Its been awhile

Wow, It has been a long time since I posted on here and I apologize. To catch up on things I did decent at road nationals in Augusta (not what I had hoped for) and did fairly well at Track Nationals in Pennsylvania. My partner Alex Riva and I did the madison together and got 3rd.
What's happening now is that I just arrived at the Chainstay house in Belgium where I will be spending the next 3 weeks. I am once again trying to conquer the races of Belgium and I am doing it with the same people that took me on the trip earlier this year in March. I am coming into this trip knowing what I have to do and I plan on getting some results. My first race is tomorrow, I am not sure how it will go though knowing how tired I am from the flight and getting used to the time change. I am so thankful to be racing in Europe again and I can tell that this will be a great trip.

Preparing for the National Championships

Since my races over Memorial Day weekend in Iowa I have been riding a fair amount and getting my body ready for one of the biggest races of the year, the road National Championships in Augusta Georgia. This is the biggest race for road cycling in America. This race is where the best juniors from around the country all gather up in one city to compete for the title of being the national champion. Needless to say, this weekend is very competitive. There is a time trial, a criterium, and a road race. My goal is to get a national championship. I wouldn't go to any race if I didn't think that I could win it. The National Championships are my place to prove that I belong on the national team.

My mind is certainly ready for this big event, but I have had some problems with my body lately. After pretty much every race I have thrown up or felt nauseous. At first my coach and I thought that it might be something that I have been eating. I have looked at EVERYTHING that I have been eating and I am just not sure what might be causing my stomach problems. I went to the doctor a week ago and he thinks that it is heart related. I did an EKG and I had my blood taken, but both turned out normal. Tomorrow I am going to the University of Michigan hospital in Ann Arbor to do a stress test and have an echo performed on me. The doctor hasn't let me do any hard workouts in the past week so I am kinda unhappy that I can't train the way I want to before nationals. I am hoping that everything goes o.k. tomorrow and that the doctors say that I can race.

Anyway, I am excited for nationals and I will be putting up a new blog everyday while I am there. I am also almost finished with school which is a good feeling. Thank you for reading!!!!!!!

Memorial Day Weekend in Iowa

This past weekend I spent the Memorial Day weekend with my parents and team racing in Iowa at the Quad Cities. This is a very famous and historic weekend of racing in some very cool downtown areas. My parents and I left early friday morning so that we could stop and eat lunch with my grandparents who live in Illinois. I don't get to see them that often so when I do it is a treat. I loved being able to see them! After eating lunch, we finished up our last hour of driving and made our way to the hotel. The night was finished off with a great Italian dinner and going to bed at a good time.
My first race was early Saturday morning in the downtown of Burlington. This weekend I decided to just do the junior 15-18 races since these races are more important and attract a lot of junior talent. We had to do eight laps where each lap consisted of a really steep and twisty cobbled climb followed by a really fast decent. The name of the Race is Snake Alley. The climb really does look like a snake. Here is a video of last year's race: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0InwFypMe-c . I was not able to stay with the front group of racers last year, so my goal was to stay at the front this year. The race started off really fast, but I was able to hold my position and fight hard. On the last lap I went to the front and drilled it up the climb hoping that I could help pace my teammates up and stop attacks. I got to the top and everyone passed me. I reached the bottom of the descent and picked off a racer in the sprint to place tenth out of over 50 juniors. After the race I overheated and threw up though. Something has been going on with my body lately and I am not sure what. Hopefully I can get that figured out soon.

Sunday was the Melon City Criterium. I will save you all time on this race because my chain got caught in my frame on the first lap and by the time I got it fixed the field was already over a minute up the road. I chased for a couple laps, but then I gave up.

Monday's race was the Quad Cities Criterium which consisted of 14 laps of a big figure eight shaped loop with a lot of corners. Last year I got 4th in this race so I had some confidence. After not feeling great on Saturday and dropping out on Sunday I really wasn't sure what was going to happen though. I attacked right when the race started and I soon opened up a decent sized gap on everyone else. I knew that I had 14 laps to go so I had to pace myself. 2 laps into the race it started to rain really hard and I startes slipping around in the corners. I figured that there would be a lot of crashes in the field and I was right. With 4 laps to go I was 15 seconds ahead of a group of 20 chasers. I realized that I had a chance of winning. I still had a small gap when I crossed the line with 1 lap to go and I put the hammer down. The field came 10 feet away from catching me in the end, but I held them off by myself and crossed the line in first. It was a great feeling!

I had such a great time this weekend and I would like to thank my teammates for helping me out and being such great friends to me. My team also did really well over the weekend and I am so happy for them. Every single person on Prochain cycling gave it their all in every single race. I would also like to thank my coach Lucas Wall for all of his advice and dealing with all the crap that comes with training a teenager. I know that I'm not the perfect athlete to coach, but he somehow manages to always be able to make me improve on my love of this sport. I would like to thank my family for always supporting me and cheering me on. I would like to thank Honey Stinger for all of their great nutritional products and Enzo's Cycling for their chamois creme. I don't know what I would do without the great sponsor's that I have. Finally, I would like to thank my parents. They are the best in the world and they are always so proud of me. It is their 19th anniversary today and I love them so much. HAPPY ANNIVERSARY MOM AND DAD!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

What's been going on lately

Nothing crazy has happened to me since my last post, but Ill do my best to make this post sound interesting. I have been racing really hard lately and I am only a couple weeks away from finishing up my sophmore year of highschool. My training rides have been pretty exciting lately. Yesterday I got attacked by some geese who were protecting their children from me and I almost ran over a squirrel. What really scared me is that the geese started hissing at me and even jumped at me and tried to bite me. haha.

