Mason Lake #3

Well, after 5 years of racing, I finally won my first road race.

Thankfully, we had a couple more women today than last week- 16. I wish ladies like Suz, Mindy, Martha, and Amara would have ridden with us, but as we rolled out, I took inventory and noticed at least two other tall women over 150 pounds, so I was looking forward to some sprinter, attack action.

The first lap was like most... good tempo, settling in, not much for attacks. Any attempt was more to poke the bunch to do something, as the one to take off only went hard for a few seconds. No one was going to let what happened last week happen again. Various players took jumps. I did a lot of chasing, but always tried to be second or third in the chase.

Lap 2... lap 3.... much of the same.... Overall the tempo was good, a little slow at times, but not too slow. Then again, no team had riders up the road. I spent a lot of time out front, but never felt that I was working too much. I was comfortable in my new fuzzy Nike arm and leg warmers. My Gleukos mix was perfect (usually it's not), and best of all.... I felt very snappy! I got in on 3 or 4 small groups to try to break off, but we always got caught. After last week, I think that maybe, kinda, my safety orange jersey wouldn't be allowed to get far.

About 3 miles from the finish, the official rolls up next to us with the following announcement: "Ok, so there's a crash at the 200 meter mark and the ambulance is still there, so we're going to let you continue, BUT, you're going to be neutral after the final turn and around the ambulance. Then we'll let you go." Then I overhead someone say something about them not allowing any breakaways between here and there.

Alright sprinters- when have you EVER been served an ending like that??? They may have well said, 'if you are not a sprinter, you have no chance, because at least one woman in your group can go from zero to fast with a couple of snaps.' I had already been out front for a couple of miles. I stayed where I was, and on the yellow line, in case someone thought about coming to cuddle. Finally, we make that last left, and sure enough there's an ambulance on the other side of the road right around 200m. mark. The lead car slooooooowed us down to that perfect, I- feel-like-a-sling-shot-pulled-back speed. Around the ambulance the lead car finally flew ahead. Me and the woman to my left jumped. She got going first. I thought about waiting to get behind her, but we had little road left. Click, click and I was gone. The Beardsleys were screaming bloody murder at me, so I thought someone was close, but turned out I had a couple of bike lengths.

Today the results were posted and I took the overall series win as well. I thought there might be a series prize, but my response email from the promoter replied with a curt, "no prizes, no BAR points." Oh well, I still won.



My bike is here. Well, sort of. All of the parts of my bike are in the city of Vancouver. The Godfrey house has been delivery central. Lucky for me, Steven said he'd build up my bike. No races next weekend- two the next.