Friday, April 17, 2009

Back to racing

Tomorrow starts the Tour of Hermann. Saturday is going to be a loooong day with an early time trial and a late afternoon crit followed by the hour and a half drive home. I'm feeling okay after a couple solid weeks of training and look forward to the start of a solid block of racing with races almost every weekend for a while.

I missed last years race in Hermann so I don't know exactly what to expect. I know the road race is kind of hilly with at least one tough hill and the time trial is pretty flat and rolls along the river. Since I expect to the the state TT this year for the first time in several years, I am curious what I can do in this first effort of the year.

My main goal is to improve over the only time trial I did last year. At the Tour of St Louis, I was very near the bottom of the Cat 3's and that is not acceptable. Hopefully, putting proper aerobars on my old frame along with the 404 front wheel and rear disk will yield some positive results. The big question marks are that I have not been on the bike at all. There's no better way to try something new than to race it, right? With any luck, everything will stay screwed together and not fall apart before the 10 miles are complete.

On to other topics. My Roubaix picks did okay. My late addition of Pozatto paid off with a 2nd place, Haussler finished 7th and Quinziato 9th. Even my longshot wildcard pick of Popovych paid off with a respectable 50th place.

This week is Amstel Gold and I'm trying to come up with some picks on short notice. The amazing thing about Amstel Gold is that only 13 riders in the race have been in the top ten the past 5 years.

I'm going with Gilbert, Andy Schleck and Nibali in no particular order.

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