Any of you RBR'ers going to be there this weekend? Hopefully there won't be much rain for the crits on Saturday. Sunday looks pretty good.

I'll be riding in the cat5 races and hope the hills are bigger than they look.

From what I read sounds like the crit has a decent hill in it. I may do the RR on Sunday.

Oh, and I hope the hills are smaller than they look.

I'll be there, and I hope Debbie Milne is, too.

I did the crit on Saturday and RR on Sunday. A couple things to note: A very well organized event and the courses were great.

Cat5 Crit - The course was just over 1 mile with 6 turns. The majority of the course was flat to downhill, with all the uphill in one climb between turns 5 and 6.

Just guessing, there were 35 - 40 riders. By lap 5 or 6, the lead group was down to 12 - 14; the hill was eating riders every lap. With 4 to go we were down to a group of 6. I attacked just prior to the climb with 3 to go and made the break stick for a little over a lap, being caught and passed by one, then two others on the climb with 2 to go. I managed to get back up to them by the start/finish line with one to go but could not stay with them after the climb on the last lap. I ended up taking 4th - which is great for this being my first crit.

Cat5 Road Race - This one was a 10 mile loop on pretty good roads and not much traffic at all; we did 3 laps. The course was slightly rolling with a couple good climbs (nothing big though) around 2 miles from the start/finish line.

We started with a field of 50 but by the end of the 1st lap we were down to 15 or so; most of the split took place on the climb where several riders tried to make a break. The second lap was just a lap; I thought there would be a big attack on the climb but nothing happened.

The majority of lap 3 was pretty easy. There were 3 or 4 riders doing all the work because a group of 3 from the same team wouldn't pull through. I just sat in mid-pack and let them do that.

The last time up the climb, someone attacked just as we started up; he was reeled back in before we were halfway up. And, just as he was caught, another attacked but it was short lived. During all this, I somehow got boxed in to the right-hand side of the road and was afraid I was going to be stuck there.

As the second attack was being caught, about 2/3 up the climb, I noticed the road to the right side of the white line was little wider a little ahead. I attacked right then, riding the very edge of the road up to where things got wider, and blew by the front at full steam, from the right, just as they were all relaxing after catching the previous attack, catching them all by surprise. I topped out with a big lead and hit a downhill section that had a few curves as hard as I could. After the curves was a small climb; near the top I was about 100 meters ahead, with maybe 600 meters to go. After the little hill it flattens out then goes downhill to the finish. At 500 meters I glanced back and can see a chase group closing fast but, maybe I can hold them off. 200 meters to go and I'm still ahead, but right then, they blow past me like I'm sitting still. I ended up 7th.

All in all, I had a great weekend!

It was well-organized, although most of the women were pissed about having a lap removed from their last 3 in the crit because one lone junior lapped the field. There were about 7 of us that were placed as we crossed the start/finish in a nice, neat line thinking that we had one more lap to go.

I'm writing a book about how to lose a race in the last 400 meters.

I wrote a race report & linked to my friend's blog where there are a lot of photos (including some from the cat 5 RR). Click the link in my sig. to see.

Good Job Mike....When I heard that you got 7th and John C got 8th I figured it was a tough course and a even tougher field....