the trip down

Sorry - no photos to share. :(
My camera will not download for some reason and I don't have the patience right now to figure it out.

Today we arrived in Anaheim after a 6.5 hour drive which was very uneventful. We drove our large van with four bikes up top and two inside. We arrived at the athlete check-in around 1:30 and did not get to our hotel (about 7 minutes away) until 4:30. The Time Trial bike Nano is borrowing has to pass a certain criteria since his time trial is a qualifier for Worlds. Anyway - he switched out the stem, twice, and it finally passed. A big thank you to Martin Messersmith (an awesome triathlete!) for taking the time and giving up his road bike stem for nano to use in the Cervelo. Karen took some great pics. which I'll eventually post here.

Tonight the kids and Martin and Ryan Messersmith met and rode part of the time trial course. On the way home we got lost, taking an hour to find our "apartment" instead on the necessary 20 minutes. Our place is impossible to find in the dark....it is a "boutique" hotel with "apartments. I guess part of the ambiance is low outside lighting!

So, here's the line up for tomorrow:
11:50:00 - 15/16 Joseph
1:34:30 -17/18 Nano
2:17:30 -13/14 Abba
3:11:00 - 10/12 Jon
and our fellow JETS:
2:39:30 -13/14 Stefan Fuller - JETS
3:04:30 - 10/12 Ryan Messersmith - JETS
3:07:30 - Robert Terra - JETS

Looking forward to some great racing and tough competition!
BTW- Nano started feeling better a few hours ago after a tough day of stomach flu yesterday. I was really happy to see his race time in the afternoon - every minute of recovery time is helpful!

By for now - will write more soon!

the fun

So what do we do the day before the criterium?

Spin around the course!

And get speed on the Alpine Slides!

the crash

This morning was our most relaxed since we've been here. We took our time getting up and going. We still had an hour before meeting with Andrew and Brentley to spin on the crit course so we decided to drive out to the site of the Flight 93 crash. It was a moving experience for all of us. We learned quite a bit about the last moments on that flight, how the courageous men broke through the cockpit door with the serving cart, how the stewardesses boiled water to pour over the terrorists, how there was a passenger pilot who would have been able to retake control and how the terrorists were the ones to crash the plane after the cockpit was rushed by the passengers. There was only one recognizable item left from that crash that made a 25 foot deep crater...it only had a slightly burned cover - but other than that was completely intact. It was a Bible.

There was an awful crash today during the 17/18 road race that resulted in two riders being airlifted. One of them was Justin Williams from Rock Racing who was preparing for Worlds. He was severely hurt. I spoke with a mom of a rider who was one of the front 20 in the original wreck...by original I mean the first who went down. 40 - 50 came storming down the descent and happened upon the wreckage and ended up hitting, wrecking and landing on those who were down. You can imagine how traumatizing that would be. Some riders who weren't in the carnage quit the race. It took over an hour to clean up and clear everyone out. The mom I spoke to said her son told her that a rider in the very front corrected away from the side of the road (they were going about 50mph on the descent) and it caused the others in the line to move to the side and two bikes connected and that's all it took. Other people told me that bikes were flying up in the air and everywhere. So, again, please pray for safety out here on the courses.

the time trial

Team Slipstream support

The best rider in today's 17/18 time trial goes to Worlds - so the best juniors in the United State are out here. What an opportunity to get out there with the best - throw down what you can do and see how you stand.

Don't know what Nano's standing is - he did the 20k in 30:07 - the fastest time was in the 25 minute range. I could not believe the equipment!!! The photo above shows the support for the junior slipstream. Rock$Republic was

also there with $upport cars, van$, "monogrammed" di$k wheels. Wow.
Anyway, just a side note to give you all an idea of how "big" this race is. I tend to down play stuff like this and wasn't really thinking about it in terms of "the nation." But after this morning, seeing my first real race, I am a bit in awe and realize more than ever how great it is to be here.

Here are some photos of Nano warming up and about 150 meters from the finish:

warming up

the hurt

Here are some photos of Jon at the start:

Jon with 3 seconds to go

Nano helping Jon to stay loose

Jon completed the 10K in 21:20 (18mph average). He says, "it's because of the bike I did so well." (shout out to Stefan!) The finish was a gradual downhill to a 700 meter gradual uphill. I was standing at the 200 meter mark yelling to Jon to shift to an easier gear and to spin.....he was standing up and just working his bike in a hard gear. After words he told me, "mom, I was too tired to take my hands off the handle bars to shift."

