Walla Walla Walla Walla Walla Walla......

After my last post, you may have been thinking "oh jeeze, Sam is cracking. He's sounds all down in the dumps, and he had a bad TT, and he's going to quit racing bikes forever, and now he's never going to  post amusing caveman race reports ever again." And then you probably worried that not getting to read caveman race reports will undoubtedly send you into your own spiral of negativity, ultimately leading to a lonely, miserable, flea-bitten death. Well fortunately for all of us, the HB team and I had a good race on Sunday, the pendulum of my attitude has swung back, and I love bike racing again. Hallelujah, we're saved!

The team rode beautifully. Lang Reynolds, escape artist extraordinaire, slipped off the front of the pack with three other bandits within the first ten miles. The Lenovo team, the burden of defending yellow hanging heavily 'round their necks, chased valiantly. They succeeded in reeling the breakaway back into the field; however, the third time up Mighty Mighty Waitsburg Hill our boys pushed the pace, and Lenovo's leader was left woefully exposed with over 30 miles of racing left to be had. With the armor of his team chipped away, we roared our terrible roars, and gnashed our terrible teeth, and rolled our terrible eyes, and at long last, cracked  McKissick wide open. My teammates all played a part, hitting-out hard when it hurt the most. With a mere eight miles remaining, groups started splintering off the front, one of which contained my teammate Søréñ Pété®søñ (arguably the fastest Danish cyclist over the age of 42 in the world). Now if there's one thing I know about Soren, it's that he knows how to party. And when I say party, I mean win bike races -- so when Soren went up the road, I thought it would be a good idea to follow him. I tried to bridge across to Soren's move with three other guys, but my bridge-mates were either tired or slow, so I called Krogg over, and well, I'll let Krogg explain in his own words:

Krogg dust off battle axe, take big swing, and drop those pipsqueek wheel-suckers like sandbags from hot air balloon. Krogg no need help! Krogg can bridge up there all by himself, thank you very much. Krogg make it most of the way with ease, but have trouble closing the final few seconds. Krogg momentarily worried him overconfident in his abilities -- "Krogg, you hang on to that axe good and tight, ya hear?" Krogg tell himself. Fortunately, Soren smart bike racer; him look back and see Krogg coming across. Soren slow down breakaway for a few seconds, allowing Krogg to catch on.   

Thank you Krogg. Upon reaching the breakaway, I just kept driving the pace, allowing Soren to rest his legs for the final climb, and insuring that we'd stay away from the field.

I was dropped by my breakaway-mates shortly after we started our final ascent of Mighty Mighty Waitsburg Hill,  but this provided me a front row view of Soren's impressive attack. He pounced with such ferocity and conviction, all the other guys looked like they were sprinting under water. I don't think our wily old Dane looked back until he was finished posting up. I hung on for eighth on the day. Ian McKissick, the poor thing, got dropped at the base of the climb, losing over two minutes on Soren. He dropped from 1st to 15th overall.

Yippie. I'm now in Walla Walla, enjoying a bit of down-time between races. I'm riding, eating, and resting a lot. Krogg has been sharpening his axe, and tuning up his TT bike. Sadly, my camera died on me (my charger is in Seattle), and so you'll have to use the camera in your mind if you want corresponding imagery.

Next up, Cherry Blossom. Head over to Oregon Cycling Action for wonderful stage-by-stage analysis, and really cool interactive maps of the courses.