U.S. Cup/Windham Cup, Windham, NY

I stayed with Brent Mellen, Andrew Freye, John Burns Hattie and Ben in a condo…
the condo was only a few miles from the race venue…played some monopoly, and ate a pasta dinner Friday night before are race… race wasn’t till 2 on Saturday … it felt weird to not be in a rush before a race…i didn’t know what to do with myself… I played some solitaire, watched a documentary on bigfoot, took a nap and played some more solitaire… it only took me an hour to get ready for the race.

THE LEGEND OF BIGFOOT
part 1

part 2

part 3


I felt fine going into this race… I had a decent call up (fourth row)… my start went ok… I wasn’t in last place like last weekend (@mount snow)…I kept myself in the top half of the field for the first lap…on my second lap climb the heat started to get to me… it was about 90 degrees and the climbs were on fire roads with no shade and I was wearing a black jersey… everyone was dealing with the same heat but I don’t think I was doing as good a job of dealing with it…I started feeling nauseous and light headed…my will was broken and I was very seriously considering dropping out of the race ... I decided at the pace I was going I would be pulled soon anyway so I would just keep going….

i eventually started feeling better part way through the 3rd lap, still not 100 percent but good enough to get my will back and repass about half the people who passed me when I was feeling ill ...I was pulled after 4 laps of a 6 lap race… again, same as last weekend at mount snow I was very close to making it out another lap but I wasn’t too bummed about getting pulled because I really wasn’t having to much fun (not on the climbs anyway , descents were still rad) it was just too hot to ride hard….I didn’t have any mechanicals, injuries or anything seriously bad happen to me…. under the conditions I think I did as good as I could do... I came in 38th out of 73 starters (all results)

After the race took a dip in the river with Burns Brent and Ben… it felt awesome… it was fast moving water only about a foot deep…we laid down on are backs and let the cool water roll over us…. I will defiantly be visiting that river again the next time I race at Windham…

Overall a fun couple of days but I did regret not having the opportunity to play mini-golf at the super sweet mini-golf course in town…with out teammate Sean Daley’s wife, kyla there to school everyone I was a shoe in to get my first W of the season… next time.
Ben

Brent
melted pre race gummy bears