Money, stitches...

Murphy's Law conspired against KBS/Medifast yesterday as our money-man, sprinter Dave McCook, hit the pavement warming up for the Visalia Criterium. He won a sweet tendon-exposing flesh wound and a broken hand. Dave was riding a lap of the course and somehow ran into a Japanese rider who was riding the opposite direction. I came around the last turn to the finishing straight seconds after the crash and saw the bike on the ground and could tell immediately by the light color of the frame that it belonged to one of my teammates. When I got there Dave was sitting quietly on the curb sweating, looking pale as a ghost and holding his crippled right hand. It's crazy how much damage low-speed wrecks can cause as apposed to high speed wrecks where the load tends to be spread over more of the body. I don't think the Japanese guy even hit the ground. As I was talking to the paramedics and Dave trying to make sure they didn't try to snare him with a $500 ambulance ride to the hospital 3 blocks a way, and they tried along with accusing us of being too concerned with the bill, the Japanese dude says "I don't think he ride today". Needless to say, Dave is out for a while. This is a huge loss for the team and an even bigger bummer for McCook.

On a lighter note, I managed to miss the call up that Dave Towle so kindly hooked me up with. Instead of rolling easily up to the front row I was out sprinting between stop lights warming up. Tumble weeds rolled by and crickets chirped as Dave announced " The future is now! Nick Waite riding for KBS/Medifast ladies and gentlemen!". Actually the future is hangin' out at the back of the field...dang it! Sorry about that, Dave. Thanks for the love, man. I'm still working on my start line punctuality. Johnny Sundt rolled up in my place as the team's front line representative. The team road with more intent yesterday and we managed to show our selves quite a bit at the front of the race. I'm still working on being comfortable in these circuit speed festivals. From the gun it is all out efforts followed by sitting in and going again. It'll come...eventually. In the last few laps we had four guys up there with Sundt, Gilbert (the guy we're all working for), Mumford and myself. The goal was to bring Gilbert up with 4 to go and get him on the Juggernaut train of Toyota/United. We lacked a bit of horsepower with only four guys and I'm not a big help at that speed but Gilbert and Sundt stayed close landing in the money at 17th and 19th. Toyota/United's Ivan Domingez won. I finished on the tail end of that group, however, not in the money. My helper's cut was $40.00. Groceries!

I've got lot's to take care of today getting ready for a race that suits me a little better, the 4 day Redlands Cycling Classic.

The list:

Race and spare bike set-up.
insoles and shims for my cycling shoes.
easy ride
blog
nap
Chiropractor visit
foam roller/stretch

Jeremiah Bishop left me a message this morning. Sounds like he'll be pumped for some training when I get home on the 26th. When ya gonna put my link on your site, JB?