Tour D'Berg (Jrs. & Masters State Champioships)

Tried to go with the major breaks and ended up taking 3rd. Two got away.

Tough n' fast race. First race with all Cat 4's and I felt the quicker pace and relentless attacks that I had to stay with. Very poor 1/2 racing tactics on my part, kept finding myself on the front and put in a huge effort to chase a 4-man break, that probably would have just been brought back in anyways as the race progressed.

Final lap, 2 turns from the finish I had really good positioning, until someone dove into the corner next to me and I was gracious enough to not let him eat the curb. But moving off my line pushed me off the pace line and allowed too many racers to come by me. Final sprint, finished strong and regained 5-6 places so at least a semi-positive ending.

I'm not going to lie and say I love crits. But I will tell the truth and say that crits offer a lot of things that road races don't. Particularly the downtown crits as opposed to industrial park settings. Besides the totally different style of riding, they allow for sitting back between races and enjoying the neighborhood. Franklinton was like that this year and Miamisburg is like that too. Where else do you see an old opera house but in good old Miamisburg OH? Or a fat lady doing the back float in her 10 foot above-ground pool that takes up her entire postage stamp sized front yard along the race course? Who else but the Miamisburg folks would find some hot chick in a short white dress and six inch spike heels to be the podium girl (but only for the younger racers and not the old geezer races-go figure).
On a separate note, I've done a lot of crits in my many years of racing and I gotta say-my 2011 Madone 6.7 with Aeolus 50 carbon clinchers, though already "outdated", is a great crit bike. Seriously.
And separate to all of that, hats off to Blair for being consistently first or second in just about every crit he does. Just like Katie. Pretty damned impressive.