Ann Arbor Spring Training Series 4-28

Another Sunday meant it was time for another installment of the Ann Arbor Velo Club's Spring Training Series. The venue and course was the same as the previous week, but unfortunately the weather was not so cooperative. Rain, and lots of it, was the story of the day. On top of that it was cold, which is not exactly fun weather to race a crit in.

This week I'd be doing the cat 3/4 race followed (kind of) by the cat 1/2/3/4 race. I decided to skip out on the cat 4/5 race that I won the week prior.

The 3/4 race got started with a bang as two guys attacked right at the start of the race. I was staying with them at first, but eventually I had to let them go as my legs weren't ready for that kind of effort quite yet. The miserable weather lead to us not really warming up well enough since we didn't want to be out in the cold rain any longer than we had to.

As I let them go I thought, "Hmm, this is only the first lap. We'll catch them for sure in a few laps." Nope. They were gone and we'd never see them again for the rest of the race. With them gone, the race was now for 3rd.

A new addition for this week's races was some free stuff given to those who won the primes. Giving all of the stuff to the two guys in the break would have been boring, so they decided to make them field primes instead (yay). After a few laps the bell rang, which meant that whoever came across the finish line first on the next lap would win the prime. I decided to sprint for it and ended up getting a free roll of bar tape for my efforts. Winning stuff for racing is great.

After the prime lap the field settled back in as we slogged our way through the rain. About half way through the race I had to take off my sunglasses since they were so covered in water that I could no longer see out of them.

It was a long time until the next prime laps came. Just about as long as possible actually since there were 3 in a row, then the final lap. All of that prime madness allowed 3 more guys to get off the front. So going into the final lap there were 2 guys in the winning break, 3 guys in a "chase" group, and then the field (which I was in.)

As the final lap was ending we wound up for one last sprint to the line. It was kind of anti-climactic since the sprint was for 6th place, but oh well. I won the field sprint, got my 6th place (full results below), and started getting ready for the 1/2/3/4 race.

Well, the 1/2/3/4 race didn't last long for me. My legs were pretty tired and frankly I was about done with riding in circles in the rain. After two laps I was struggling to stay on the back of the pack so I just decided to call it a day. Another hour of hanging on for dear life in the rain didn't sound like fun, so I DNF'd and grabbed a burger courtesy of the AAVC guys. Also, shout-out to Patrick for giving Danny and I a lift home as riding home in the rain would have been a terrible experience.