Cycle Smart day 1-Tasha 2nd DSJ 6th

One down, one to go. Back in MA for a little nice weather cross racing. Tash had a solid race and came 2nd today. She made one small bobble in the sand and it was the difference between first and second. It's good to see that the women's racing is taking on that kind of level. Basically when there is stiff competition you have to ride almost to perfection to get the win.

Adam (Myerson) hooked us up with a great host for the weekend, we are about 4 k away from the course, so it's perfect. Super nice family, Mike and Maria and their children Emma and Phillip and dog Dozer. We're just getting cleaned up before dinner..Maria is Italian and she is making some really nice smelling chicken and tomato sauce..mmm.

My race was ok, I finished 6th. I was a little disappointed with how I was riding a few parts of the course, I just wasn't as good as I needed to be today over some of the technical stuff. C'est la vie. It's actually kind of funny cause I slid out in the exact same section twice...exact same mistake.

At least the weather was nice and this is a great race so even though it wasn't an awesome day for me, it's still a good experience and fun to be here.

We did narrow down some possibilities for our Trip to Europe. We are leaning on a shorter trip, as we first decided to do and shut it down Jan 3rd and no WORLDS this year. Why? Well I have obligations next year on the road and my season will be focused around a few key UCI races. This means I need a break this year before getting on the gas again for a training camp and early season races. Tasha does have a few offers for the road right now and for her, she would like to do some more National team projects , some early season stuff like Redlands, Gilla and so forth, so we will race hard until Jan then shut it down and hopefully enjoy this thing called "vacation"...I hear they are quit fun. Next years push on the road will be a little bit longer I suspect so we have decided that we need to go into the year on a full tank. And who knows, taking the rest this January might lead to both better road and CROSS seasons next year. Natasha's said one of her goals was to be doing Worlds in both cross and road next year, and be in the races to podium. Doing Cross till Feb is great but it just eats into the prep time for the next season. So that's where we are at, more like 2-3 weeks in Europe. This way it allows us to to be focused in training and preparation and then we know how long we can float on the shape we have. We'd rather be focused for the races we chose to do in Europe rather than racing just because.

DSJ