That Ended Quick....

Yesterday's race took place in Vernon Hills, several Spidermonkey racers took the start line and I would like to congratulate Trent Williams for a 7th place finish in the 5's, excellent work.

The Vernon Hills course is fairly simple, two sweeping turns (if you can ever call them that) and two real turns, one of which would end my day a 1 1/2 laps early. The day started with bad news when my team mate and post up legend Mike Shea sent me a text message that informed me of his crash in the masters race, bummer.

After a good warm up with several teammates we took the line (Bryan, Chase, Dan, Ken, Brandon, Geoff and myself). The race started and I got stuck behind a rough clip in, and of course botched my clip in, something new and different (see every race report i have ever posted). As we headed towards the first real turn the group bunched, and gingerly got through the turn and then sprinted to the next turn, clear evidence the chicago cat 4's crit season was in full swing....

The group was actually pretty safe, i saw a little bumping and some interesting lines through the turns but i didnt feel like a crash was an inevitability as i had in previous weeks. For the first couple laps my positioning in the pack sucked, i mean it was really piss poor. I was literally in the back of the pack and worked my ass off around each of the turns, now that is racing stupid. But after about three laps i remembered i knew how to race and positioned my self midpack, i made my way through the group on the right shoulder and found myself behind my teammate geoff who said "come on zens lets go". I followed geoff to the outside of the pack and found myself either on the front or slightly off the front as we made our way into the first sweeping turn when i saw chase jump to the outside of the group, i attempted a block, unsuccessfully, no break was established. I retreated to the middle of the pack when Bryan lit a match to claim the $10 prime. As he returned to the middle of the pack i made a comment to him and the next thing i knew a small gap had formed between bryan, myself and the rest of the racers (note to self, no comments with 2 to go). As we easily regained our standing in the group we approached the second turn with a lap and a half to go. I positioned my self to the left and took a great line through the corner, unfortunately two riders a few wheels up were bumping through the turn and rode into the curb causing a 6 or 8 man pile up, which included yours truly. I tried to ride around the pile but it happened too fast (it always does) and i endoed on to a fellow racers drive train, i have the teeth marks in my back to prove it, and you can see where i landed from the chain ring on my jersey. I pulled myself off the ground and checked that everyone was okay, which they were, and then inspected my equipment to ensure that i wouldnt be bike shopping next week. The bike was okay, but one of my crashmates sacrificed a zipp 303, what a shame. The best part of the crash occurred when my teammate Dan asked me "is my skinsuit okay?"

So thats how that goes my first DNF of the year, at least there wasn't a hospital visit and I didnt have to figure out if there is a way to "fix" carbon, so i will give it a shot again next week.

Thanks to DJ Ryan, Maggie, Jenna, and everyone else who made there way to the race to support the team. Thanks to Eric for the savvy pre-race advice, you were right. And thanks to RDS for a well run event.

Keep the Rubber Side Down,
Zens