Part of me wanted to go out and beat up on the 4/5 guys and then I started listening to my body (stomach in particular). I knew that I'd had a hard stretch of races so I knew my legs wouldn't appreciate it if I went out and destroyed them again. Also, about 2.5 hours before the start of my race I'd eaten a HUGE bowl of pasta with a bunch of cream and meat in it. Oh yeah, and 3 Doubletree Chocolate Chip Cookies-at least twice the size of the ones pictures-(I didn't want them to go bad...). On the way over to the race I felt like there was a rock sitting in my stomach. Given this it wasn't too hard for my teammates to convince me to race the 4/5 race with them. Sorry, no pictures of me racing this race, you'll have to settle for the picture of me winning the race on Sunday in Walla Walla.
Almost right off the bat I noticed the that field was more unstable than usual. This was a combination of junior racers, brand new Cat 5 racers and Cat 4 racers hoping to beat up on the field (yeah, technically i was in that category). In my defense, I was in that race because my teammates were there and I wanted to take it easy on my legs. This race was anything but "taking it easy." Granted, it wasn't impossible but people started attacking right off the line. Now there's something special about the Cat 5 racers: they don't let anything go, and I mean ANYTHING. It seemed like every single time we hit a straight stretch someone was attacking off the side, the front and even the back! This led to a surging within the pack of every single rider trying to get in the break, thus meaning that nothing got away. There was way too much sketchy stuff happening in this race for me to touch on all of it so I'll hit the main points. A lady who's race weight (total rider, bike and equipment weight) was at least 40 lbs heavier than me cut me off through a corner (even after I warned her I was there). She was one of those people that if you touched you'd skyrocket off in the other direction, yeah, bad news. I made it through the corner (my tire was sitting an inch and a half from the edge of the road through the entire corner). My teammate sitting on my wheel saw the whole thing and was sure I was done for.
Besides that there were junior racers darting all over the field without signalling, Cat 5 racers thinking they're hot shit because they look "so PRO" but can't ride worth shit and then the Cat 4 guys muscling their way around jostling for position (I didn't fall into this category). After my little incident with the woman I didn't want to risk it so I took the "safe and stupid" approach: ride just off the side of the field so I still get a little bit of drafting yet I can avoid a crash if something happens.
The "safe and stupid approach" ended up paying off. Granted, I know I'm strong but I also know I'm not strong enough to ride without a break for an entire race and still take with win. Somehow it kind of worked out that way.
On the final lap I made a surge towards the front and tried to get an inside line so I could catch as much of a break from the wind as I could for the final sprint but I never got my desired line. I ended up getting pushed to the outside of the corner and straight into the wind. Coming out of the corner I saw that groups of 2-3 riders had opened small gaps (about 10' or so) as the field strung out. I went ahead and jumped, 300m out--BAD IDEA. Who knows, maybe I was thinking about Fabian Canceellara... I just tucked down and kept bridging. Caught one group, caught the next, grabbed the next guy's wheel then took off. Damn, still 150m to go. I grabbed a quick look between my legs and didn't see anyone on my wheel but that didn't mean they weren't off the side. I stole a quick look back and didn't see anyone right there but saw a gap closing a little closer than I liked. I stood up for a while, gave it a little sprint and sat down to time trial in. I don't know what the hell happened but I have no clue how I was able to win that race. I did just about everything "wrong": I didn't sit in the field and draft, I took all corners on the outside, I was the one catching the wind EVERY SINGLE time we came down the straight stretch, I ate like crap before the race AND I was coming off my 8 day (5 races) racing stretch. Anyway, somehow it all worked out for me. 
It didn't work out so well for Evan (a teammate). A junior caused a crash in the last corner that caused about $1000 worth of damage to Evan's bike. I didn't get a picture of the wheel but here's pictures of the road rash and cracked crankset. We'll get him fixed up and ready to race by next week.
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