Joe Martin Stage Race

Last week I traveled down to Fayetteville Arkansas for the Joe Martin Stage race. I arrived on Wednesday afternoon in Bentonville, home of Walmart, and my host housing for the week. Trent Talley was kind enough to let me in on the housing from a fellow BMC (Boston Mountain, not the BMC) club member's house. It was a sweet setup and we even got meals! I was very appreciative.

Thursday Time Trial, 2.5 Miles
Almost all uphill, this time trial was a bit deceiving. Based on the previous years winning time of 8:07, I set a goal for myself of under 9 minutes. I started OK, but dropped too much off pace at the base of the climb and tried to make up too much too fast. Tried to finish hard, but only good enough for a 9:27 and 107th out of 160 riders. I was was pretty spent, but I know this high intensity short effort will come as the summer progresses.








Friday Road Race, 110miles
Not very hard, and the only climb of the day wasn't too bad. Able to keep it in the big ring most of the time since the group was climbing pretty fast. I was itching to make an attack on the long downhill run in to town, but I know it would have been absolutely pointless. I positioned myself fairly well in the final miles, but got caught a little off guard by a cop car sitting in the middle of the road and some small rollers and turns before the uphill finish. Only 15 seconds down on the leader, good for 64th. Props to fellow house mate Andrew Talansky for his aggressiveness and getting into a 2 man break that had 8 minutes on the field at one point, but unfortunately he got sick and had to drop.

Saturday Road Race, 92 miles
A much better race, and a lot harder than yesterday. Reminded me a lot of the UCI's of last summer. Ouch put their entire team on the front and drilled it from the gun. A group of 10 got away in lap 2 and forced the unrepresented team Ouch to chase even harder. I focused on staying near the top third and out of trouble. The race lined out a bunch and we were cruising at an average of 28mph all day long. The hardest part was the steep climb to the first feed on each lap, and then the steady uphill for the next few miles after. The final 10 miles seemed long, and I was getting some small twitching in the muscles. I tried to mix it up in the sprint, but the rider in front of me pulled a foot out of his pedal in his sprint and almost went down. Good save by him, but slowed me down a bit. I got my best finish of this race in 32nd, S.T. as the winner Haedo who won for the second day in a row.

Sunday Criterium, 90mins.
Really hard crit today, but luckily the rain held out today, as it did all week. Tried to move up at the start, but the race lined out after the first couple laps and I was feeling it. There was a super fast downhill to a hard left turn that I was starting to get gapped on, and then started to get more tired chasing, and it was a viscous cycle from there. I lasted 35 minutes with the group, then rode the next 15 minutes by myself trying not to get lapped. They told us at the start line that making it 45 mintues was all you needed to get a placing in the crit and the GC. I made it 50 minutes in total, but they failed to include me in the results. I guess they messed up alot of results on the last day.

Overall it was a great race and I would love to go back next year. I feel my form is coming along good. I need to work on my short intensity (ie 2.5mile TT's and crits), and I feel like I will be good to go for the upcoming events.