When???

Sometimes I think to myself when did I become smart? The facts are that I act like a moron and act like I don't give a shit, but I may afterall. Today I went online to check how much my classes would be costing me. I look at my school email and see an "award letter" and I open it. To my disbelief I received a grant from WMU for my mathematics success and all the other moneys was from scholarships. So right at the moment I am pretty happy.
On top of all this Le Tour was very exciting today. Carlos Sastre has been in the GC picture for the past 5-6 years since leaving ONCE. When I saw him attack on Alpe D'Huez I was thinking he went to early. Once he got brought back by the GC contenders he went again and never looked back. It is really great to see someone who deserves to wear yellow finally achieve it. The CSC-Saxo bank team did what T-Mobile never could, they played their cards to perfection. Now this is where I get a bit brash and cocky. I did say previously that Evans, Menchov and Sastre would be on the podium in Paris. Sastre has the lead and Evans and Menchov are better time trialists, but Vandevelde may be a bit to far back to get a top 3 in Paris. So I guess I should be a DS or psychic. I also did mention Freire for the green jersey, although I was thinking Hushovd had a better chance, but with the lack of pure sprint stages, which Cavendish owned, Freire is looking even better.
Finally, I did a race this past weekend and that is all I will say. I have never ridden a TT so slow in my life, honestly. I have only ever been caught by one person and that was Josh Tarrant, but that changed on Sunday. I got caught by my 3 minute man, enough said. Smart guy is off!

Superweek was good

Ah so the first two races of Superweek are in the books. I am back in Kalamazoo after a good weekend in the "hood" aka Blue Island, Illinois. I couldn't tell you what the second city was because I just felt like racing. I will say that I have officially ridden a race in the hood, which is nice. The first race was in Blue Island, and Baar warmed up and said that it wasn't a good area to warmup in. So I did not listen to his halfhearted warning and warmed up while he was racing. Lets just say Detroit is a dream compared to this area, and I saw what the projects look like. Anyhow, I chose to head back and warm up around a parking lot for a bit then hop on Boer's trainer for 5 minutes. This being my second trip to Superweek I knew it would be fast. The first race was HUMID and hard. Standard 4 corner crit which was one mile in length. We were hammering around the course and the first time I looked up an hour had passed. A group of 5 got away and the field was content to let them go, as was I. I didnt feel particularly great but still managed a top 25-30. Baar got 9th in the 30+ and Boer was behind me in the 3's. Day 2 was good except for the fact that the hotel did not have Versus, so no Tour watching. I slept like a small child and we headed to the race around noon. The race was held in an almost finished suburb, in which none of the houses were yet owned. At half a million dollars it was no wonder why. The course was shitty to say the least. A Half mile crit, with the slight uphill being into a headwind and a sharp corner with some dirt in it to make it interesting. I felt blocked from the day before but still good enough to move up easily most times. Nothing got away till about 12 laps to go and chaos ensued. I saw Boer shoot past me and head right to the front. He had a gap, but the guys with him would not pull. With 3 to go there was a big crash and the field split, so for the last 2 laps I was chasing to get to the back of the group. I almost made it and came in 5-10 seconds down on the winner. After the finish I did 2 cooldown laps and see Boer bloody and dirty. I had no clue he was caught in the crash. But with 3 crashes in the last 3 laps it was hectic to say the least. All in all a good weekend as the races were well above any you will see in Michigan. I would venture to say that not many guys would finish these races at all. Twice as long as most crits around here and much faster. Anyhow, it was a good weekend hanging and racing with Baar and Boer. And if you have never traveled with kids I would highly recommend it. Chris' sons made me realize racing is so unimportant in the big picture. Just to see his kids get enjoyment running through puddles kept me relaxed and made the time pass. I would say this was the best racing weekend I have had all year long. PEACE!

Tour de France

So I have been spending the last 4 days doing nothing more than work, riding, and watching the Tour. Yeah exciting life huh! So I decided for the first time to make a fantasy team of Tour de France riders. Here is my team for Stage 4 that I chose.

David Millar
Fabian Cancellara
Cadel Evans
Stijn Devolder
George Hincapie
Jens Voigt-
Christian Vandevelde
Thomas Lokvist
Carlos Sastre
Marzio Bruseghin

Not to bad of a day with my team getting 3rd, 4th, 5th, 7th, 8th, 9th, and 11th.

Might as well name a street after me....

If they did it would be called 15th street. I raced rockford this past weekend and felt good heading into the race. The first few laps were rather hard and all of a sudden I feel like everything is extremely hard and nearly getting dropped. I came over the Maple Street climb and took the left and headed into the dicey right hander I almost lose it. Luckily the curb stopped my bike from going to the ground and I look down and realize I had flatted. I did not panic and knew I could get a free lap. I went to the wheel pit and got my teammates spare. I have been riding a Ksyrium Equipe rear wheel due to the hubs on all others being shot, and who would have thought a wheel with a powertap on it would be lighter than the wheel I was racing on. I get my wheel on and wait to get back in the group and right after I am in the group the break of the race goes. I think to myself oh shit because I missed the break, but had a teammate there so I was cool with that. We did get really close to catching them but no one wanted to close the last 10 meters down, so I figured hell I am not going to be the guy to ruin Boer's chances. After a few laps their lead grew to 25 seconds and I was just trying to sit pretty and wait until the closing laps. A crash in the last 15 minutes nearly derailed all my plans, but I snuck around that safely. Moving on I was feeling good coming into the last few laps, sitting up front and out of trouble. With a little over a lap to go Taylor Birrman gave it a dig and literally was 5 meters in front of us the whole last lap, and everyone jammed up the hill. I eased back waiting for Taylor to get caught and put myself out of contention for a good placing, so egg on my face. I was eager to race the TT the next day, but a respiratory infection dashed those hopes and I have not touched a bike since the race on Saturday. I really need to grow some balls and just stop thinking so much while racing. Fuck it, it is just a bike race though.