there we saw the famous comedienne Tig Notaro and her kids, along with her wife Stephanie Allynne. Their kids were really cute and it was cool to sight a celeb, albeit a B or C-lister.

We rode a bus to the Broad (pronounced brode, not brode) and found out that the wait time to get into the museum was 2 hours. Cassidy wanted to go but I wanted to find something else to do, so we compromised for Cassidy to stay in line while I explored the Walt Disney Concert Hall (LA Philharmonic’s permanent residence) and the LA Opera hall. I found a rock for Cassidy’s brother Carlen and by the time I made it back Cassidy was almost at the front of the line. The museum was really cool, a lot of contemporary art with some cool video pieces and plenty of sculpture. I saw some Basquiat’s and Warhol’s for the first time and that was cool.

We dined at Grand Central Market again and I had sushi. I accidentally ate a glob of wasabi and my heart rate is still elevated. We left from Grand Central Market to Chinatown where we ran into some big festival where everyone was launching confetti cannon-firework-projectile-launchers. There were a bunch of food trucks and stands. We ducked out of the chaos for a second to grab some bubble tea and explored a few shops. I got a picture in front of a restaurant featured in Jackie Chan’s Rush Hour. We rode a bus home and watched Tig Notaro’s TV series, One Mississippi.

Stuff I couldn’t mention: fake crab, overzealous security, Jenny Holzer, fake cat poop, burly security guards eating vegan coconut soft serve

 

Sunday

Sunday was our beach day, and we rode some busses and trains to Santa Monica beach. We had some lunch and got cranky at each other cause we were both hungry. Once we got in the water, things were a lot better and we had fun playing in the surf. The beach was packed.

I rented a boogie board for an hour and had a lot of fun with that, even though Cassidy thought I was trash at Boogie Boarding. I’m not. I want to be a professional.

After that we left the beach, got some Powerade and tried to find a place to change out of our swimsuits. Cassidy managed to change in a hotel before we got kicked out, but I had to change behind a dumpster. We walked 1.5 miles to a Veggie Grill (worth it) and refreshed with some tasty veg. On the way back, we hitched a ride with a Louisianan transplant who dropped us off right by the pier. We explored the pier and had an awesome conversation before we hopped the train home and got on a bus with a gang member who visibly did drugs in front of us. We finally got home and crashed hard.

Stuff I couldn’t mention: Iranians, the merits of to-go vs. dining in, hot feet, food sharing with strangers, inadequate surf, fierce sunburn.

Monday

Monday we weren’t sure what to do so we tried to get into a studio audience. We went for Jimmy Kimmel and Conan, and a spot for Conan opened up right away. We ate some breakfast and watched some more One Mississippi before we got on a bus to Studio City. We had some burritos where I ran into a relatively unknown Soundcloud rapper named De’wayne Jackson-I took a picture with him. He was one of the guys that got me into rap, surprisingly enough, off of a remix of Kendrick’s HiiiPower.

We walked to the studio since we had time to kill and pretended to see celebrities. We crossed over the illustrious LA river and arrived at Gate 8 at Warner Brothers Studio, where we were corralled and had our pictures taken (presumably so the producers could seat the most attractive people up front). We walked through the lot past a bunch of sets before we arrived at the studio.

Me and Cassidy were seated right up front, cause we were the most beautiful. First we got directions to the exit from the Warner Bro’s fire chief, and then a hype man got us HYPED. The band worked the crowd up with a few songs and then things settled down. Conan went on and did some one-liner type-deals before the first guest, Bob Newhart, who is very old. The second guest was a comedian and he was really funny, at one point I was crying and trying to not make any noise as to disturb everyone watching ALL ACROSS THE COUNTRY. The show ended with us pretending to applaud Sheryl Crow, as she had a scheduling conflict which required her to tape in advance. We took a Lyft home (which was nicely appointed) and I had 5 for $5 tacos from a Mexican Groceria.

The power went out which was very interesting for all parties. I was in 7-11 at the time, and was the last person who made it out with their purchases. It was out until like 12:30. With our phones dead, no light, and no wifi, there was not much else to do but shower in the dark and go to bed.

