Superior Morgul Road Race

The alarms went off on Sunday at 5:45 am. Brutal. A TT and a Crit in the bag and the Morgul was left. I didn't race until 12:30, but the expo needed to be set up by 7, so we packed up the car and headed over to the finish line. While Breeze warmed up for her 8:30 start, I got the tent set up and prepped samples for the day. Breeze had a great race and took 7th and 5th in the Omnium. She got back to the tent around 11:30 and it was my turn to warmup and prep for the day.

As I climbed on the bike, I knew I was tired. Two races, two days of the expo, no where near enough sleep and some time on deck had me gassed. I was wondering if I could get up that thing once, let alone 5 times. All was well on the start and thankfully there was a good bit of looking at each other. My job was to look after Gibson and I made sure I was on the front up the first 3 times of the wall. I set a solid tempo so no one did anything crazy and with 2 laps to go, all was well.


The only issue was that Boups was chasing everything. We wanted to let some things go, but he was across every gap. It was incredibly impressive, but it was making the race easy for Gates. Mike Gibson and I went to the front on the descent of 93 and tucked it, hitting 55 mph and coasting right off the front. By Marshall road we were 20 sec off the front and we rode some tempo together, but again Boups rode the group right to our wheel. The 4th time up the wall, the race livened up. A couple of accelerations and the group was split with me and teammates Bob Dahl and Mike Sutter in the back group with Boups. Again, he went to the front and dragged us to the pack. After 60 miles and 3 days, we came to the base of the Hump together. It was very twitchy up that climb and I went to the front after it to keep the pace high and safe through the round about. I pulled up to the feed when Bob Dahl took over and then I sat up, opened the jersey and settled in. In retrospect, it was a cop out. I could have hopped back in the group, but I was beat and in the fog of fatigue, the places didn't matter. Ken went off the front early and nearly survived, but Gates was strong and he and Mike Gibson fought it out to the line. Gates took the win, Gibson second and Ken 3rd. Sadly, this put Mike and Gates on equal points and the road race was the tiebreaker so the Omnium went the same way.

I rolled in for 26th on the day and 14th for the Omnium. I must admit, I was a bit frustrated with myself.  I used the excuse that I had done my work to sit up. I had more. I could have gotten back on to the tail end of that group and maybe picked off a couple of riders on the climb and then moved up in the Omnium. Those Omnium points are also team points in the Rocky Mountain Road Cup. I won't do that again. Gut it out and race to the line no matter what Grant.

Oh yeah, then we packed up the expo site. What a weekend. I am still tired.