Hammerfest pics

John Taylor on the lower slopes of Mt. Locke:

Lopresto tearing up the road to McDonald Observatory:



The team at the finish line of the hill climb:


Thanks to Muffin Camp for the excellent photos.

Hammerfest '06: return of The Pterodactyl

John Taylor has officially earned the nickname "the Pterodactyl." Interestingly, his ability to fly up mountains on his bicycle is not really the reason he earned his name. The real reason is probably best told in a different forum--at Hill's and Dale's after the Toosday Nighter over a beer, for example.

What a weekend! As you know, John Taylor, Mark Lopresto, Phil Nava, and I tried our hand against the headwinds and big mountains of West Texas at the Hammerfest this last weekend.

The fun began early Saturday morning with the 16 mile time trial, 9 miles of which was up a false flat into a typical West Texas headwind. Lopresto had the best result with 8th place in the Cat 4 race. John Taylor laid down a good time in the Pro 1/2s, despite puking twice during the race.

I had a bout of bad luck during my run. We had adjusted my seat height the night before and apparently not tightened my seatpost clamp enough. During the race, my seat slipped down about 6 inches. I finished a disappointing 33 out of 50.

Things began to look up after the brutal, 16-mile hill climb to McDonald Observatory Saturday afternoon. John Taylor had a good run up the hill and even dropped Jason Sager, a pro MTB racer and Cat 1 road racer. Lopresto got 10th place in the 4s, and I got 16th out of 50 in the 3s. Phil has a pure sprinter's physique and hates long climbs. Nevertheless, he was a good sport and persevered through Saturday's stages.

Sunday's race was a 74 mile road race around the challenging "scenic loop," which included two major series of climbs, with a lot of stingers thrown in between for good measure. John and Mark had excellent races. John got 9th place in the Pro 1/2 race. This is an excellent result considering the talent on display in his field. Team Hotel San Jose had 12 really stong guys in that race. For John to singlehandedly get a top-10 result is really incredible.

Lopresto got 6th in the 4s race, which had a strong field of guys who should definitely be in the 3s. He finished in the money ($40!) at 8th place.

I had another bout of bad luck during the road race. I was feeling good after a relatively decent climb on Saturday and was looking forward to the climbs on the road race. 40 miles into the race, up the first major climb, a guy who was riding near the front decided to dismantle his brake in the middle of the road. He stopped pedaling and then swerved to the right. I was behind and to the right of him, so I had to slam on my brakes to avoid hitting him. The guy behind me, John McAllister, ran into my rear wheel and took us both down. His handlebars ended up in my brand new Race X-lite rear wheel, which resulted in two broken spokes and a taco'd wheel for me. The wheel was so warped it was rubbing on my frame. Unfortunately, the wheel truck was ahead of the pack behind a breakaway of two guys, so I couldn't change out wheels and chase down the pack. I sat around with John Mc for about 10 minutes until a lady whose husband was racing in the masters stopped and lent me a wheel. I chased as hard as I could for the last 30 miles but could never catch the pack. Still, I had a blast racing and hanging out with Mark, John, and Phil.

Again, props to John and Mark for their excellent results at an extremely challenging race. If this race is any indication, we are going to have a good year.

John, Phil, Mark, and I will be out at the Toos tomorrow, hoping that the altitude training this last weekend will still be with us. I hope to see you out there.

--Clay

Sign up on bikereg.com

Just wanted to let everybody know that sign up for the State RR Championships, Ft. Hood, TX <http://www.theracingpost.us/State%20Champ%20%20Road%20Race.htm> is now available on www.bikereg.com . I hope to see a lot of you out there come June 25. Also, you can still sign up for the Houston Grand Criterium. http://www.bikereg.com/events/register.asp?eventid=3207 .

hope y'all have a great day,

Dave

Hammer Fest Room Available

We have an extra room at the Wayside Bed & Breakfast if anyone is
interested. It's about $60/night and we have it from Fri evening to
Sunday morning. Email if you want it joe@peakfitnessnow.com

Thanks,
Joe

Peak Fitness Vanderpool Training Ride 4/2

We're heading out to the hills of Vanderpool this Sunday for about 56
miles. We're meeting at Soler's in Helotes at 6:30am. If you're
interested in joining us, let me know so we can look for you.
joe@peakfitnessnow.com

Hope to see you there,
Joe

Props to Berchelmann

Props to David Berchelmann for getting lucky #7 in the RR and the TT at the Cleburne collegiate race last weekend. That's two good results in the last two collegiate races for David. Keep it up!

As David mentioned in his comment to the previous post, there is a crit in Houston on the 14th of May. Hopefully we can get a few of us out there for this one:

http://www.houstongrandcriterium.com/index.html

John at Fayetteville

For your viewing pleasure, here is another pic of John in the field at Fayetteville. Nice Michael Jordanesque tongue position, John. ;-)

State Championships

As you may know, this year's skill-based (as opposed to age-based) State Championship Road Race is scheduled for June 25 at Fort Hood near Killeen. This is a change from previous years, when the States were in Bryan in October. There will still be a State Championship race in October in Bryan, but it will be the age-based race.

Here is the flyer for the June 25 race:

http://www.theracingpost.us/State%20Champ%20%20Road%20Race.htm

Take a look at the course profile. There are some major climbs in this race. The Pro1/2 race is 112 miles, the 3s race is 78 miles, and the rest are 44 miles. This should be a challenging race.

Unlike the course in Bryan, where the finish usually comes down to a field sprint, I imagine the climbs on the Ft. Hood course will break things up a bit. Looks like we need to schedule a Vanderpool training session soon.

Fayetteville

Props to John Taylor for mixing it up in the breakaway on the first day of the Fayetteville Stage Race. Here is a pic of John in the break:

Welcome

Welcome to the blog page of the BSKlaw.com/Bikeworld.com Bicycle Racing Team of San Antonio, Texas. From time to time, we will post team news, race report, photos, and general information.