Let's get this party started right!

Today marked the opening of my career as an actual bike racer with a team and everything. I regret to say that I did not do well. I finished dead last (or far enough back that place really didn't matter). I could blame the too long training ride yesterday; the fact that, in hindsight, my front wheel was misaligned; or I could just man up and admit to the lack of training over the winter. I now have just under four weeks to get ready for the Tour of Richland County out at Malabar Farms. My very first road race was the 2005 Ohio Road Race Championships on the same course, and I can't wait to get back there with a real bike (one without flat bars this time). Other than myself, SBR had three riders come out: Chad M., Dave S., and Chris B. all braved the cold. Chris and Dave raced in the Cat. 3/4 field and finished in the pack. Today was Chad's first road race and he managed to pull ninth in a pack of at least thirty. Kudos to him!

As far as a race review I thought the course itself was nice: flat, short, and fast, and very spectator friendly. Some would say, however, that race organization, left something to be desired. Others would say it was a complete fuster cluck. Thanks to the promoter only having one registration line open, even those who pre-registered had to wait in line for almost an hour; considering that registration opened only an hour before the Cat. 4/5/Juniors/Womens race this was something of an inconvenience. Before the start of the 3/4 field, Gov. Schwarzenegger showed up to start the field and parked his motorcade right in the race path. As the 3/4s rounded turn 4 into the final straightaway, the motorcade started to pull out against the flow of cyclists. Th marshals stopped the race at that point and waited for the motorcade to leave before they restarted everything. And to add injury to insult, apparently no one on the Fat Rabbit Racing team owns a broom, as none of the corners were swept before the race; turn 4 was around a seventy-five degree hairpin loaded with gravel. I must say that I expected better from a club that puts on, at least from the reports of my teammates, some of the best triathlons in the area. I can only hope they do better next year; for now, on to Malabar Farms!