I’ve been stalling on writing up the Grandview races because I’m not quite sure what to say. Both races went very similarly for me but, because of my personal expectations, the first race was awful and the second a success. Go figure.

The Tour de Grandview was the hardest set of races I’ve done yet this season. As opposed to the local races that draw women from across the state and perhaps from Indiana or Pennsylvania, these races drew elite racers from both coasts. Not to mention a big purse for a local race is $500.  Between the races, there was $9,000 plus prime money on the line in Grandview.  This was some serious racing.

Saturday’s course was a (more or less) flat, four corner, city crit. A straight forward course with only one decently tight corner. Watching others race was fun and my warm up went well. I got to the start and was able to squeeze into the second row. We’re off, the girl in front of me can’t clip in and I’m delayed until about halfway back in a 51 person field. Not the best start, but I’m able to move up a little on the first lap. They’re flying and I’m well into the red zone by the second lap.

It was sprinkling when we started, but by the second time around it was absolutely pouring and thundering. For those of you not aware, we race in the rain, but not in the lightning, so the official stopped the race for the weather. I tried to stay warm in the car, but 45 minutes later when we were called to the line I was shaking in my shoes. I was on the front line the second time, but to no avail. My start was great, but I lost a few positions every corner due to my scaredy-cat grabbing of the brakes in the rain.

A handful of laps in, I found myself in that lovely position of being dropped. It was quite surreal, as I was so deep in the pain cave that it almost felt like slow motion. Everyone was just passing me and I couldn’t do a thing about it.

I ended up in a group of 9 and we were caught with two laps to go. I don’t know why they didn’t pull us, but it wasn’t my call so I pushed through. At that point, the pace was fine and I was comfortable. I moved up into 15th place or so on the final lap but then on the second to last corner there was a pile up on the inside directly in front of me. I had to slam the brakes, but I was able to get around on the outside unharmed. I was detached from the first few ladies, but held it together for a 10th-ish place finish, ignoring the fact that I had been lapped. The official results put me at 33rd, which I’m not sure was quite right but it was in the neighborhood.

Saturday’s race went much the same, but it didn’t feel nearly as soul-crushingly awful. Saturday I had expected to stay with the big ladies and do decently in the sprint. Sunday, however, my goal was to finish the race without being pulled. Sunday’s course is the “classic” Grandview race – a 1 mile loop with a mild descent and a decent climb. It’s not too steep, but long enough to hurt. Before the race, I had done workouts on the hill back in my OSU days so I knew how it rode. I think the most I had ridden it though was 10 times. On Sunday, I was on the line facing 28 laps up the beast.

The weatherman predicted a nice sunny day on Sunday, except for an isolated thunderstorm from 4-5pm. Guess when our race was? We had sprinkles again at the start and full on rain by the second lap, but no thunder so we pushed through.

I stuck with it for about the first 5 laps and then came off a bit. Thankfully for me, unluckily for her, one of the Kenda girls dropped her chain on the same lap. She was behind me and was working to get back on. I have to admit, I let her pull me back up. It was only half a lap and she ended up doing much better than I overall, so I don’t feel too bad about it. Back on, I was able to hold on for another couple laps before the attacking on the hill got to me and I popped. The downhill corner in the rain was also making me nervous and I probably lost a bit of energy braking into that one. Conveniently enough for irony’s sake, it stopped raining about the same time I got dropped, so for the rest of the race I felt comfortable taking the corners faster.

Coming around the next lap after coming off the main group, I saw 18 laps to go and knew I wouldn’t make it to the end. I ended up riding with a group of 7 ladies, and each time up the hill put a burn in my legs. With $6000 on the line, the officials decided to be nice and give our little group a prime sprint with about 15 laps to go. I decided to go for it like it was my finish and put everything into it. I got the $25 by but a few inches and was about ready to call it quits when word got around that we were still in the money (thanks Rick and Ben for your great counting skills). The race was paying 25 deep and there were only 22 women up the road. On one hand, SWEET! On the other hand, OUCH!

I sucked it up and stayed with my group the whole way through. I had friends watching to encourage me every lap. There were also three different groups of kids spread around the course that every time I would come by they would emphatically chant “Jeni’s! Jeni’s! Jeni’s!” They were awesome, and had a great deal to do with me finishing the race. Thanks kids!

Once again, we were caught by the whole big group with one lap to go. The seven of us had agreed to let them roll through so that we could do our own sprint, but as it was the last lap the pack had slowed down in anticipation of the last big effort. They didn’t really go past us, so we were just tagged on the back on of the group at the bottom of the hill. Had I known this was going to happen, I would have tried to stay up front to sprint, but you know what they say about hindsight.

As it ended up, I was second in our group coming around the last turn onto the hill. The Hub Racing girl who was in our group took off like a bat out of hell at the very bottom of the hill and I couldn’t respond quick enough to follow her as she weaved through the pack. I found out later that she had gotten the call on her radio to lead out her teammate who was at the front. As I wound up my sprint, I ended up passing about half the pack on the hill and came in second in my dropped group for 24th place overall out of 45+ starters.

As opposed to post-race on Saturday where I didn’t really want to look at my bike, I was thrilled on Sunday and can’t wait to have a go at it next year. Turns out I don’t suck, but rather just have a lot to learn still. I’ll be up there with the big girls as soon as I figure this whole thing out race by race.

It was great to race in Grandview in front of a home crowd. Team Awesome was out in full force, with some great results. Nate Ziccardi placed 5th on Saturday in the Pro1/2 field. Scott Wesseler won both his 5 races on Saturday and Sunday and Joe placed 2nd on Saturday making it a 1-2 podium for Jeni’s in the 5s.

And as Mason said, we were definitely the best looking team there.