Of course I did. The week before what is probably the most important race this season. The big hometown UCI race. What else can I do besides taking tons of Zinc, Vitamin C, multivitamins and, drinking tons of water and green tea and eating really well? Any miracle cures out there?

Brutal road ride tomorrow morning. I fear I may be coming down with a cold. Sore, scratchy throat this morning. We will see. Saturday is a big day. The first of the Crank Brothers grand prix of cyclocross. Thanks to Jackie at King for the photos.

Wow. I don't think anyone will be able to describe the weather in Seattle on Saturday night. The start was delayed due to lightning. It was torrential rain and then hail and then rain and hail and thunder and lightning. I was warming up in a pinic padoga with Tim Johnson, Ian Brown and I assume the Jaques-Mayne brothers+the "Dopers suck" guy. It was just ridiculous. And then, not ten minutes before our start, it clears up.

I had a good start and a pretty good race. My fitness is ok, my technique needs work. It took a bunch of laps to get into a rhythm and at that point I was battling it out for like, 15th. Which I got, I think. See that Dale Knapp guy? Yeah, I finished behind him.

We drove back after the race finished, I got home, washed my bikes up and tried to get to sleep as the neighbor upstairs moved her furniture around till about 4am. I got up at 9 and drove out to Hillsboro for the Cross Crusades race #1.

Long story short. I had a craptastic start and then found the legs in the 2nd lap, made the move up to my teammate Shannon Skerrit and flatted. We were 3rd and 4th in the race, chasing down Barry Wicks and Eric Tonkin. And, I just get a flat. I was thinking, "sweet, we have 3rd and 4th locked up." How awesome would a Vanilla 1-2 have been?

Not today though. The course was LONG! I jogged it all the way from the backside of the course and swapped the wheel out. Rode a few more laps for fun and then wandered over to the hoses when I noticed Barry ripped his derailleur off. That left Eric and Shannon to duke it out.

Vanilla took top honors.

I'm late for a movie. More tomorrow.

PS: My Veloshop teammates are amazing. Truly. I'll post some results when they are up.