So, to stay with the focus of the blog of bike racing, I'll post a quick recap of the the first 4 races, which have gone really well for myself and our Grandstay team.
Opus#1. I'm not a huge Opus crit fan, I just seem to be decent at them. And luckily my sprint was good out of the gate and with some sweet leadouts from the team I picked up the first win of the year.
Durand RR. One of my favorites of the year. This race has one the the best courses and strongest, deepest fields. It was one the best fields in years this time around and the weather was almost too nice. It was pretty mellow for a few laps, the team kept anything serious in check all day. We were all together into the last lap until five of us got away. It looked pretty good, but came back with about a kilo to go. I was lucky to have Ian at the front. He drilled it with the textbook leadout delivery. I only had to make a few more pedal revs to secure the win.
Opus#2. I decided to try to get some points in break solo. I tried two different times but both failed and left me tired. With 4 laps to go I still didn't have any points so I decided I'd better get some. Winning the last 2 sprints secured the win for the night.
Ken Woods Road Race. I've won this race every year since 2004, so I knew what I had to do. It was cold but not too windy or wet so it was actually pretty easy. Grandstay had everything in control all day. I didn't have to get into the wind at all and was feeling super fresh going into the last lap. Jens ramped it up on the hill to get things going. From there is was non stop action. Casper got away and after some attacks from Dave Zimmerman of Flanders I countered and bridged up to Casper with Mike Woell. We worked well together until the last climb where Mike was forced to lead me out for the win.
It's been fun, our team is really riding well this year, better than ever.
