Like this:

The kick off to the season for the girls in green was the Redlands Bicycle Classic in So Cal.  Redlands is one of the biggest races in the  US of A and it covers all of the major disiplines of modern road racing.  There is a prolouge uphill time trial, a road race, a criterium and a circuit race.  All of the big teams come out and it is quite the event.  Redlands is one of my favorite races on the NRC calendar.

For the girls in green Redlands was the first race of the season as a complete team.  Webcor has five new riders this year so it was the first chance for everyone to blow out the cobwebs and see who has what.  The race itself was pretty uneventful for us.  Mechanical and puncture free but with the ban on team radios, in all but UCI events,  the road race was a bit chaotic.  Race radio kept calling us up for service and each time they did my blood pressure would go through the roof.   I was jacked and ready to go-  one hand on the door handle, the other gripping wheels, ready to fly into action only to find out that a rider was dropping back to give up a gillette or ask for a feed.    The one  real service call  I got was a shitty one.  Lindsay was involved in a crash that resulted in a fractured fibula for her and a bruised tail bone for me.  I ate shit pretty hard and in trying to save the new Ritchey Carbon wheels I put my hands above my head when I slipped on the ball bearing like stones that covered the pavement,  landing square on me ass pad-  no fun for Lindsay or me.    Anyway, Joelle came away with a podium finish taking 3rd in the Road race.  She came in fourth in the Crit the next day and catapulted herself from 40th to 11th on GC.  KCM held her spot in 9th from the prolouge to the finish.  Enough of the chit chat-  on to the picture show!

New season= new sponsors. The new Ritchey Super Logic Carbon Clinchers and Maxxis Radial 23c  Awesome combination that gave me a worry free weekend.  Light, dependable,  solid performers.  The girls love em and so do I!!!

Joelle had a great race and awesome debut with the team!

KCM gets a call up at the Crit.

There were two middle fingers flying as I snapped this.  Not mine.  I am a consumate professional and was only sticking out my tongue.  Lucky for Muck my camera sucks.

With the ban on race radios at NRC events, mechanics have to get creative.  My brother from another mother, Tim B. of Peanut Butter and Company demonstrates the latest in staff to rider communication.

Is nothing sacred?  Good work though-  even looks similar to my own hand writing.

Assess, Improvise, Overcome.  My trusty bike rack gave up the ghost on stage two but was ressurected with the help of 8 zip ties and held up to the weight of 8 bikes for the remainder of the race.

With all due respect Garmin….. WTF?  After getting up at 4:30am to load the truck and get riders to the airport at 5:30 it was time to drive back to the bay area.  Somewhere alon I5 the Garmin decided to send me on this narrow ass twisty road, barely wide enough for a small car.  I was driving a fully loaded down Sprinter with a 158″ wheelbase.  This road went on for 85 miles.  I did manage to maintain a fairly quick pace, the Sprinter handles like a champ, but Jesus Christ!  WTF is up with that?  Did someone write virus and upload it so that GPS units will choose the most random, crappy road it can?

Anyway, that’s all for now.  The season is in full swing.  More to come.  Thanks for reading.