Benicia

And I thought my season was over...

Couldn't help but head out for another event. 1)close to home 2)good money 3)I love to race.

The course is really nice. It's got a Vacaville like hill (OK, little smaller), then little descent, smaller hill, turn to a short rise, turn to the finish. Lots of crashes! Luckily I wasn't involved, but the Tues Port ride took a hit as both Hanan and Carla crashed in the p1/2/3 race. Carla looked a lot worse for it, hope she's OK. Then Roman (OK, only shows up on occasion at the Port, but still) took a bad spill in the p1/2 race. Please comment if you have news on Carla or Roman, I had heard that both took a trip to the hospital.

Masters race was interesting, the field being small the pace was somewhat on the slow side. I took off from the gun to try to speed things up but never got a really big gap and the only taker was a Morgan Stanley rider who wasn't going to work, so... back to the drawing board. Sat and watched as breaks formed and were caught. Then with 10 laps to go or so, a Squadra rider took a flyer and a Mako rider then bridged. Thought it looked promising, so I bridged up as well. It wasn't the smoothest break but it stuck. Two to go I pulled a bunch cause the other guys were prematurely playing the end game I thought, field was getting close. Last lap, I gapped them a bit on the hill, but they got on my wheel again after. Ended in a dead sprint, in which I got second. After five weeks of Cal Cup Velo promo races (which I love) the nice payout was a shocker.

P1/2 race was a lot faster, and the breaks more threatening. Same as always! CalGiant showed up and was the only team really, and with another small field I knew we were in for some trouble. Sure enough it was: CalGiant break, try to bridge or organize break, catch; CalGiant break, try to bridge or organize break, catch....

Four guys were off the front for a long time, and mostly through the work of three or four guys they were caught with five to go or so. I was pretty cooked from all this, including being in no man's land for four or five laps. I was glad to be in top ten in the sprint, but wanted more...

Near the end, ClifBar guy went down right in front of me and I hear two tire pops, which was very confusing. Sounded like another rider went down behind me as well, and I saw Switters later and he had gone down. Any information would be appreciated. It was like the Kennedy Assasination out there, trying to piece together what happened.

Nice work for Ian Swinson who got two 4th's in the 4's too. Stephen Langone also went down and broke his nice carbon handlebars (aluminum works well in crits Steve). He seemed to be fine though.