Redlands Bicycle Classic

I was looking forwards to Redlands Bicycle Classic, having some more racing under my belt with the past weekend in San Dimas. Redlands is a gorgeous area, about an hour east of LA, and we were fortunate to have amazing host house families for our team for the week as well. This was my first actual NRC race, and I was pretty excited for the stages later on in the weekend.

First up was the uphill prologue, 3.1 miles, on Thursday afternoon. Not my best strength in any means, but gave it all I had. I put in a good warm up, but about 1km into the race, up the first steep hill, my legs weren't very kind and decided to 'blow up'. From there on out, I didn't seem to have any power, and I was pushing a smaller gear than I had previous days in practice. The false flat uphill was really tough, and the course progressively gets steeper until the end. It was over fast and was time to focus on the next day. We luckily had Katie 4th on GC!

Saturday was the Beaumont Road Race. I was really relaxed before the race, and it started off fairly slow, with a good tailwind- my heart rate barely went above 100bpm. The race got tougher and tougher when the uphills started, but I was still able to stay near the front. Once into the park when the KOM climb started, I started to really suffer. My ribs were nearly good, and I just didn't have it. I cracked fairly fast, and wasn't able to continue.

The rest of the weekend went by slowly, and now I am in Oxnard, Cali for a couple weeks- before I head up to Monterey for Sea Otter Classic (which I am super stoked for- probably my favorite place I've ever been).

Its pretty quiet here- but I like it. I have a lot of time to ride and focus on everything I need. I basically ride all morning and early afternoon and spend the rest of the day lying on the beach, playing soccer in the sand or attempting to surf. It's fairly cool by the water, but lying in pants and a hoodie is still comfortable on the warm sand. It's so relaxing and it's nice to be left with my thoughts while I only hear waves. The house I am staying in is about 50 meters from the beach, walk able distance in bare feet.

Looking forwards to this next month block of training. I have my race confidence back, feeling like this will be a great month ahead, and hope to a great season as well!

Miss everyone back home, hope you all are having fun in the blizzard today..ha ha ha!

Karlee