Mid-Summer Training

Racing Bikes in Capitol Reef!

These past several weeks I have spent the majority of my time in Park City with a lot of fun but challenging training. About a week ago we had an intensity period which ended with a weekend getaway to the Capitol Reef region of Utah for a 3 part Bike Race. Before we even left for this race we had already completed about a week of intensity training with several different team comps and time trials. I was very excited for this bike race as I have never raced in a Stage Race before. The first day we had a Circuit race in the morning which was a 17mi loop, after this race I was sitting right in the middle of the field of about 30 racers. Later that afternoon we had a 12mi Time Trial which was brutal as it was an out and back. What made it brutal was the large amount of headwind on the return stretch. I had fun as it was just a race to put your head down and hammer it out. After the first day of racing I was sitting in 12th place a couple seconds behind my teammate Michael Ward in 11th and Adam Loomis was sitting in 5th place after crushing out the TT. The second day of racing was a 62mi Road Race with a solid climb about halfway into the race. On the climb Adam took off and Michael and I rode with about 6 other riders over the top of the hill. After the climb the group I was with worked together in a pace line to cover the windy section before the descent into the final couple miles. Adam and two other riders were leading the race with a substantial gap on my group that they were able to maintain all the way to the finish. After the descent Michael and I broke away from our group and worked together for the last 10mi or so till the finish. Michael ended up finishing just ahead of me in 5th place and I came in 6th on the day. We all had such a large gap on the rest of the field that we ended up moving way up the overall rankings. Adam ended up taking the Overall Victory, Michael came in 6th and I came in 7th overall! We now have US National Championships coming up this next weekend on Saturday here in Park City. There will be a live streaming event here if you would like to tune into the event. Below are some pictures of the last couple weeks, I will post another update after Nationals with results!

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