Brentley with 9 seconds to go.

Joseph had a great start. His challenge in the time trial is finding the right balance between going hard enough with out going too hard. He got off the start before I could get a photo. :) He placed 16th out of 57. There were records being beat out there today. The fastest 14 year old did it in 14:50.

Joe spent the afternoon with Andrew's family and Brentley. Those young men finished the day as 14 year olds will...more bike riding (including getting caught in the rain), going FAST on Alpine Slides, watching Myth Busters at the AMD condo, and of course eating.

As soon as the results are up on USACycling I will link the page from my blog.

Thanks to all who are keeping up on the races.
Sunday morning - crit
Tuesday morning - road race

Will keep you posted.

Here are some photos of Joe's time trial start that I was able to copy from Jennifer's camera:

count down begins

down with 10 seconds to go...

and he's off!

the lite training day

It is really beautiful. Seven Springs is like a piece of heaven on earth. It is so green here and so many trees - it is amazing to look at the landscape and realize that the Civil War was fought amongst forests like the ones we drove by today. You could not see 15 feet deep into the forest. That was one of our topics of discussion as we drove toward Seven Springs.

So, I must tell you that Tim and Andrew Sr. went the second mile with us today! We met at the criterium course and all the kids rode it easy for awhile - Stanley and his dad Greg rode the course with Jon. Thank you Stefan for letting Jon use your bike!!

Then we drove the 1/4 mile to the TT course and spent awhile (along with some other cyclists) just trying to figure it out. Andrew Sr. blessed us with his track expertise to show a proper start - hopefully I will get some good start photos tomorrow. Andrew, Joe and Brentley are working on their "team" strategies. (Those three were the 1st, 2nd and 3rd, respectfully, in the Lance Armstrong junior point series.) Today is the first day I began to get very excited. Anything can happen. Fast kids from all over the US. Just pray for no technical difficulties or injuries.

About this time it was 2pm so we grabbed lunch at Subway where I realized that I actually had Abba's USA Cycling license - not Jon's. We grabbed our food and ran to find a computer with printer....eventually we were sucessful at the public library and printed out his permission to race thingy. Like I said Tim and Andrew were awesome and waited for us so that we could follow them to Seven Springs.

There we registered, checked out the TT starts, drove the road race course and the guys then rode the descent twice. (According to Joe's computer he hit 47 mph - this is just from not using his brakes, he didn't attack it like he loves to do.) Like I said please pray that there will be no injuries. The rules: have fun. no getting hurt.

It was cool watching those young men today. They are so healthy, focused and really nice kids.

Good news - for those who don't know, Nano and Joe built up a TT bike with
the help of Robert, Eric, City Bicycles, Joshua, Garrat, Dan, Brian P. and are sharing one bike. We were hoping that the timing would work for them in regards to the bike. It does...Joe races at 9:26 and Nano doesn't start until 1:13 or so.

Tomorrow will be very interesting. Joe, Jon and Nano are already asleep, the bikes are ready, Gatorade is made, numbers are on the jerseys...so...
Let's roll!

the arrival

Here we are in beautiful Pennsylvania!

Finally!

After packing:

and weighing,

and wondering how it will fit in the rental van:









from our driveway
to the airport!







Everything barely fit, thankfully! Soon we were on our way traveling the Pennsylvania turnpike!













Two of the bikes were put back together tonight....tomorrow morning the other two will be completed. Already received a call from Brentley's dad and tomorrow we will meet up with them and the Laniers for some training rides. Both offered to help us with the bike mechanics, but it looks like Nano and Joe are doing fine. Nano gained a lot of experience working for Erik at City Bicycles and it has come in handy for this trip!



This is the end of a very long day...we are excited and looking forward to some great racing!

the start

Four-thirty in the morning is a beautiful time of day - sadly, rarely experienced by me in a vertical position unless something amazing is happening like skiing, working in our blueberry field or heading out to a bike race. I don't know, maybe I am strange but I love getting up early and going on adventures, like bike racing, with my kids. So, we have two teenagers in bed EARLY on a Friday night because of a race - gotta love it!

We got started on this course 3 years ago through dabbling in triathlons and last season that transitioned into pure cycling...we got our feet wet and now we are fully immersed. That's the short version. In a week we leave for Nationals in Pennsylvania, which is why I started this blog. This will be my way of communicating to family, friends, and whoever else is interested in our journey.

Will keep you posted.