August 5, 2009: Northern California District Champ RR
Race report by Raegan L
Jamie and I headed up to Northern CA for their district championships at Fort Ord road race . It was a 42 mile race, 10.2 miles per lap with rollers and and one mile-long climb. As we drove in, we noticed a distinct marine layer and strong winds. We were thinking, “what did we get ourselves into?” Or I was thinking that. I am not a fan of strong wind gusts. So we get there and the weather was cool enough, that we raced with arm warmers. Can You believe it? It’s August! What a special treat to have nice cool weather to race in. And the winds, they were there but not too bad. Our field was small. So we knew that it was going to be hard to “just sit in”. On the first lap, I attacked on the climb just to see who would go with me. Nobody did, so for the rest of the climbs I was sure to be second wheel. There were not any attacks the entire race, everyone was saving up for the uphill finish. So it came down to the final lap with 1k to go and we all pretty much sat up waiting to see who was going to pull. I kept looking back, waiting for the attack to take a wheel. Nobody was going. We came to 200m. Finally someone went. I took the wheel. It was so close. The girl who took my wheel sprinted past me. I ended up with a 3rd place finish. And Jamie finished in the top 10! It was a great day for the I.E. Girls!
