Hermann.

So this past weekend was the Tour of Hermann, the first of many stage.....i mean omnium and stage race weekends. The first day was the time trial and criterium. In the time trial, I really did as well as I could have without a full TT setup. I think I was towards the top out of the people without TT bikes, but that doesn't really mean anything when the first 20 guys have TT bikes. So I was nowhere in the overall but Pence put in a pretty good time and was sitting in 5th overall going into the Crit. What kind of sucked, was that our time trials were all over by 10:30 or so, and our crit didnt start until 4:50. That's a long time. That's a long time to sit and watch races. It was a long time of waiting, and was made longer because of a crash that postponed a few races, and I think we started around 5:10 or something. This crit is kind of scary. It has a descent that is nothing short of treacherous and bumpy as hell. Every lap I felt like I was on the verge of my fork snapping clear off. The turn at the bottom of the descent is also weird for some reason, kind of off camber and awkward leading into it. There is also a good climb to the finish, which I actually do like. Anyways, the race started out fast and started breaking up quick. I tried to get to the front and do some damage on the 3rd lap up the hill, but we were already going really fast. I think on the 4th or 5th lap I hit one of the bumps on the down hill and it knocked my front derailleur loose, and had it basically riding/grinding along my big chainring. I rode to the pit and thankfully got a free lap, and got my bike fixed right in time to hop back in. By now Austin, Zach Reed and Nick Coil were clear of the main group that I had been in and many people had fallen off of the group as well. I hopped back in and tried to survive. The group got down to about ten of us. With 4 or 5 laps to go there was a 150$ prime for the field, and Henderson and a dude from Iowa jumped for it. They stuck it and stayed away for the rest of the race. So we were racing for sixth. In our group was Bill Stolte, Ethan Froese, Luke Lininger, the guy who won the RR last year, and a few other dudes. I was trying to hang on, and hurting pretty bad. Every lap, Lonnie said "Sit on and attack on the last lap". So that's what I did. Going up the hill to the finish, I attacked/sprinted, almost got taken to the curb twice, and ended up 6th, almost getting the Iowa guy who was with Henderson on the line. It was a pretty solid result and a satisfying race. The first good result of the year for me personally. The next day was the road race. 90 miles, which is the longest RR I have ever done. Pence and I were sitting in 8th and 9th overall respectively. The race was pretty relaxed heading out of town, and then halfway up the climb last years winner attacked. He had a decent gap by the top and a couple miles later a few other dudes attacked and went up to him. There were no real GC guys up there, last years winner was sitting in 7th and then Stolte who was in 12th or something. I wasn't really convinced it was going to stay off with those two as the only real horsepower in it and Dogfish wasn't exactly well represented up there, although I kind of thought that the guy who won last year had gotten up there relatively unknown and would probably just attack the breakaway eventually. So I wasn't convinced that was the move, and also right when I was thinking about maybe bridging, Pence flatted and I assumed Grman had dropped back to help pace him back up to the pack. I didn't want to risk them not getting back on, and put our whole teams cards in one move, that wasn't really going along with our race plan, and then get dropped out of the break or something. I guess taking the risk would have been wise. About ten miles from the end of the first lap, Austin turned to me and said "this is the 2nd hardest hill on this course". I had a feeling that meant something, and then a little bit later he attacked and I was right on his wheel. It was when he motioned for me to pull through that I could tell I didn't have great legs. He was also going super strong. We got caught by the pack and then I decided I needed to sit in the group and try and conserve anything I could. The break had gotten up to 2 or 3 minutes, not surprisingly as the field was going 17mph for a good part of the first lap. I don't really think anyone cared that the break was up the road. Austin attacked again and went solo. Pence eventually caught back on right before lap 2. Up the wall out of town I got dropped by at least a minute and chased back on. Grman flatted a few miles later and got a horrible wheel change, and was out of the group for good. About 7 miles away from the finish of lap two, Henderson hammered and I got popped off the group. A few more little breaks of ones and twos had already gone off of the main group. I rode and Grman eventually caught me near the KOM climb. My legs were pretty destroyed. We got some fresh bottles in town and headed out to finish out our third lap. It was kind of relaxed, really just a training lap, but we still kept a good pace. I started to feel a bit better, I think part of it was just wanting to get home. We rolled in in somewhere around 20th. A bunch of guys had abandoned, even people who had been ahead of us. As much as I didn't want to ride that third lap, I was really happy I did afterwards, and it also kept me in contention for the overall where I got 10th. Pence also ended up 9th overall, so it wasn't too bad. I was pretty happy to be top 10 overall, although I would have liked a bit better than 10th.