The Tiger Town Omnium (or Clemson Race) was another extremely fun and successful race weekend. We left after morning classes on Friday to go preride the course, luckily the race was only 2.5 hours away compared to our usual 5 hour drive. Unfortunately our preride was interrupted by a controlled burn on the back side of the course. This meant that we were unable to see the back hill where the longest climb was. it was still possible to ride most of the course, so we rode what we could before loading the bikes back up for the day. Saturday started early as normal, although this time the Women's A had the morning spot and the B's were set to start at 10:45. It was a weird feeling to start my warm up with almost no one around, both the men A and women A were out on course still. It had warmed up by the start and we rolled out as a group, we were neutral until the first turn. A few attacks tried to go almost immediately, but nothing stuck. I knew on this course with the large amount of climbing I was better off waiting for a field sprint, if I got away I'd probably be caught by the field on a downhill anyway. Right before the crest of the last hill I was sitting 4th. The finish was about 150m after the crest so the sprint had begun. I passed two other riders and ended up second in the B's. The ITT course was altered right before the start. It dropped from 7 miles to 4.8 miles with a big climb we hadn't ridden before in the middle. I started out as fast as I possibly could, I knew pacing was less important with the course being so short. I could see my 30 mark the whole time and caught her about half way through the race. I also caught the rider that started 1:30 in front of me with a gap closing on my minute-woman (Marie). I really enjoyed the course for this time trial, the steep climbs made it interesting and it was short enough to go all out the whole time. I pulled away a first place in the B's and was only 9 seconds off of second place in the A's. The crit was extremely technical with a shikane in the middle and two speed bumps. I'm glad it wasn't wet out or there would have been a lot of crashes. The plan was to go from the gun and I took off. I clipped both my pedals on the first lap from pedaling through corners too hot and backed off a little after that. I forced a gap in the field and Marie stayed on my wheel. The two of us were separate for a few laps before a small group caught us. That group would remain until the finish in a bunch sprint. I attacked them a few times but never manged to get away. Looking back at it, I shouldn't have attacked as much, I was already toasted for the finish and my sprint was only good enough for a 3rd place at the line. Marie was able to come away with the win. It was cool to have a course where the team could be out and around hyping it up. I can't wait for the back to back crit weekend at King next weekend.
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AuthorHi I'm Laney! I'm a freshman at Milligan College studying Mechanical Engineering and Multimedia Journalism while racing my bike on the road and cyclocross teams. I'm honored to have been blessed by God with these amazing opportunities and can't wait to tell you my stories. Check back here often to see what I've been up to. Archives
March 2019
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