Tour of Ohio finished up last weekend. I finished tied for 5th overall, which put me in 6th since Ty Stanfield had the best stage finish between the two of us. Ohio was awesome. I felt great. I hope I can come back someday and win a stage there…or maybe even the overall.

In other news, I’m packing up my world and I’m moving to Austria in less than a week. The move has been in the works for a long while now, but I didn’t want to bring it up too much, but since I’m about to leave 119 Richmond Court Athens, GA 30605 forever, I figure it’s about time to broach the subject.

I’m moving to Innsbruck with Ashley. I’m going to race with the UNION Raiffeisen Radteam Tirol and I’m really excited. I’ve wanted to go back to Europe to live there ever since I left back in 2004, and I’ve desperately wanted a chance at racing again…as a real bike racer. And the opportunity to live in Austria? Arguably my favorite place in the world? Yeah, I’m pretty much ecstatic.

More later, but just a little update for now.

So after Nature Valley, we hopped into the van and started the big, bad drive to Ohio. After a night in Chicago and a lot of good driving from Daniel and Tom, Duncan and I were dropped off in Columbus. Pat got in a little while later, and the fun was about to begin.

Stage 1 – Duncan won! It was awesome. I felt incredible, Duncan was fantastic, and he made the break – and took the win. Behind, I followed some good stuff, felt strong, and led out the sprint from a ways out and finished 10th. Sweet! That’s only the second top 10 I’ve ever gotten at the Tour of Ohio!

Stage 2 – Hocking Hills…ugh. This stage never gets any easier. I seem to do better and better, but I suffer more and more. Dewie Dickey and two others rode away with three climbs to go. I managed to get across just in time for my nemesis of a climb. I don’t know what it’s called. It will always be the climb where Jacob said Spin to Win…and then I promptly got dropped 1 minute later. Anyhow, so this time, I caught on, pegged senseless, and then Dickey just pummeled it from the bottom. I held on for a little while, but came apart spectacularly toward the top. It sucked to get dropped from the winning break, but Duncan came up from behind and we put together a game chase to lose something like a minute, but we were a minute up on the field. Sweet. So I was 6th on the day and 5th overall. By FAR the best result I’ve ever done in Ohio. I’m happy with my ride. It was hard, I rode well enough, but I would love to make that break. I’ve got a few more chances!

Stage 3 – This stage was fun. It was rolling and fast and I rode alright again. My big ring stopped working part of the way through the stage, so I rode my little ring the rest of the day. It was ok…but that whole spin to win thing really came to mind. On the big climb of the day, Dickey rode hard again and made a nice little break with all of the GC people in it. It was impressive…it seemed like everybody made the break, and then Dewey just throttled it with the help of a few others. People go so hard sometimes. I didn’t feel the need to work, I felt the possibility of being dropped, so I watched Dewey and Josh England go really hard. We got caught. Then we rode for awhile, and then sprinted up the hill to Gambier. Heading into the sprint, Inferno had a decent leadout going, then there was a big ol wreck, which Duncan and I barely avoided, then we sprinted like hell back up to the leaders. I went fast! I was excited as I was doing it because I knew that I was going fast, it was a cool feeling. I only finished 6th or 7th, but for once I passed a lot of people.

That’s three top 10’s in a row! I can’t believe it. It has been an ok week so far. I hope the next two days go as well.

I’m tired. Going to bed now.

So Nature Valley was ok up until today. I was getting through without too much ordeal, but definitely not doing anything of any consequence whatsoever, but then I got the Most Aggressive Rider jersey after Stage 5’s Mankato Road Race and suddenly this is the best race I’ve ever done, bar none.

I finally got my shit together and decided I was going to race my bike and do my job, and it was fairly necessary considering the 20ish mph winds that were a’blowing. From the start, I managed to get up front, stay there, and keep Daniel in a good spot. We led into the first left hand turn, which appeared like it would be crucial to the outcome of the whole day. We’d turn into a crosswind section, the field would blow up, groups would be everywhere, then we’d turn out of it, and then there would be some kind of regrouping. For the most part, I managed to be in the first part of all of these splits and I felt good.

At some point around this time, I decided to attack. So I did. I ended up in a group of five…we were away for like 10 miles I think. That was kinda hard. We never got too much of a gap.

We got caught and then I sat around for awhile and decided to attack again. Bissell was on the front riding tempo, so I wasn’t sure if it would be ok to attack, so I asked Roman Kilun and he said, yeah, that would be a good idea. So I attacked.