Stuff I couldn’t include: Yes, no, rock, Gypsy

Tuesday

We were trying to hit two museums today, the LA County Museum of Art as well as the Getty. We got up early to pack and hit the Getty earlier. When you arrive at the Getty, you take a tram up to the top of the hill where the museum is located. It’s an extraordinary open campus museum with a few galleries connected by some terraces and with some gardens on the grounds.

Cassidy and I split up at first to do our own thing. I explored some Gothic art and learned about the religious history of art. We met up at Rembrandt and then went and saw a room chalk full of masterpieces-Cezzane, Rodin, Monet, Manet, and Van Gogh, who signed his famous ‘Irises’ with a simple VINCENT.

We grabbed some lunch at the cafeteria and enjoyed a shady lunch under the great architecture. We tried to nap on the lawn for a little as we realized that the LACMA wasn’t possible and enjoyed the Gardens. Finally, we checked out the photography exhibits. One was an interesting collage-ist, one I found a bit documentarian for my taste, and the last was a photographer named Chris Killip who embedded in a fishing community in England. There was a video of him going through his pictures and talking about the meaning and his relationship to the subjects which I really enjoyed. We left on the tram and took a bus and a car to LAX. The Uber driver was a woke music producer named Antonio.

When we arrived at the airport I forgot to take my laptop out through security and got held up for a while. But we made it through and got to the terminal just fine.

We went to another terminal for some food and I dragged my feet a little through the duty free shop as Cassidy continued on. On the escalator I ran into famous, multiplatinum recording artist Swae Lee of the hiphop duo Rae Sremmurd. Then we ate dinner and almost missed our flight.

Stuff I couldn’t mention: Cassidy being right, Swae Lee’s middle finger, bodyguards, posse members, juice cleanses, hodgkins lymphoma

The flight was uneventful except for a bit of an in-flight hiccup with some screaming babies. When we got off the plane we walked to the light rail to get home.

When we got off the light rail platform, we turned around to a man slamming his head into the now departing train and then the concrete. We were screaming at the people in the train to call 911 as he laid dazed on the train platform. I called 911 through the emergency dispatch box on the platform and we went over to the man.

Another man got off at the same stop us as us and two dicks tried to steal his bike as he was trying to help the man who had hit his head. The guy who had hit his head was on the ground not moving and bleeding out of his ear.

After a little while a lady who had gotten off at the same stop started trying to move the guy around. I was freaking out because although his eyes were open, he was not able to move and was not able to talk. I was freaking out at the lady and she kept being aggressive towards me and saying she was going to hit me. I was scared but I hoped that if she would yell at me she wouldn’t move the guy around at all.

The police finally arrived and they got some information from us. Me and Cassidy took an Uber home and ate some granola and went to bed.

And then our trip was over, just like that.

A couple takeaways-I feel like I really got a feel for the city of Los Angeles—I knew some neighborhoods but I never really got the topography or geography, and I really feel like traveling on our own and constantly looking at bus routes and google walking routes.

We had super full days every day, and a lot of that was due to us taking our time and seeking out new parts of the city, along with the relatively high public transit times. Public transit, by the way, was more than adequate even though almost all sources said that you needed a car as a tourist. We intended to use a split of public transit and Zipcar to get around but really relied on public transit more than anything along with Uber to fill in the gaps.

It was awesome that we left early and got back late-it basically meant we had 2 extra full days of travel without having to pay for lodging, so that was awesome.

Finally, as I sit down to write and reflect on this trip I realize how insane and action packed it truly was. I could write for pages and pages about it and all the crazy experiences we had, so many of them unplanned. The 7 days cost around $600 for me total-I think I’ll do another breakdown later talking about my costs for the trip.

 

I love the Tour of America’s Dairyland-henceforth referred to by the initialism ToAD. It’s an 11 day crit series in the Milwaukee area, and it’s some of the fastest and best run crit racing I’ve ever done. And that’s just Cat 2/3. I was racing five of the days in the middle, as I wasn’t prepared to race all 11 days this year.

