Oh, Vermont.

Last weekend I went to Vermont for a couple of regional races. I was staying with Cody's sister-in-law and his wee little nephew, as he and his brother were up in Northern New Hampshire doing a man-retreat (ed. note: how manly is it to bring your iPhone backpacking? Yeah, that's what I thought too). Anyway, I'd decided to go to these races rather than down to those in Plymouth because they had almost $1000 women's prize purse between the two of them. I like to support events that support women's racing.

The course on Saturday was in Windsor, VT, and went all around the Harpoon Brewery (it's kind of like Sierra Nevada Brewery, but in Massachusetts, and not as big). The course wasn't overly technical, but it had some fun sections. There was what felt like a lot of climbing, which hurt. Anyway, I had a great start (for once! yay!) then got passed by a couple ladies. Basically I was in a group racing for 4th for a majority of the race, but I was sucking on the run-up and eventually got dropped there. Hella uncool. So I wound up 7th. The picture at the top is from that race. I also almost wrecked myself on the barriers, but held it together somehow. Oh yeah, and my teammate won!

On Sunday I went to Putney, VT, which is a neat little town on the Connecticut River that has one of the most fun co-op groceries I've been to in a long time. Loved that place. They also have a shop that puts on weekly Wednesday night 'cross races. How rad is that? Yeah, hella rad. Anyway, the course had a lot of fun stuff, including a super steep descent into a big rutted mud section that was kind of sketchy. Unfortunately it also had a big flat section virtually free from turns that went around this field. Boring. And really painful. And as it turned out, the course was super short, so they could definitely have added some turns in there to make it more fun and so that we didn't have to do 8 laps. 8 laps, you ask? Yes. 8. And there was a really hard run-up. That we had to do. 8 times. Anyway, I didn't have as good of a start, but I got with a good group and I was doing pretty well. Then I dropped my chain. It was so stupid, it was on this little stairs run up part, and as I was running my knee pushed my pedal backward and as it backpedaled the chain came off my inner ring. Ok, no biggie, chain back on, get with some other riders, keep moving. Then, on the next lap, it did the Same Thing. Put it back on, but then apparently I hadn't done a very good job and it came off again immediately. This was pretty much where my race ended. I got my chain back on and kept going, but I was so far back from everyone that, well, my motivator broke. I rode around for a few more laps (and dropped my chain AGAIN!) but I was about to get lapped by the leaders and the officials weren't pulling me, so I pulled myself. AKA DNF. But whatever. At some point that whole "stick it out, quitting is for losers" stuff just doesn't apply. There was nothing to be proved. So, yeah. But my teammate won again!

Anyway, I rode way too long and hard today for a tuesday following a race weekend, but it was 60+ degrees out and you gotta get it in while you can. Carpe diem, or something like that.