Tour of the Frozen Flatlands

Well its been a long trip and I am glad to be home. I arrived early this morning around 5a.m. from Spokane and slept till noon. It was a long night of driving, so the first thing I did after waking up was getting on the bike for a nice hour spin.

The Tour of the Frozen Flatlands went well and better than I expected for the most part. It was my first race competing as a category 3 rider. I was nervous and anxious to see how my long hours in the cold during the winter and my training camp paid off. The first stage was a 12.5 mile time trial. Everything was going good until about 4 miles into the race I flatted in my front tire. I naturally started to slow down thinking I would just get a spare wheel from the wheel car but then realized that there was no wheel car and unless I quit, I would have to ride it. So I rode with a flat front tire for 8 miles finishing with a time of 32:19. Suprisingly I didnt even take last place lol, I took third from last. That afternoon was the road race, which I just didnt want to get popped off the back of. The whole race I rode at the front and saw that I had the condition to keep up with these guys. With about 8 miles left in the race, there was a climb called the "wall" that split the peleton into many groups and I was dropped into the second group of riders. We chased to try and catch that first group after the climb but couldnt do it. I finished 13th overall which I was happy with. That night the Kelly's took me out to an amazing local pulled pork restaurant and baught me dinner to top off a pretty good day. The best part of the day though was Nate Hoiness took 23rd overall in his first race ever in the cat. 5's!!!! AWESOME!!! I was so proud of him, so congrats to Hoiness on a tremendous race :).

Sunday was the last day of the stage race and intaled the circut race of 2.5 mile course and an hour long. Once again I rode at the front of the pack and finished 10th overall this time which I was stoked about. And once again Hoiness stayed in the pack and finished 44th , which was great for his first race. So all in all it was a good weekend. My next race will be on April 26 in Missoula, MT called the Rocky Mountain Roubaix. I will be doing this race instead of Peaks to Prairie this season.