Almost fast, not quite last.

I think the squirrels and bunnies dug up my tulips and ate them over our extended winter. All I could think about during most of today's race at Rock Cut was bacon. Never a good sign. I felt good and strong over the first lap, even though I was shown at the start that I can't start expert fast. The mud holes were so bad that I would say they were almost demoralizing. They felt like they were sucking us into the earth, and loaded up the bike something fierce. I made the rookie mistake of trying to ride away from a couple of the other single speeders too early in the race(while also hungry), when I should have rode with them and waited. In the process of trying to drop them I gave myself a double whammy pop and bonk, followed by a series of smaller pops. Needless to say half a lap later those guys came back, then passed me up just as I had washed out and hit the dirt on a sharp left. I just rode the rest of the race at a survival pace mostly, then started to recover and feel a bit better in the third lap after popping a gel (too late).

Today showed me in a rather brutal fashion that I ain't no expert yet. I think I'm going to start the WORS series in Comp SS again and see how that goes. Talking to Rick afterward in the bike wash line, he seemed to be reinforcing my lean toward Comp SS. I have mad respect for the guy, and he has been racing a whole lot longer than I have, so I think I've made up my mind for now. Besides, it sounds like most of the single speeders I started in sport with last year will be there, so it should be hella more fun than getting stomped every race. At least as a Comp single speeder, I might only be intermittently stomped.

We were also shown today that the universe is in perfect balance. I found out after finishing my race that I had won an 8G ipod Nano w/ arm strap, then later we discovered that we had lost the camera. We might still be in the black though, since the camera was 5 years old and the size of a brick. If you find an old Sony camera with photos on it of a painfully average bike racer, let me know.