Nobody followed me on this stupid attack. It was into a block headwind and was so so slow. I think I might have averaged just over 20 mph into the hurricane blowing into my face. I got to sit out there all by my lonesome for a long while though. I won a sprint! I waved at people in the crowd through town, waved at the camera man, talked to the com car. I mean, I was going hard, but I was NOT going to let anything pass me by. I knew that this was some sort of special moment, I didn’t know how special at that time, but it was pretty cool to be off the front of a huge NRC race all by my lonesome.

I was eventually caught and then Daniel mentioned that my efforts might be good enough for the Most Aggressive Rider Jersey…I thought that was funny.

I rode in the field for a while longer and then it got hard and I caught the tired so I got dropped. I rode in and laughed about the idea of getting the jersey, then HealthNet director Mike Tamayo said I got it, so I had to get changed from my normal clothes, back into my nasty bikin clothes. It was awesome. I waited forever for the podium, but I honestly didn’t care one bit, you know? I was so stoked (still am).

Then I saw them playing with the jerseys and getting them ready and it wasn’t long till Dave Towle called my name and I walked up the steps and holy crap I was putting on a JERSEY. I always smile, but this was a special smile for sure. I tried to take everything in as I stood there on the podium. I tried to soak it all in, but looking back at the pictures, I realize that I failed miserably and it was all a huge blur.

I know this isn’t a huge deal in the grand scheme of great bike racers, but I know where I’m at, and I know who I am, and this is a big deal, and I’ll remember this forever.

As it stands now, this is the coolest thing that has ever happened to me in bikin. And tomorrow I get a call up at the hardest crit in America – Stillwater. Wow. I’m deliriously happy.

I celebrated tonight with some all you can eat PIE. Yes, I ate lots of strawberry-rhubarb, oreo, raspberry, and blueberry pie.

Hopefully tomorrow is a HUNDREDTH as awesome as today.

After this? Straight on to Ohio!!!

Check out pictures from today HERE!

So it’s about that time again, my time in Colorado is done, and I’m off to Minneapolis in a few hours for the Nature Valley Grand Prix. I am pretty excited to get back to racing again, and really excited about this next block of racing – five days in Minnesota, a day of driving to Ohio, and then five more days of racing at the Tour of Ohio. That should be tough.

I’ve been doing my best to take it easy the past week, I figure this 10-race block doesn’t warrant too much hard work in the immediate days leading up to it.

I did hike my first 14er in a long while over the weekend. Vati, Josef, and I hiked up Mt. Bierstadt, which is something like 14,100 feet tall I think. It was a hard day for me. I don’t do so fantastically at elevations over 12,500 I think, but then again, I don’t think too many people feel too froggy that high up.

I took tons of pictures. It really was a great day, and I can’t wait to do some more hiking soon.

First, I’ve got a race season to take care of…

So I had a few weeks off between the disaster that was the USAFGP and my first race in Colorad, the Hugo Road Race. Hugo was pretty good. I got in a couple weeks of good training and was pretty happy going into it. I made the break right off and was having a good old time until I caught the tired an hour or so into the break. It got kinda hard what with the 3 hours worth of crosswinds and all. I had enough after an hour, or rather, Colby Pearce had enough of me and made sure I got gone. I don’t think he had anything against me of course, but it’s hard not to think like that when I’m going as hard as I possibly can in the gutter, desperately trying to stick my nose into what’s left of some kind of draft. I figured whoever was killing it had to slow down at some point, but the problem was that I had to slow down before that point. Ah well.

I rode in after that. The field took forever to pick me and my dropped pal Randy up, and then it was a matter of paying just enough attention not to get dropped out of the field, cuz I didn’t want to ride my bike any longer than necessary.

I led out the sprint for a mile and a half. I led it out on the yellow line with the wind coming out of the right, so everybody was in the left lane. I didn’t think much of it and sat up with about 500 meters to go. Turns out, the official relegated EVERYONE in the sprint, so I went from last in the sprint to first because I was the only one who DIDN’T cross the yellow line. HA. So I got 9th. It was funny. I’ll take em however they’re givin em.

I raced again the next day at City Park…I had gotten royally throttled in this race three years ago, but this year was a whole lot better. I don’t feel like chatting about it right now, maybe tomorrow.

In summary, I did three races in four days and I caught the tired again, so I’ve taken it pretty easy the last two days. I’m planning on getting back into it tomorrow, but not too vigorously, cuz I don’t think it’s too terribly important with my super fun 10 races in 11 days sequence coming up: Nature Valley then Tour of Ohio.

I’m tired. More soon.

Check out the pictures on FLICKR!