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!

Day 17 (My last day)

Today I am all packed up and about to go to the train station which will take me to the airport. I can't thank my parents enough for always supporting me and cheering me on. I want to thank Lucas Wall for his great coaching and making sure that I was prepared to race here. I need to thank Alexey Vermeulen for all of his advice and thoughts on Europe after kicking butt here last summer. Thank  you to the Chainstay for providing a great place to stay. I felt like I was at home with their amazing hospitality and their wonderful dog Belle. Their website is http://www.thechainstay.com/. Finally, I need to thank Tim Redus for providing the trip. I always had a great dinner to look forward to thanks to him. Tim also took me to some really cool cities, helped me out at the races, and basically made sure that I was having a great time. His website is  http://vertexcycling.com/. He is having another trip in August and registration is open for that right now. These last two weeks have been the best ever! Thank you everyone for your support and reading my blog. Im not looking forward to my flights, but It will feel great to hear English again.

Day 16

I had my last race here today.There were 124 starters. I have never been in a race with this many juniors.  The started off very fast and I had a very hard time trying to stay in good position. I made it to the front once, but soon I was in the back again. After 3 laps I got dropped and rode with three others. What made this race interesting was the fact that there were 2 sections of downhill cobbles. One had a turn at the bottom which force me to brake. Braking and shifting are very difficult when your hands and body are being vibrated at a fast pace. On the first lap bottles were flying all over the place on the cobbles which made it dangerous. I am disappointed with my results this past weekend, but it is a long season and I had barely ridden outside before coming here.

Day 16

As expected, today's race was super hard. It was on some really narrow, windy, and turny roads. I got caught at the back before entering the narrow roads and the yo-yo effect started. I tried to move up, but there was ditches on each side and absolutely no room to manuever. The courses here are insane. I wish I could have done better, but if anything, I got more experience and fitness.

Day 15

Today was everything, but boring. I woke up early and Tim and I went to the start of E3. One of the belgian spring classics. There were thousands of people walking around and surrounding the GIANT sign in stage. Everything about it was so cool. I was on a mission to get autographs and see my favorite pro riders though. I went to the street with all of the team buses and cars. It was packed with people. Every team had a super cool set up. Their buses are really big and look very luxurious (I got to barely peak inside). On top of the team bus, there were two team cars loaded with shiny new bikes and wheels. My favorite rider is Fabian Cancellara because of how he is able to just ride away from everyone else, so I waited outside the Radioschack team bus. Fabian was the last one to come out and when he did, everyone started screaming their heads off. Cyclists are rock stars over here! He didn't sign for anyone though. I even chased him down the street and begged, but he wouldn't even look at me. It is still cool to say that I have been right next to him, let alone even see him in person.

Once I found out that I wasn't going to get his autograph I went on the hunt again. I got Sylvain Chavanel, the French national road champion, and George Hincapie to sign for me. I have to say that George's jaw is very big in person. He was super nice to me and I think that he is a great role model. After that, everyone was at the start line. I was definately star struck after getting both of those two to take time away to sign for me. The start line was super crowded so I just decided to watch the big screen on the sign in stage.

Next Tim and I met back up at the car and went to a cool bike shop in Ghent. This bike shop had everything you could possibly need. It had hundreds of bikes, every single component group out there, and any clothing item you could dream of. American bike shops can learn a thing or two from the bike shops here.

After the bike shop we went back to the house to watch the rest of the race. Tom Boonen won it. I went on a hour ride to get my legs ready for tomorrow's race after watching the finish. We had beautiful weather today. It was super sunny and warm. I am super nervous about this weekend's races knowing that they are my last for this trip. All I know is that I will do my best and see what happens. Thank you for reading.