I headed down Thursday after work so I could get a little time to settle in at the Madison house. Friday I went to the dentist and visited the new house my parents are building out in Fitchburg, WI. It’s going up crazy fast. Fun Fact: Fitchburg, Wisconsin is bigger in area than the capital city of Madison, Wisconsin.

Anyways, Saturday morning I was off to Grafton, Wisconsin for the first race. Coming into the race I was seeing that the first few days had a lot fewer people than last year. Along with that, I recognized a lot of names that had gotten in the top 15 the first days, and felt like I could be pretty competitive overall.

The race was quite aggressive, but none of the breakaways were lasting very long and I was comfortable surfing wheels and staying in the top 10-15 positions. 5 to go a guy escaped by himself and there was a moment in the front group where everyone just looked at each other, giving him enough time to escape. Through the last corner, which was quite technical, I was about 10th, a bit further back than I wanted, and I rolled in for 11th place and $40.

Sunday was in Waukesha, and I was determined to be aggressive. I was in a couple early moves, including one where I had maybe 15 seconds solo, but I was brought back each time. Towards the end I was sitting further back and a strong move escaped. It was completely gone by the time I made it to the front. Last lap through a corner someone came out super wide and caused me to hit my pedal, (I kept it upright) but I was forth back. Came in 20th, and was disappointed.

In West Bend, my Grandma came and watched me, which was cool. She’s turning 90 in September. I was stoked and aggressive but couldn’t manage a split. Came in 12th in the sprint.

Schlitz park was more of the same-on a course that really suits me, I tried to be aggressive and couldn’t break away for long. It was frustrating, and was proving to be a long standing theme in all of ToAD this year. It’s easy to blame it on my legs, but simultaneously, I think that could be a cop out.

I was aggressive this week-which was a large goal. But it’s not enough to attack and to stay away for a lap or so. I really need to save my energy for one big attempt to break away and to legitimately have a shot of winning. It’s not enough to be aggressive for aggression’s sake.

Port Washington was the last day, and a course that suited me. I focused on a good result, I meditated on it, I knew that this was the course and the day for me. I was going to leave nothing out–today was the day.

When I rolled up to the start, my legs were tired, but ready. The first few times up the climb were tough, but by the third lap my legs started to come around. I started to force splits, to follow moves. It was hard for the next few laps, completely strung out. But when you’re at the front of the race, putting the hurt down, it hurts a whole lot less than when you’re at the back getting dropped.

Finally there was a split, but we couldn’t work together well and were brought back. Two or so laps later was the move. It was four of us, and we got into a good rotation immediately. I was second wheel going into a downhill corner, and the guy in the lead went down. And that was it. I slid on my butt for about 22 feet and destroyed my chamois and that was it. ToAD had come to an end.

I went to the medical to get myself checked out and patched up, and I was ok. Then I drank some chocolate milk, picked up my payouts from the week, went to my car, and cried. I didn’t cry cause I hurt, but I cried because ToAD is my race series, the set of races I base my season around, and I couldn’t pull a single result out.

I’m kind of at a crossroads now. The season more or less winds down in a month, but I’m not even sure if I can scrounge up enough motivation to finish it out. After Collegiate Nationals, I thought my future was set out for me–a great summer crit season, and then a jump to a higher level team for next season. But with my results the way they’re going I didn’t even touch my bike after I got up to Minneapolis until the following Sunday

It’s easy to focus on how you feel day to day when the macroscopic ups and downs are harder to see. That’s what’s interesting about bike racing, and sport in general, and what makes it so hard, and what makes it so beautiful. I love it, but sometimes I don’t. But that’s why I love it.

 

Jack

 

 

With both me and my beautiful girlfriend Cassidy restless and between jobs, we decided to take a quick trip up to the north shore of Lake Superior for a nice little Sunday-Tuesday vacation/getaway.

We left Sunday from my house for the little less than 3 hour drive, with Cassidy napping/navigating and me handling the wheel. She provided logistical support and equipment. We stopped to grab camping food for the trip in Duluth and hit up Target and a nice Co-op, called by, but not affiliated with Whole Foods.

I’ve never been to Duluth, and it’s amazing. Coming in from the southwest, I35 drops down towards the St. Louis river as it flows into the lake, creating a huge watery green expanse. We ran into a little rainstorm as we hit the shore and made our food stops, and it was freakishly cold.

