Tour of Ohio Stage 1

Hey Folks,


I am going to make this short and sweet, as it is late, I am tired and have to get up early tomorrow for the Stage 2, 70-mile road race....

Todays stage was insane!

Picture this:

70 riders on a .5 mile loop. One roundabout, 4 narly 90-degree right hand turns (one of which went onto a very sketchey brick road.

From the gun, it was single file. Riders were lined out pretty much the length of (at least) half the course. My legs felt good, and I started to move up a lot.... I was despritly trying to get up to the front, but riders were popping left and right. Eventually the officials pulled almost half the field, even though were were only around 100 meters... from the leaders..

At one point, I went through one turn REALLY fast and almost went over the hay bails! Gabe also made a dramatic save on the same corner. Sketch Fest!

Only Gabe and Mike finished.

This was actually a "proulouge". Basically, it sets up what the general classification will be like starting tomorrow. Everyone who was pulled from the race got the same time as the finishers. The top 3 finishers today only got some time bonuses....

At the race representing Team Alliance are:

Mike Miller, Dan Wilson, Zac Felpel, Gabe Lloyd, myself, and Greg Lovell.

Greg Lovell is a Super sprinter from Belize. He will be racing with us for the summer. This kid is fast! He was a bit dissapointed with how today went, but he is not used to short, technical crits here in America. Right now he is blasting some strange reggae music in the room next to me. We are staying at some really sweet dorms here at Denison University and Grainsville, Ohio.

Tomorrow will be a nice road race, with a 1-mile climb to the finish.

Thats all for now

TG