Sat. 7/3/2010

Well, I made it down to Austin and met up with a number of Silver boys as they once again placed their mark on the annual Spam race.

I didn't get an official count, but there had to be 12 to 15 Silver in attendence.

As usual, the pace at the start was brutal and with a stiff tail wind it was even more brutal this year. Everytime I glanced down at my speedometer, it read 32 mph.

Just before we turned east (and into a head-cross wind), H-wood and Todd Peterson launched an attack. Two others went with them (one guy from Flanders and one from the group from Owatonna).

With so many other Silvers in the group, the pace slowed as they let the break get away. No one else stepped up to the front to chase them down, so we all settled in for the rest of the race. Which was good for me, because I was well past my comfort stage.

We turned south (into the nice stiff 20+mph headwind), and I smartly tucked in back on the the left side of the group. There were a number of Silver near the front and to the right of the group. We moved along nicely, until someone cut off Chris and he went down (along with Sea Ray, Expresso, and two other riders).

As I went past, I noticed the Silver jerseys in the mix, so I pulled off and turned back to see if there was anything I could do. Chris was in the ditch and he laid there for a bit, while Ted was chatting with him. when he turned over, his face was pretty bloody, he had a nice couple of cuts by his left eye (one above and one below). Chris sat up for a bit and started to feel a bit better, but was pretty light headed. I told Expresso and Sea Ray to go on and ride in and I would stay with Chris until a SAG vehicle showed up.

I guess we waited about 10 minutes for the SAG, we put Chris' bike in and the SAG guy had some paper towels for Chris to hold over his cuts.

As Chris got in, I got back on and started the ride back in. Now of course, I was alone and had to tackle the headwinds for the next 5 or 6 miles by myself. But I made it back anyway.

H-wood ended second overall, with Todd finishing fourth, the girls finished 1, 2, 3, plus we had anumber of others finish up in the individual categories (Bruce finished 3rd in the 50-59 age group).

So a pretty good showing considering our group was missing 4 riders to the big crash (3 strong riders and me)...