When we arrived it was beautiful for a little bit as I worked on a fire to cook our pizza. As soon as we got the pizza on the fire, another crazy hard rain squall hit and caused us to char (blacken) the bottom of our pizza, as well as get our clothes wet. We peeled tin foil off of our messed up pizza and laughed about our misfortune as we ate in the car.

The rain cleared up and we walked down to the water. The coast was a little foggy, you couldn’t see across to the other side, but it was beautiful. The craggy rock shore runs all the way up to the water and it’s really nice. We took some pictures and returned to go to bed. The night was cold, but bearable.

We woke up the next day for a nice little bagel breakfast. With bellies full of fruit and bagels, we went back to sleep, and didn’t wake up until lunch. The plan for the day was a hike, with maybe a little swim. We had some trouble getting to the falls, but we made it and snacked and did a little more relaxing. Back at the camp Cassidy whipped up some Seitan and Couscous (delicious), and we went down to the beach and chatted as the sun went down. I slept a little better the second night, Cassidy said it was cause I snuggled with her more.

The next day we took it easy, made it down to the shore one more time, and left around noon. We stopped in Duluth for some Chipotle.

We arrived back in Minneapolis in time for a quick buzzcut (I look like an egghead) and the Tuesday Night Criterium, which was a blast (Jordan grabbed his first Cat 3 win). I had good legs in the 1/2/3 race, coming in 10th, a victory for plant based athletes and car campers everywhere.

 

 

Collegiate Nationals is often placed quite inconveniently relative to University of Minnesota’s Finals week. Last year it was smack dab in the middle of finals, but this year it was only mildly inconvenient, placed after a long and tiring week of final projects and final reviews for classes. But I got through it, and packed up Thursday night. With a relatively rigorous qualification process, there were only 5 of us in the contingent, all some of my best friends.

We had:

• Born Finesser (both on and off the bike) Daniel Svedberg
• Bike Prodigy Colin Catlin
• Crit Monster and super-domestique Logan Grace
• The opportunistic goofball, Chase Wark, who brought along his food baby, Phil D.

We left at around 4:30 AM Friday, electing to skip the Time Trial so that we didn’t have to skip as much class. The drive was uneventful and smooth until Colorado, where we went up through the mountains past Denver through Vail Pass with the high point at over 11,000 feet of elevation. As we started getting up to high elevation, I looked back at Logan, who pretended to gasp for air. We all laughed, but could really feel the altitude, and realized that it could play a big role in the racing.

We arrived at Grand Junction while it was still light out and checked into our days inn. Our bikes were a little gritty, so we showered them off and went to bed.

We woke up and had a good breakfast before heading the 30 minutes to the race course. The profile looked a little more extreme than it ended up being, with a flat crosswind finishing stretch gradually climbing to over 6000 feet, then a long sweeping descent with a switchback climb, back into a crosswind section, coming back around to the climb with a little kicker into the finishing stretch. We raced four laps, for a little over 100k with 6k feet of climbing.

I got a front row callup for winning the conference, which felt good. The pace started off pretty slow, and the high speed descent with over 100 riders was pretty sketchy, but coming around for the crosswind section I positioned myself well towards the front. An attack through the start finish had the field guttered through the crosswinds, and some jockeying and attacking caused a pretty serious selection of around 30 guys. I made the split as we started the descent, but no one was working seriously at the front which allowed a lot of guys to catch back on. The group ballooned to probably over 40 as four attacked: UCLA, two guys from University of Colorado-Denver, and one from Boulder. I thought the move was pretty promising but thought it would still come back, with the pretty big chase group I was in. Only Colin had made the selection, but he lost a contact lens, causing him to crash a little later and he pulled out of the race with 2 to go.

The third lap was hard but uneventful, with UW-Madison’s David Lombardo Chasing for Max Ackermann and a few single riders contributing a little. The crosswind section dropped a few people but I stayed towards the front and had to be aggressive to hold good position. The gap was around 2 minutes coming around for the last lap.

