Another rainy and windy day

Yesterday we had a race in Beveren in East Flanders. This race was pretty well suited to me with no hills whatsoever (although, I seem to be riding better on the steep cobble climbs, my problem is just positioning) and gnarly crosswinds and on and off rain again. It was just short of 160k, but half the race was on a large loop while the other half was on local laps. We did a few more local laps than I anticipated... My legs were still feeling pretty shot from Saturday, more so than normal and the last two nights I had been having some asthma problems that seemed to carry on into Monday. I knew I was going to have to try to take it easy where I could. With the crosswinds, we had to try to stay near the front and watch things. This is where we messed up, going into the section of crosswind I was the closest guy to the front. This time I was in the top 30 and wasn't too far from the front echelon and wouldn't you know it, a gap opened about 5 guys in front of me. I was on the wheel of one of the guys I knew was strong as he had won a few of the kurmesses I had done earlier. Things behind us were falling apart as well, so it was pretty much just the two of us. We tried to get across, but with no luck... I rode way into the red trying to close the gap. With the asthma problems, it didn't seem to take as long for me to go into the red and it took me a long time to come back out of it. I blew up and was somehow able to tag on the back of Summerhill and Carlson's group. I sat on the back for a good 20 minutes until I could start to breathe halfway normal again. I started to move back up towards the front, when I saw Kirk go off the front with a small group of guys. They were out of sight pretty quickly, which was pretty impressive as we weren't going that slow. I found Summerhill and seeing as the group in front of Kirk was pretty large, we decided to try to chase. I went to the front and pulled pretty much the rest of the way into the local laps to try to keep the pace consistent. A small attack went just before the finishing circuit and with a little bit of help from the cycling center guys, we brought it back. I made my final push to close the gap to that break with Summerhill on my wheel before I succumbed to the asthma again. To my surprise, the peleton was breaking apart... As I dropped back, I barely jumped on the back of the second group and hung on till we reconnected with the first group I was originally towing around. I thought my day was done after that bit of work, I felt so hammered and the asthma deal was getting kind of rough. It was getting to the point where I was having to work so hard just to breath that most of my energy was going to that and my chest was starting to hurt with every breath. Mind you this is only in the first lap of the finishing circuit.... I was expecting 5 to 6 laps which is normal, but after 5 laps I figured I would be seeing 1 lap to go... Nope, 3 to go... I was already getting strange cramps in my hands and feet, so 3 more laps seemed like an eternity... There didn't seem to be any of the real strong teams there, so I didn't expect the race to be that hard. I don't know if it was because I went into the race already feeling a bit tired and sore or if the race was indeed tough, but I was more hammered after that race than some of the bigger races I've done. In those last 3 laps, summerhill and jones got away with some riders and going into the last lap monteleone got away with another small group. I followed shortly after and won the sprint in my group for who knows what place. Kirk ended up 9th, so I'm guessing much of the riders in that early split cracked. I'm not sure where Summerhill and Jones ended up, but monteleone won his group sprint too... Collectively, I think we did a descent job in salvaging what we could of the day after missing the early split. That's about it...

J signing off...