Bariani Road Race

Today was so much fun! Chandra woke up feeling like shed "been hit by a Mac Truck" but she drank some coffee and ate some Wheaties and pretty soon was itching to race. So we headed up to Zamora for my race at 11:10. Chandra was my soigneur and helped get me ready to roll.

I think my race should have had 5 laps instead of 4 because although there were some women who couldnt hang, it still came down to a "sprint" at the end with 30+ women. It was a fairly monotonous sort of race, and I sat in the whole time. There were virtually no team tactics being employed (save for the random flyers off the front on a perfectly straight road with excellent visibility...????) My excuse is that I was boxed in at the end. Really I should have been in a better position going into the last corner, which was so do-able. Tracy Ford practically sprinted from the last corner and won by several bike lengths, from what I can remember seeing. Girl is strong. In all it was a good race for me, since I rarely even participate in road races, and this one had climbing in it. I actuallly love climbing, but not when its a race!!! I need to seek out hilly road races and face this fear: Copperopolis and Berkeley Hills...

Anyway, the BEST part of the day was the womens 4s race and all the team chaos surrounding it!! I hope someone else submits a report describing the scene better thatn I can, but heres the gist of it: The other ladies teams, Velo Bella, Squadra, Velo Girls...they are all lined up on their trainers with their team banners and everything, warming up together, pre-race stuff all dialed in. A few yards away is the NorCal Team...Claire running frantically around getting signatures on waivers, pinning #s, filling bottles....Melissa pulling up 7 minutes before the race start...frantic Claire again....naked little babies running all over the place...The Bulldog staring down the competition...Claire emploring the race officials to delay the start by going over some extra rules and regulatioins so that her derelict team has time to use the porta-jon. I flippin love it!!!

No matter, all 5 ladies make it to the start line in time and GO!!!! I will leave it up to them to say how the race played out.

Afterwards, I am beside myself, over the moon, dancing a jig of joy. NorCal came to play! Their first ever road race together and they all did FANTASTIC! Smiles anf hugs all around.

We caravan to downtown Vacaville for Fat Tire ale all around. My heart swells, I love this team.

-Claire

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