Day 7

The crit:
The course is four-cornered, fast, and has a punchy, out of the saddle climb. Several large breaks went up the road but they were always either too big and didn't work together or too small and didn't stick so the race ended with a sprint finish.


Stephen's view
I was excited to race the crit today and hoped to be active in the race. The first few laps were very fast and it took me a while to move up in the field. With about 15 laps to go, I attacked with an Exergy rider. The attack was more costly than I expected and wasn't the smartest move. I was only off the front for half a lap and didn't think that the effort was all-out but as I was pulled back into the field I did not recover very well and couldn't hold position near the front for the rest of the race. This was a bit of a disappointment as I would've liked to help Danny in the finish. All I can do now is look forward to tomorrow and prepare myself for what will be the most difficult race of my life.

Danny's View

After a morning of playing Wii we headed off to downtown silver city for some four corner crit action. I was more thinking about tomorrow's 9,500 foot climbing day but I like crits so today was mostly fun. I had good position with 3 to go and was fighting with all the pro sprinters but I made the fatal mistake of touching my breaks at the wrong time and boom 20 spots were lost. I rolled in around 40th bummed at my mistake but excited for tomorrow. Last year I had a mega crash on the last day after really struggling for the whole stage race, so I'm excited for some redemption!

Hubby's View

After just rolling the time trial yesterday to try and get my health back on track for the remaining two stages I had high hopes of being competitive in todays crit. My hopes weren't answered today and I was suffering on our warm-up spin. This years addition of the Gila was a hurdle too far for me. I had hoped after suffering in the neutral section on day one I would be able to ride myself in. Today my asthma was the worst it has ever been and slowly getting worse each day so I have decided to pull the pin and focus on achieving my goals at the Joe Martin stage race starting next Thursday with an uphill time trail! Recovery and rest on the cards for the next few days.