Day #3. Tulsa Tough.

 Didn't get much sleep, but legs felt pretty good in morning compared to saturday morning.  It was hot and windy, the bad kind of wind.  The only time you felt the wind was at your back, which makes it hard to keep up with the big guys.

I jumped on the first lap, mostly because my legs were needing warmed up, I didn't ride much, and standing for 25 minutes by the gate to make sure I got a good start.  I could tell off the bat my heart wasn't right.  I didn't have much coffee, not nearly enough, a sip of coke, and I forgot to take my double shot espresso clif shot I had been saving all weekend.

I was under the impression that this was going to be at least a 70 minute race, with about 30 minutes in I got sleepy, mis-shifting, and losing position in the hard tailwind section.  I was thinking I couldn't go 40 more minutes like this, my legs felt like my hr was at 190, but it was at 170.   Couldn't understand it.  Everything felt bad.  I mis-shifted again, a small gap opened up, I lost momentum, I lost 5 bike lengths, I had quit for a 2nd, and it was done.  I kept pedaling easy, the next time through the start finish line they yelled 8 laps to go, making it a 58 minute race.  I'm not sure if I would have been good to keep going if I knew only 8 laps were left.  I road around the course waiting to be pulled, finally with 2 to go they did pull me. 

Strava here.
1 second off the kom. 

Results Here.


Spencer Martin ended up winning the cat 3 race saturday and sunday while the other cat 3s and 4s road well too with a bunch of top 20s.  Top 20 at these races is pretty good, especially with over 100 riders in each field.

The weekend in Tulsa was definitely worth the trip, even with crashing twice.  The crowds were amazing, the people, the officials, the announcers, Tulsa made it easy to make the decision to come back again.

  Its' a great place to visit, even if you are there just to ride  gran fondo or just to watch the racing.   The racing is really hard, its basically as hard as it gets for the season.  For me anyway.