I noticed a few lasting effects from crit racing last weekend. One, I am still insane. I have gone through my calendar and written down the cycling events that occur in the Southeast, same as I did early this season for triathlons when I thought I would pursue that route instead. Two, I have much more confidence in my abilities on the bike. When I started riding in March 2005, I hit the ground running on the fast track. I've accomplished quite a bit so far to be racing just fifteen months after my first bike ride in clipless pedals. (Which was 12 miles at Oak Mountain State Park, and afterwards I was exhausted.)

There's this one short hill on Ruffner Road I used to hate last summer because I would get dropped there on group rides. I dreaded the onset of that hill, knowing that at the top I would be breathing hard, heart thumping, and suffering greatly. This year, it appears that there is a game involving the girly men I ride with that before we reach that little hill, they rotate quickly off the paceline and dump the work on an unfortunate, unsuspecting person. Who happens to me, because I think they are being weenies. Someone has to pull up that hill. So I stay in my big gear, stand up, and crank my bike up that hill as quickly as I can. I love that hill now; I enjoy looking behind me at the top to see who couldn't hack it.

Then again, there are a hundred other places on the route where I am greatly humbled by other cyclists. I'm talking some sh*t in the paragraph above. At least I don't suck. Or, maybe I do. I'm covering up the fact that in the real world, I ride a tricycle. A pink one.