Since my last post I did a local spring training series race at Ann Arbor where I got fifth in the pro 1/2/3 race. I was able to make it into the winning breakaway of 8 and gave it my best in the sprint. The next weekend I did a road race called, Cone-Azalia. The course consists of a rectangular 10 mile loop with 4 miles of gravel and 6 miles of paved road. The pro 1/2 race had to do 7 laps. The first 3 laps went fine and then the pace started to pick back up. I got dropped 55 miles into the race and then I rode with one other for the last part of the race. 3 others caught us in the last mile so I had to bring out a hard sprint. I got 20th place out of 30some riders. It is a hard transition going from cat 3 to cat 2 and racing with the professionals. The races are longer and the riders are better. I am learning a lot and I enjoy the high level of competition.

This week I am preparing for a two day stage race in Grand Rapids this weekend. Saturday consists of a 14 mile time trial in the morning and a criterium in the afternoon. Sunday consists of a 90 mile road race. I can't wait!!!!!

Also, I would like to wish everyone mom and expectant mother out there a happy mother's day! My mom means the world to me and I am so thankful for her. She is always cheering me on and supporting me. I feel so blessed that I have her!!!!!

A day in my life

These last two weeks have been pretty casual for me. Here is what my daily schedule consists of. I wake up at around 8:30, eat some waffles, cereal, and bananas, and then I go on the computer to check my e-mail and facebook for a bit. By 10:00 I am sitting at my dining room table getting started on my schoolwork. Homeschooling is one of the sacrifces that I have made to help me become a better rider and be able to travel to bigger races. It can become very lonely at sometimes, but I also like having my own schedule. At noon I walk down the street to visit my dad during his lunchbreak at the middle school he teaches at. Then I walk back home and finish up my subjects. When I am done with school, I go do the workout that my coach has planned for me.

Thats pretty much what my monday-friday's are like. Besides from school, I have been doing the local spring training series in Ann Arbor. Last weekend I upgraded to a category 2 which means that I get to race with the best in Michigan this year. I never dreamed of being a category 2 a couple years ago. I have really worked hard and I am ready to race at this very high level.

Today I did at time trial at Willow Metropark. This is a 13 mile tt consisting of 6 laps around a closed course. I did not perform nearly as well as I thought I should have. My goal was to acheive a time that was under 30 minutes. The course conditions were not very fast though. I ended up getting 7th place in the pro 1/2 field with a time of 30:53. I was not feeling my best today, but I gave it my all.

Happy birthday to my awesome coach Lucas Wall!!!!!!!!

Tour of the Battenkill

Well, I just got back home from New York. My team and I arrived at registration at 5:00 on friday afternoon and then we went to recon some of the course on our bikes. After the ride, we went to go get dinner at this cool old hotel in the downtown area of where the bike race was. After dinner we went to our hotel where all five of my teammates and I slept in one room. Lets just say that it was crazy.

We woke up early in the morning and I had two giant waffles and some bananas. My start was at 11:30 so John, Weston, and I arrived ten minutes early at the start line. The race started off very slow and picked up a little now and then. I am not a fan of junior races because of the fact that no one wants to keep the pace up. 40 miles in everyone was still together so I decided to change that. I attacked on a flat gravel section and broke away by myself. I gained at least a minute gap and charged ahead for 7 miles until I was caught by seven others. Besides the seven that caught me, the field was torn apart into shreds. I was happy to see that I did my job and that my teammate John Murdock had made the group of 7.

When I got caught the breakaway was going very fast and I did my best to try and stay on. The 7 sped up though and I got dropped. So for the last 15 miles I worked with another rider to stay away from everyone else. I dropped the other rider with 5 miles to go and then time trialed to the finish. I ended up eighth and John endud up sixth out of 43 riders. I am not happy with my result, but there are no excuses.

I am very thankful for my supportive team, parents, and family that let me do this race.

p.s. I threw up after the race. I guess that means I did my best and I should have no regrets.

Back in the Groove

Wow, I have had a great start to my season so far. I was fortunate enought to be able to do Valley of the Sun Stage Race in Arizona in February and then head off to Belgium for a couple weeks of racing. Needless to say, I have had a good early season. Since getting back from Belgium I have been able to catch back up on school, see some friends, and get in a couple of local races. Training is back on schedule and it feels good to be back in the regular routine. Today I am heading off to Ohio to meet up with some teammates who I am going to carpool with to a race in Cambridge, New York. This race is called the Tour of Battenkill. It is a 62 mile long race with some tough hills and gravel sections. The great thing about this race is that it has a fairly large junior field and I will have teammates in it with me. I never enter a race that I don't think I can win and this race is no exception. I am very fit right now and Lucas Wall has been doing a good job of keeping me on track with my training. There will be some very strong competitors, but that is why I am going all the way to New York for this race. I am always a little nervous when going to a big race, but I am feeling confident in the fact that I have done all that I can do to prepare for this race. My next post will be on how this race goes. Thank you for reading!