Monday, June 05, 2006

Rough Week

Wow. I'm sorry that I complained about how poorly Captech went for us because now I realize how bad things can get. At least at Captech we all stayed upright and left with our bodies still intact. At the CSC Invite, we weren't so fortunate. Worst for the team was the loss of Eddy from the racing scene for a few weeks at the least. Eddy went down hard midway through the race and broke his pelvis. His spirits were good that night (considering how much pain he was in) and knowing Eddy, he will do everything in his power to be back on his bike riding in less than the 6 weeks that the doctor predicted. Our other ER visitor that day was Richie who suffered a gash on his chin from a crash with 6 laps or so to go in the race. Richie ended up with 14 stitches but was otherwise feeling okay and decided to sit out Lancaster for a couple more days to heal and recoup. Crash #3 came courtesy of Brent Meister General who was killing it in a 3 man break when something caused him to slide out on a corner. Brent hit his knee hard and got some scrapes on his face and wasn't able to continue either. A rough day indeed for the Priority Health squad. Robbie continued his dazzling form with an 11th place finish and Teddy gutted out a 23rd place after covering a ton of moves early in the race.
So, by default, I was on the Lancaster roster and raced a good 2-3 minutes before I got caught up in a crash and landed hard on my toosh. Bummer for me, as the pace was so high that I wasn't able to catch back on and my race was over after 2 laps of time trialing in vain. Robbie, Brent, Teddy, and Tommy all finished with Robbie in the lead group and Brent 1 min. back after suffering a slight mechanical on the last lap. Another super hard race from the start to the end where finishing is an accomplishment in itself. Reading is on Thursday and probably won't be any easier so it's time to put these races behind us and suck it up. No excuses, we can race better than this.
Enough of this - it's picture time!
Cool one of Brent on a corner while in the break at CSC

Teddy working hard in the early going at CSC
Robbie getting a feed from Ben during Lancaster
Team ride in Amish Country
Intercourse, PA (no joke) where we're staying this week. These Amish carrying buggies zip by every 5 minutes or so. Kinda cool.
The team is sporting new Ergomo powermeters (lower right), but they just don't compare to Glen's ultralight super power meter that includes everything that we have plus Seinfeld episodes, a mobile phone and more! (upper left)



Here is an article in the Richmond newspaper after CapTech - needs no explanation.

3 comments:

Anonymous said...

Just keep your chin up and keep dancing on the pedals. It will eventually all come together. We keep cheering you on back here in Iowa.

Anonymous said...

6/15/6 Congrats on the TT today. Looks like the remaining team rode well, and you sure deserved a break

Matt Marchal
(Doc and host in Richmond)

Scott said...

Dang Thor Zirbel. It looks like you crushed 103 people in the TT. Good job man and tell those other guys the same.