Its been WAY too long since my last update so here goes!! I
started the season pretty well finishing 17th overall at Valley of
the Sun stage race and 3rd u23 overall. I did some local AZ races working with the
team on tactics and just getting to know how we race as a team. I had high hopes going into the Merco Cycling
Classic the last weekend of February.
The first day was a road race, I started out not feeling great, throughout
the race I felt worse and begin to have some shooting pain in my right calf
when pulling up on the pedals. I
finished the race almost 20 minutes down in a race I should not have any
problems. I stayed in the race as long
as I could to help my teammates. When we
got back to our condo in AZ I went to Enurance Rehab to see a physical
therapist to see if he could help with my calf issue. He quickly diagnosed me with a severe Gastroc
muscle strain. I spent the next 3 weeks
in physical therapy and not riding much.
I did a lot of stretching, foam rolling and scraping to help loosen up
the problem area. Although I missed 3
crucial weeks of training I was able to learn a lot about my body that will
hopefully keep something like this from happening again. I owe a huge thanks to Nate Snell at
Endurance Rehab and to On The Rivet for getting me fixed up as quick as possible!
As my leg begin to feel better we were creeping up on the
San Dimas stage race, another race I was hoping to do well at. We left after my last day of physical
therapy, I had to change my goals going into the race quite significantly from
hoping to contend in the young rider classification to just finishing the race
which I was really bummed about. I ended
up not finishing the race.
Following San Dimas I went back to the Bay Area to put in
some miles with my good friend David Benkoski as well as spend time with my
coach. I left CA with much better
fitness then when I had come in. From CA
I flew and met a few of my teammates and the Presbyterian Invitational in
Charlotte, NC. It was a great event and
was an awesome town to race in while I don’t excel in the NCC crits yet they
are super fun to race in. I flew out the
next day to Missoula to see my family and get in another solid week of
training.
It is always great to come back to Missoula, but I was not
thrilled to fly in and have it snow on me on my first ride there. The weather was very cold but I was happy to
spend time with my close friends and family.
I am currently on a plane on the way to St. Louis to meet up
with the rest of my Gateway Harley Davidson/Trek U23 team before we head to
Arkansas tomorrow for the Joe Martin Stage race. We will be fielding a strong team in the pro
race and have high hopes for both stage and general classification
results. From Joe Martin we will be
making the long road trip to New Mexico for Tour of the Gila.
Thanks for reading!
