I'm racing an omnium this weekend (my first omnium ever!) and I'm not feeling very motivated. It's been a month since the last road race/criterium, so I've had plenty of time to recover. The problem is that in women's races, they usually throw all the women together regardless of experience or strength. Thus, it is difficult to look forward to an event where I will probably receive a sound butt-kicking. Not fun.

There aren't enough women in bike racing because of these high barriers to entry. Race promoters have to combine the fields since there are only like, five women who show up. But if the fields were separated by strength and ability, then more beginner women would want to start racing. It's a vicious cycle.

I'm trying to get some of the ladies who ride with me to try out some races for the first time, but they are already intimidated, and it doesn't help when I tell them, "Oh... this race will be 50 miles at 12 noon in July, and the fastest women in the southeast will be racing with us. Want to race anyway?" Ha ha ha.

So I'm doing a lot of positive self-talk this week. Things like, "Hey, last place isn't so bad when there were only three other women racing!" and "You'll get a great workout even though you came in last!" and, best of all, "You will get a lot of time trial experience once you get dropped by everyone else!"

This is going to suck.