29 May Melon City

Sunday morning, while the other girls enjoyed a sleep-in, I decided to double up my races for the day in hopes of fast-tracking my fitness. Brian and I headed about 30 minutes north to Muscatine Iowa for the Melon City Criterium. The course was a one-mile circuit with a fast decent complete with speed bump (judder bar) at the bottom, sharp uphill gradient, and two 90-degree turns at the top. The course circumnavigated a lovely park with statues of wild animals—elephants, deer, moose bison—variously dotted throughout terrain.

Mid-morning, racing was delayed while we huddled in shelters, waiting out 70 mph winds, horizontal rain, and pitch-black skies. Fortunately the forecasted baseball-sized hail never materialised. After 90 minutes, the skies brightened and racing was back underway, beginning with the Women’s 2/3, first women’s race of the day. I tested my legs on lap three to grab a prime, but two laps later lightening brought the race to a temporary halt. Soaking wet, I struggled to stay warm in the chilly temperatures. Several riders decided to abandon. When racing resumed 30 minutes later, my legs felt like concrete. Nine more laps felt like a long way!

Somewhere on the course, with two laps to go, my brain fast forwarded to the bell lap. I put in a huge attack up the hill and had a massive gap at the top. You can only begin to imagine my disappointment when, thinking I had won the race, I neared the start/finish line to see one lap to go on the lap counter. Oh no! OK. Salvage mode. I had a good gap, but not enough beans left to hold it through the headwind downhill section. I tailed to the back of the bunch for protection, thinking, “recover, recover, recover”. Over the speed bump I launched to the front of the bunch and somehow hung on up the now massive climb for fourth. Not quite the result I was aiming for, but a testament to the combined mental and physical acuity required for victory—and the mental impact of sleep deprivation.     

By afternoon the skies cleared, the roads dried and my second race, the Women’s Pro/1/2/3, bordered on hot. A bit over twice the distance of the first race, this race—which included a handful of pro riders—was going to be a massive effort given how I was feeling. Joined this time by four teammates, I worked to keep them in contention. The race was won solo by Ashley James from Team Kenda who slipped off the front early on. Little incentive to chase from the bunch meant a fairly neutral race. Late in the race, with Stacy in a small group towards the front, I faded with two laps to go. Stacy launched up the hill to take third to Amanda Miller (HTC Highroad). Coryn Rivera (Peanut Butter & Co) took 4^th and Jessi just got pinched on the line by Samantha Schneider (Team TIBCO) for 6^th. Not a bad result against some top pro riders.