After fighting, everything else in your life got the volume turned down. – Fight Club
After bike racing, everything else in your life got the volume turned down… 
Stepped up to some Cat 4 fun in Banff. Drove down Saturday afternoon with Naomi. Banff Park Lodge… decent hotel, decent price. I recommend.
It rained all the way through the kids and cruiser crit races,but the weather gods blessed the category races with sunshine. The roads were still a bit wet with puddles though.. wet wheels made the corners a bit sketchy and likely contributed to a few crashes. I didn’t hear of any serious injuries, just broken bikes and road rash.
I must admit.. the crit was a bit intimidating as or the first time I was racing in front of a large casual spectator crowd, instead of the usual athlete crowd. The Cat 4 race went out pretty hard, and the lactic acid was killing me.. I thought I was going to throw up. I really should get LONG warmups in prior to crits as I’m never ready for the start. I hung on to the last wheel throughout most of the race, although the pack slowed with couple laps to go as people were eyeing each other and I should have attacked.. or something! I probably would have been run down… but damn.. I gotta learn to take those chances. About half the race DNF’d due to lapping or crashes so I was happy just to finish with the pack. I went in too hot for the last corner, braked to avoid hitting the barriers and missed the sprint…. AGAIN. Second last in my Cat.. but I finished.
The road race.. they start all the cat 2/3/4 together. It was a HUGE field. Feeling a bit intimidated by the sheer size of the peleton, I started at the back. Bad move. The race went out hard and furious. A gap opened up on the first climb… and I was racing to finish after that. I got stuck with a bunch of guys who wouldn’t work in a paceline.. or do any work. Because for the rest of the race only me, a bicisport, and a Speed Theory guy go to the front. With almost 10 guys… and a good paceline.. I think we could have brought the gap back. Frustratingly… we lost several minutes to the field each lap. I was the only cat 4 to miss the break and still finish.. 17mins behind the field.
I had a much longer race report in my head… but no time to write it all up. All in… a fun weekend of racing. Next up is Male 30-39 nationals in Edmonton. Thankfully, it’s flat… I’m going to try and just finish close to the lead group!!