It was the move of the year, and I'm not talking about Jonny's "Jacky Durand" style attack in the 35+ race. Nope, Mike M. gets a prize for finding a bathroom with two free stalls as we arrived at registration and had been holding it for the last half hour. Mike says to me, skip the first bathroom with the line and follow me. We went through busy locker rooms, darkened hallways, climbed through a few windows through the air conditioning duct and "viola!" open bathroom! Upon completion of our task, we noticed that the other lines had hardly moved so KUDOS to Mike and effort which gives him the "Meridian Homes Move of the Day".
We had a large contingent of guys at the race. Adam in the cat 4 U35 race. He said it was no problems until 53 miles when all got fuzzy and he just bonked. Rich, Jim and Cannibal Ken did the Cat 4 35+ race and battled hard, but ultimately fell a little short on the penultimate climb.
In the Master's 35+, we lined up six guys with Mike C., Mike M, Hot Rod, Al, Jon and Bill. The action started early as Jon took off. Mike would get in a chase group that looked like it caught the leaders and looked like a good size to stay away for a while. I was really hurting early and struggling to keep pace. It was going to be a long day for me that is for sure. So, we catch the group up front after a couple of miles and I start to move forward. Mike is patrolling the front and jumping on everything like there is someone up the road. I notice it is not the pace car in front of us but still the motorcycle. Some guy asks me who from my team is up the road. I didn't know I told him. He then says, "I don't know who he is, but he was riding the 53x14 up that last climb". Ahhh, that narrows it to either Jonny B. or well, Jonny B. Mike later told me he never got to Jon. Jon rode in typical Jon fashion and just rode hard, dropping everyone. I'm sure that Jeff would be more than willing to give them some counciling.
The moto leading the field took a 2nd wrong turn and I thought we might never see Jon again. The cat 3 field caught us and I figured they were going to neutralize us. Had they done that, Freak might have stayed away, but alas, it wasn't meant to be. We captured him after the climb on the second lap.
The climb wasn't too tough, but with the two fields mixed together, it was a cluster^%$#. I rode it easy up the climb, but in retrospect, too easy as I was at the back of the field and had to jump across gaps. After the start/finish, a split occured with Bill up in the front group. This section really sucked for me. I was really hurting, dangling off the back on each little rise. I just needed a moment to collect myself and move up a tad. When I finally composed myself, the groups had reformed with about 50 cat 3's and 20 Master's guys. I tried an attack and those stupid cat 3's chased me down. D'oh. They were chasing everything regardless of the number on the jersey.
The race was pretty boring and pretty much we all rode slow until Dmitry attacked, then it strung out until he grew tired of hammering away at the front. So, when I get bored, I do stupid things and the closing miles were no exception. Brain Wirtz was a little up the road, so I decided to join him. Unfortunately, it was in the last 2-3 miles. I caught him and we had a little gap to the field. Then the big right turn and the road goes up. I went to push it a little harder up the hill and NOTHING. I was sorta spent. Shortly, the field of 3's and 35's rolled by me as I lost it physically and mentally. I went backwards fast. I picked up a bunch of cat 3's as it flattened and I got to observe a crash on the steep section just before the finish. Bill won the race with Jon in 3rd place. Al got a well deserved 10th to put three in the top ten for the squad. I ended up 16th. Mike had a bazillion mechanicals and finished up with Rod a few minutes laster. It's too bad that took too many wrong turns and were forced to mix with the 3's..