This weekend was Eugene Celebration Stage race, a 3-day, 4-stage race including a hill climb prologue, road race, individual time trial, and criterium.

The 3 mile mile prologue climb up MacBeth was my old stomping grounds, and I set a new personal best of 12:00 flat up the climb (old record was 12:41) to finish 6th in the cat 3s.  In the road race, the finish came down to a bunch sprint and I got pretty decently positioned to make some passes and took 4th.  This morning in the time trial I proved to myself that it’s really the discipline I need to improve in for next year, as I didn’t do particularly well and finished mid-pack again with a time of 36:21 for 15th.  This stage race is almost entirely decided based upon the time trial, and that 15th place dropped me from 6th overall to 13th overall.  The criterium was fairly non-eventful other than an early breakaway I got in for 4-5 laps, and I probably finished in the 15th-20th range as I never found a good wheel to hop on in the sprint.

It’s a little bittersweet to have the road racing season come to a close, but at the same time I’m tired and could definitely stand a break.  I’ve been racing regularly since March, and there was a three-month period where I raced nearly every weekend.  This has certainly been my best season ever.  By the numbers:

31 starts, 30 finishes (1 DNF due to a flat tire)

2 flat tires (DNF as mentioned above, and the other cost me dearly as I waited 5 minutes for a wheel change and watched my chances at Elkhorn GC disappear on the first day.

0 crashes, 1 should have crashed but somehow didn’t, 3-4 other close calls.

11 top ten placings:

2nd x 2 – Rehearsal Road Race and Portland Twilight Criterium

3rd X 1 – Overall GC at Cherry Blossom Stage Race

4th X 4 – Eugene Celebration Road Race, OBRA TTT Championships, Mt. Tabor week 6, and Cherry Blossom SR Columbia Gorge Road Race

5th X 1 – Kings Valley Road Race

6th X 2 – Eugene Celebration Macbeth Prologue and Silverton Road Race

7th X 1 – Cherry Blossom SR Time Trial

I also finally got the upgrade from cat 4 to cat 3 (cat 2 next year?).

All this, and a great team to share it all with.  I enjoyed having great company, and it was a huge plus to constantly have a good number of teammates in races.

Now just a secret 130 mile race-ride coming up shortly, and then it’s cross season.  More to come on that.  Then it’s winter training to get ready for next road season.  So really, I don’t know what I’m feeling bittersweet about – next season will be here before I know it.