Bob Blyth, Bariani 35+ 5

The DBC was certainly looking strong in the Cat 5 race and although my day started ominously I want to thank Rod, Dan, Darin, Nelson, Joaquin and Tom for a great race in the chase group.

Feeling the wind when I got to the parking lot I immediately began to regret that I had left my other wheelset at home. Going out on a warm up with Dan I could really feel the crosswind wanting to steer my 60mm deep dish wheel off the road. Once the race started I felt fine but going into the second turn I felt something hit my back wheel and then it seized and lifted the back of my bike off the ground. Thankfully I was near the rear of the group and other than startling a few of the people around me I was able to stop and see what happend without incident. There was a small stick partially lodged in my wheel. Once I checked that everything was fine it was time to get back in the group. So straight into the wind I went in pursuit of the pack. Maybe it was the deep dish wheels but I was able to get back up to them in pretty short order. By this time though we had already had an attack off the front. Rod let me know that we had at least two guys in there so we all settled in to try to control our group. I heard the Rio Strada guys say that they had two or three in there too so it seemed like it might be a group that could work well to stay out front.

I was feeling pretty good and as we came through the back of the loop on the second lap and we were told that the lead group had a 1:40 lead. We had about 15 or 20 guys in our group and I started thinking that with only 15 miles to go we were most likely not going to threaten the lead riders so I thought it might be fun to try to soften up our group. I asked a couple of our guys how they were feeling and if they wanted to do a few attacks and see if we couldn't shed a few riders. Rod offered to come to the front and sit up if I wanted to go. Just before the KOM section I accelerated. At the top of the climb I could see that I had some pretty good separation and decided that I would just hold on for as long as I could. Coming through the Start/Finish line I was trying to relax as much as possible. Thank god for a tailwind. Once I got back on the frontage road with the wind doing its best to make me hurt I felt that if I could just get around the corner I might just be able to stay away. I could see the main group getting closer to me and I knew that my legs still felt good but my brain was telling me that maybe I should just rest a little so that if they did catch me I wouldn't get spit out the back and still have to ride alone. I then set out to convince myself that there was no way I was going to let the group catch me without as much of a fight I could give them. I got to the corner and said goodbye to the headwind, goodbye to the negative thought, and, at least mentally, goodbye to the chase group. Coming down the hill to the gravely right hand turn I felt great. I could see some riders on the road ahead and hoped that it was some people that had fallen from our lead group but it wasn't. After the KOM line I realized that I had been out front for over a lap and I was close to the end. One more little stretch of horrendous crosswind and I would be done. As I came around the turn towards the finish line I couldn't have been happier. I had spent 12 miles on my own and still felt alright. I still couldn't believe that I was able to hang on to the end. Thanks to the guys in the group preventing any serious chase.

I am looking forward to more races with my DBC team mates. A lot of what made yesterday so much fun was doing the race with the team. We were definitely the team to watch in the Cat 5 race with about 8 of us in the top 25 including Jim Kuphaldt taking second. I know that Nelson should have placed but they have him as DNP, any one know why? I thought he was listed on the sheet at the race.

Proudly wearing the orange and blue,

Bob