Sunday, April 5, 2009

WVU Strikes Again @ VT

Another exciting weekend of RACING...
6 riders and an official traveled to VT for a fun filled weekend of racing.
We attempted to depart Morgantown at 4:30 on Friday but that failed and we finally got on the road shortly before 6. Along the drive the Cucumber (not pickled yet), AKA Elliott, claimed to have witnessed 3 moons (2 which came out at the same time). We stopped in Fayetteville, WV for some Mexican at Diogi's, and made it to "Big Watts" Hanson's House around 11pm.
We all took the chance to claim our sleeping space and after some school girl giggling and Chad partying with the neighbors (AKA asking them to turn their thumping bass down), we all fell asleep.
Morning came a few hours later at 7am, and the coffee was brewing and the bike packing went into action.
We loaded the vehicles and headed for the road race. Steve decided to take the lead without directions and got lost, and after getting on the correct road, the horribly unfortunate occurred. A deer found the headlight/hood of Steve's car. After some blood was shed, and fur relocated into the bumper, the entire team arrived safety and prepped for the race.

The racing was intense. Men's A went off first, followed by Men's B and Women's A.
James M. Schulte 3rd (men's A)
Janel C. Bedard 2nd (Women's A)
Steve Nutt 9th (men's B)
Brian Talbott 21st (men's B)

I don't know about the other races, but I broke away at mile 10 (solo'ing for about 20 miles and held upfront for close to 55 miles) and even though I did look back, I kept charging forward and it payed off for me in the end. This was my best ever ACCC road finish.

After a brief intermission and a slight course change the Men's C and D races took off. (these races had a different, much easier finish)
James Braswell 19 (men's C) having dropped his chain very early on and had to chase the whole race.
Chad Lowers 21 (men's C)
Elliot "Cucumber" Iannello 24 (men's D)

All of them looked fast as they went through the race.

After the race, we left Ryan to officiate the TTT and we went to took some showers and ate some food at the Cellar. YUMMY food!!!

After, an anti-climatic evening (minus Ryan's free drink from taco bell, and frosties) we hit the hay.

Waking up at 7am for round two. CRIT action.
The crit racing was intense, with Talbott asking for a pity win on the start line... After 7 years of racing for WVU this was his last ACCC start. The field laughed offered a prime (silly man denied a free prime, and said all or nothing). (prime- pronounce preem).
Elliott took 9th in Men's D
James and Chad took 20th and 22nd respectively
Talbott took 16th and Steve (after a flat and several attempts to solo) took 6th and a 4th place prime.
Janel took 1st place with the big W, shaking off "Big Watts" for the sprint.(with 1-3rd, 3-2nd's, and 2-1st's primes)
and I was unable to repeat and finished 22nd.

We'll miss ya Dr T, even though you never did win


Overall, an AMAZING WEEKEND.

3 comments:

James Braswell said...

I finished 18th in the RR your jerk! Lol, out of the points who cares?

Brandon Crawford said...

Why is Elliot called cucumber? Did i miss something?

Ryan said...

Too much Liquigas. But I think the shirt he had wasn't even that, just day-glo green.