Like Oil and Vinegar

Sunday was the Monsters of the Midway Criterium that is hosted by the University of Chicago Velo Club. The course is a four corner crit consisting of two long straightaways and two short connector sections. It seems that last couple of years I do about one crit a year just to remind myself that I don’t really like racing crits. I raced the Cat. 3 event, and it was pretty uneventful. As the course is really simple there was a 99.9% chance that it would end up in a sprint finish, so I essentially sat towards the back of the pack for 50 minutes, making sure no one got off the back. I think I did a really good job of this, and no one got off the back until the last two laps. I ended up finishing with the pack, and didn’t really contest the sprint. The good part of the race was that I never felt like I was ever really on the edge, and hopefully that will bode well for Lake Geneva this coming weekend. Based on reports, Lake Geneva will beat the cicada hatching by two days. After that we are in for 3-4 weeks of hell. Riding, especially off-road, is going to be awful. Luckily I will be heading to Asheville, NC on May 23rd for five days of road riding. I am really pumped to get on some nice roads with actual climbs, and I think it will be a good final tune-up for the Big Ring Classic on June 3rd.