From Bob...

The Rio guy did what he could during our break, I just made some missteps. I felt alright going into the road race. I did not have Madera listed as an A race and am still in the process of building some fitness from a decidedly low intensity winter. My week prior to this weekend was pretty intense and I could feel the miles in my legs during the TT. For the RR I stayed at the back most of the time with Bowlus just staying safe and conserving as much energy as I could. By the time we were coming around for the last lap I figured that half way through the rough section would be a good time to attack since it would be really hard for a large group to come out of the middle to respond. I saw that Rio had set up well at the front and I saw Robin and Jason ahead of me. We were moving along at relatively slow pace so I jumped up the left side. I knew that Rio would be able to respond and actually heard one of their guys say "there it is" as I went past. I was hoping one of our guys could react too since I figured Rio. with their numbers, would be able to block at the front. Here is where I lost the advantage. I launched from about half way back and ramped it up to 30+ which in and of itself would take a lot of effort. I failed to properly gauge how much more energy I would be using going over the rough stuff and I stayed out front way too long. I was so intent on getting a good gap that I ended up gassing myself to a point that even after Rio took a turn up front I couldn't recover quickly enough. So my take away from this is two fold, one is to understand that the amount work needed to propel yourself over a rough surface goes up much more quickly as you accelerate than it does on smoother roads and two, if someone is coming with you and you have created a gap, force them to start helping sooner rather than later. It was a good learning experience for me and I am feeling like I am stronger than last year. Bariani should be fun.