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Written by Rob Wing
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Friday, 14 September 2007 18:57 |
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{moszoomthumb imgid=57 itemid=37 style_m=4 caption=(Warming up for the TTT)} Stage 2: TTT 40k out and back course, fairly flat, mostly uphill all the way out, but strangely seemed uphill a ways back too. Funny how that works.
It was only sprinkling when we got up to get ready, but that changed. By the time we saddled up and started it was blasting rain again. We were first to go off because we missed the first stage and sat last on team GC. Since we had 7 guys we had to put one of our guys on another team for the TTT, so we elected Brett, who was probably the weakest link in that discipline, plus he had never done one before. As we really hadn’t done any effort since before we left for this train wreck of a race, we opted to take the first 5 min fairly easy. Even with that, it still hurt like a bitch. It took about to the turn around to get the kinks out and work out our order, and then Dave’s shoe strap broke, because he’s got those stupid string strap things on his shoes. We dealt with it the best we could, and turned around. We felt pretty good at this point so we just blasted it all the way back, averaging 51kph for the final 20k. We got in, found out we broke the course record by 4 minutes, and waited. The team that got 1st and 2nd the day before, Dos Pinos, beat us by about a minute and a half. So much for the easy first 5 minutes, that was the difference between first and second right there. 2nd isn’t too bad though. It’s about this time that one of the other American teams starts to bitch that we missed the first stage. Funny how people complain only after they are severely beaten…. Stage 3: Mountain Stage 1 Stage starts at a gas station, on the climb. Felix is gone, so now it’s hot and the sun is blasting. 18k uphill is not a nice warmup. I made it to the first KOM sprint at 3k up the climb, and slipped off the back with Dave, and we dangled for a few k. Then Jared decided to finish the job and he attacked, fully detaching us from the peloton, relegated to riding the rest of the climb alone, in the process picking up another teammate and some locals, and losing about 8 minutes to the leaders. At this point Dos Pinos had sent 5 guys up the road for a 120k team time trial. Guess they didn’t get enough the day before. A while was downhill, fast and crazy through little towns with horns blaring, and speed bumps galore. I wasn’t quite sure why the other guys were lighting it up, we had to make up 8 minutes, and with 5 of us, it wasn’t looking too likely. But I did my part and kept it going. We slowly picked up some more local riders, and as we did the less and less people wanted to work. I ended up with 3 other teammates in this group with me, and we pretty much had to run the show. Tom D scamming bottles off Dave and myself all day, we get to the final loop and I cramp super hard. Basically had to come to a rolling stop and work it out for a while, so the last 20 k looked pretty shitty. I got back into a rhythm and ended up making it most of the way back to my group by the time we hit the end of the road. Aight, lets get the F out of here.
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