The uphill crosswind section was brutal the last time, with attacks going hard, and everyone guttered. I saw newly crowned Collegiate TT Champion jump hard after a few attacks were reeled in and knew that was the move. CCB Pro Noah Granigan caught his wheel along with me and a guy from the Air Force Academy. I hung on for about a minute, going incredibly deep at the portion of the course at the highest altitude. I made the decision to drop back, hoping that there was a smaller chase group behind I could get into. Max Ackermann jumped past too fast for me to hang on so I got into the next group of 3 riders. We pushed on down the descent but were caught. The group was quite small at this point, with around 20 people, and 2 groups up the road. With Max Ackermann sprung from the group, David Lombardo no longer chased. Fellow Minnesotan Sam Fritz jumped on the descent and I tried to get a chase started, no one wanted to work. Some Colorado Boulder guys swore at and made fun of me for trying to start chasing with some others, which is something I found incredibly unsportsmanlike.

We more or less rolled along until someone jumped from the group in the last 10k. No one chased and we were spread out across the road. A few Ks later  I jumped once and was followed. I jumped again a little before the 5k to go sign and got a gap. I put my head down and powered on. With the last hill approaching I threw both of my water bottles to the side of the road, knowing I’d need everything to hold off the chasers. Up the last kicker, 2k to go I looked back and saw that I had a healthy gap, I thought I could hold it. On the finishing stretch I caught the UCLA guy who had been dropped from the break, but he sprinted past me at the finish. It was awesome coming in that early in the race, ultimately grabbing 10th place. I rolled past the finish and was immediately ran up to by Logan and Chase, who congratulated me and handed me some food and water. They had both DNF’d, with Chase having an asthma attack. Sveddy and Colin DNF’d as well. We went back to the car and grabbed the water bottles I dropped, I ate a bonk breaker and sat in the back seat, incredibly pleased with my result and completely blown out. It was the best result of my life.

We ate dinner and went to bed. The crit was the next morning and we were stoked to race. The plan was to race for Logan, who had a good result last weekend at UW against some of the best crit riders in the nation. We were excited but nervous, and we knew if we played it right we’d have really good chances. The crit course was pan flat, unlike the last few years at collegiate nationals, so we thought it would come down to a bunch sprint.

I got a callup again and the race started furiously. It was 70 minutes plus 3 laps, which is longer than the crits I’ve been used to doing this year. The pace was on from the beginning and I was sitting in pretty good position for the first few laps, but ended up floating to the back. 15 minutes-35 minutes I was much further back than I wanted to be, probably sitting 50 wheels back and suffering.

Hard crits are a bit of  a catch 22. The only thing to do when you’re suffering that will save you is moving up, but it’s simultaneously the hardest thing to do when you’re suffering. I worked up a couple wheels at a time until I was only a couple seconds behind. And life got better. I began to recover and be able to breathe again. I was able to get a drink of my water bottle. Around this time, I saw Logan reenter the field after a crash. He said he was fine but had limited use of his front brake. Chase and Sveddy, victims of the back and the pack were dropped by this point.

I kept trying to move up, even through a few crashes, one which had me chasing onto a pretty significant split in the group. 3 to go I saw Logan, who was surfing wheels in the top 5 drop his chain. Free laps ended at 6 to go so I knew it was game over for him and I was racing myself. Two to go I got in the top 10 and saw that a little break was up the road, and thought about attacking. I hesitated, which was a mistake. Last lap I was sitting in the top 10 but was passed by a few in the sprint, ending up in 18th place.

We rolled to the car and I heard about the various misfortunes of my teammates. Chase had gotten popped early and Sveddy had some respiratory issues. A UW guy had crashed Logan out early, and then he had some other issues including the chain drop.

I ended up 11th in the omnium, which was fantastic for me. I was surprised that the racing didn’t feel horribly difficult-it was hard, but it wasn’t like I was hanging on for dear life the entire time-I feel strong and invigorated more than anything else, and I feel like I have some impressive results. The weekend was a blast, and I was stoked to finish.

Next on the docket is some local racing and maybe the Almanzo 100, a big gravel race. I’m stoked for the summer crit season and nationals round 2 at the end of June.