Fitchburg Longsjo Classic

Fitchburg is one of the races in New England; it's on the National Racing Calendar and is the second oldest race in the States. This all boiled down to one thing: I was in for an experience. The trip from Hershey to Fitchburg, Massachusetts started at 3:30 on Wednesday and didn't end until midnight. One thing I'm learning to deal with is that traffic jams on the East Coast are much more common and just as unpredictable as the ones in Colorado (they're just not caused by "rock scaling" or rockslides).

Thursday morning got off to an early start with number pickup and the time trial. The course was mostly uphill with a road surface shady enough to make most riders question the usefulness of aerobars. I personally had a less than stellar race, but seeing a lot of my collegiate racing friends almost made up for it. One stage down and I had mostly written off my chances of a decent place in the GC.

Friday morning it was pouring rain before and during the road race. The course was a 10+ mile loop that was either going up or down which, coupled with the rain, didn't leave much room to relax. It culminated in a 3 k climb up Wachusett Mountain that set me further behind in the GC, although I didn't really expect anything less. Living in Pennsylvania has taught me how to handle the rolling hills, but hasn't helped my climbing when it comes to anything more than a couple minutes long. My teammates Chris DeCarlo and Sean McLaughlin fared much better, taking taking a 1st and 4th place in the Men's category 4 road race.

Saturday was the circuit race which was thankfully uneventful for me. There were a number of crashes and I was happy to finish with the pack. In the Women's Pro/1/2 race, Anna McLoon of Harvard had an unbelievable day and finished 2nd after spending the latter part of the race in a breakaway.

I had suffered all weekend to make it through to the crit and Sunday morning I was as ready to go as one can be after 3 days of racing. For the first half of the race, I struggled to keep a decent position and read the pack as best as I could. In the final 5 laps or so I got more aggressive about getting and keeping a position in the front of the pack. With half a lap to go the pack got strung out with a small gap between the front 3 girls and the rest of the group. There was only one girl between me and the top group, so with a small surge I was able to jump the gap. I dove hard around the second to last corners and by the time I got onto the finishing straight, there was only the points leader still in front of me. She powered hard through the last 400 meters or so, and I sprinted around her with about 50 m to go to take the win. It took me another 50 m to realize that I was the first one across the line - it felt great but felt even longer to sink in.