a time to rest

Triptyque was a beast. Not many races have the combination of field quality and course difficulty as this bad boy. Day 1 went well for the CC Team as all 6 of us finished with the peloton. Yeah, after all those climbs there was still a pretty big group... crazy. So the race was wide open after the first stage which was a good thing for our team. Racing in the Ardennes is straight up awesome. The hills, the history, the war monuments, and the weather all make for very distinct racing flavor and can be repeated nowhere. The second day's climbs were longer and more selective and the weather made for a semi-epic day. Fog, mist, and cold temperatures all added up for a pretty miserable day on the bike. The team raced well though... at the front, going with moves. At the end of the day we had Jim, Aaron, and Steven in the first peloton and Ian, Peter, and I in the second. The finish was in a beautiful, German, valley town that was filled with cheering locals. What a great place to finish a race. Day 3 was the double: Morning TT afternoon leg breaker. My TT was plain. I was 70th out of the 135 racers still left. Ian beat me by 1 second after missing 2 turns... don't I feel slow! Steven had a good ride with an 8th place. The afternoon was only 110km but by far the hardest stage. It was like a condensed Liege-Bastogne-Liege. On the early climbs I wasn't feeling very strong and made a tactical mistake of poor positioning on a very decisive climb. On a good day I could have moved up as the climb progressed but I was going nowhere. As my group came came into town for a 20km final loop, we got the yank. DNFing is never fun, especially 20km from the finish. Steven busted out another top 10, as only 90 guys finished the race (190 starters). My overall feelings about the race are mixed. I climbed well the first 2 days and raced pretty well but I would have liked 1 good result and obviously to finish the last day.

This afternoon my legs feel like I've been hanging out with baseball bat-wielding children... like egg beaters have made their way into my muscles and gone haywire. So it's time to rest, recover, and focus on the next race which may come in the weekend.