first race report of the season

and my race started with a laps in attention from the peleton within the first mile of the race. I simply rolled off the front with another guy. We would quickly join up to Veggie and my teammate James who attacked a minute or two before I rolled off the front. Unfortunately James would break his seat and have to drop back before the break really got rolling. Going into the first lap, the break was three strong and we were opening a pretty respectable gap. At the beginning of the last lap we started to see a group of 12 or so coming up behind us. There were some of the bigger guys in Texas in the group so we decided to sit up and not waste our energy trying to stay out front. When they caught us, I was pleased to see I had two teammates (collin and colt) but pretty disappointed to see Josh Carter in there. Carter's living up here in Wichita Falls and is the Husband of the New director for the MSU cycling team. He's pro... and one of the better sprinters in the country. So, basically if one was to finish in the same group as him, one would be racing for the position after him... Now, the only option was to get up the road or drop Josh (which frankly wasn't gonna happen). Our best option was to stay on top of the attacks and make sure if anything went up the road, we had someone in there. Well, we missed a few of those and one big one that got way up the road. Only in the last 8 miles or so did we get organized enough to bring it back close enough to send me across the gap. I made it about halfway across before the rest of the group was on my wheel. When everyone sat up, I went for it again but it was too close to the finish for anyone to get off the front. With a couple miles to go we were all back together and no longer racing for 3rd... I really tried pushing the pace over any of the climbs I could to try to gap Josh.... Don't know if it actually put him in any difficulty but it was worth a shot. Over the final climb into the long downhill finish, I was sitting 3rd wheel and right on Josh. I got a little to antsy and started my sprint too early. I started coming around Josh and the guy in front of Josh started his sprint when he saw me. I started sinking back, but was able to jump back on Josh's wheel and kept my momentum to snake past the guy who started the sprint in first a little before the line, putting me in second place. It was a tough day, but great training and was super stoked with how the legs seemed to do in this early season stuff.