I did the double this weekend along with Andy, Eric, N8 and CJ.  Great weekend of racing.  Won’t go into the course description as the others have covered.  Saturday was an odd day for me.  I was able to get into the lead, but I felt like I was way overworking as I was hoping to save some legs for Sunday’s race.  I just couldn’t find the groove all day.  I was third after the first corner heading to the big run / ride up.  I opted to run as I figured it might save my legs for later.  Sure enough, the second time around I passed the first place guy about 3/4′s of the way up as he was riding.  I was able to build on my lead for the next lap or so.  I saw Andy setting in 2nd…thank goodness for teammates as I really hoping that no one would chase me.  Thanks go out to Andy, he blocked, then rode everyone off his wheel for second.  It was my first win of the season.  Didn’t feel stellar, but a win is a win.

Sunday’s race was at Powderhorn Park.  This was the toughest race for me last year, so I was a little concerned about how I would perform on tired legs from the day before.  I have really been trying to focus on getting better starts so I was one of those “early birds” Andy was talking about trying to get a good position.  I think it payed off.  I was setting in 5 or 6th after the first set of barriers.  I tried to get into a rhythm quickly as I didn’t know how my legs were going to respond.  About 1/4 way through the first lap Andy blows by me.  I figured I would tuck in and hope that I would loosen up.  After a lap or two the front group was thinned down to about 4 or 5.  The pressure was pretty constant and slowly three of us seperated from the rest.  I was able to match the surges, but I was never quite able to make my own attacks.  I decided I was going to sit in and force them to drop me and hope that they would wear themselves out.  It worked up until the last lap when one of the guys made an attack.  I was setting third wheel and Ezra, the guy in second, did not respond.  I finally made a move to bridge accross when the gap was about 30 meters.  Luck must have been on my side.  The guy on the attack went down on the set of sweeping corners heading down towards the lake.  Ezra and I got around him and I saw that he had dropped his chain.  It was the break I needed.  I stayed at the front and kept the pace as high as I could leading to the big run-up.  I surged a little on the run and got just a little gap as we remounted.  I was able to come off the final corner and drop it down a few gears for the final sprint.  I JUST held him off at the line.  I would have felt bad if I didn’t win….Ezra was killing me on his single speed!  Andy, single speeds were there own category, so you should at least move up one place.  I was stoked with my second win of the season.  Sunday’s race was better than Saturday’s for me.  I felt good after I got through the first couple of laps, and to win against a bigger and better field made it all the more sweet.

All the Crossniacs rocked the weekend.  It was great to see everyone out cheering for each other.  CJ, you rocked it this weekend….you can suffer with the best of them.

Other Guy