Holy Hilltowns!

How's this for a course profile??

This is considered by many in the NE cycling community to be the hardest one-day race in the region....which is interesting when you consider that Battenkill, Quabbin, and Purgatory are all pretty damn hilly as well! The illustrious JLC had the line of the day when asked how this compared to Quabbin: "Quabbin is a crit compared to Hilltowns".

Really not sure how I did as the results outside the top 10 haven't been posted yet, but I'm hoping top half. I started to cramp pretty badly about a third of the way up the East Hawley Rd climb which is bad. I was within site of the leaders and going at a pretty solid tempo but had to slow way down or risk DNFing. There was one hell of a rainstorm with about 20 miles left that provided some welcome respite from the humidity. I really need to start forcing myself to eat more in the morning before I head out for these longer races. I seem to cramp up pretty easily it seems, especially on hot and humid days and I have to believe it's really hard efforts combined with not enough fuel. I'm just not hungry when I get up though; problem but I need to rectify it. I don't have the same snap and acceleration as a lot of my team mates on the super steep climbs but I can maintain a good tempo that doesn't blow me off the back. If I can keep the leaders in site and then catch back on I should be able to improve my results. Considering that I am stepping up next year, that will be critical.

Well, road season is almost done....3, maybe 4 races left and then it's on to the fun part of the season - 'CROSS baby! Time to start gluin' up those knobby tubulars!