Amgen Tour of California

Wow, that was the hardest race of my life by a long margin. It was also the biggest show that I have ever been a part of, and the constant attention was pretty cool. It was a definite bonus being a local, since I definitely got a lot more interview than I would have otherwise. And in sport media attention is the whole point of the game, so any exposure is great.


The first stage was basically easy, but the second one to Santa Rosa really put me in the hurt box and it took me a long time to get back out of it. The climbs were hard, yes, but the whole stress of that race with the rain, and the constant fight for the front really took its toll early on. Then in the finale, I crashed going down Trinity when I was just about to regain contact with the front group and that definitely messed me up for the next few days.


I missed the front group going over Bonny Doon on stage 3, and instead of just sitting up and riding in the grupetto, I persevered and finished in a chase group 4 minutes down. At the time I thought that was fine, but in retrospect it was probably a bad idea. I had to dig pretty hard to stay in that group and the net result was that I was pretty destroyed for the next day which started with the only category 1 climb of the tour up Sierra Road in San Jose.

I knew it was going to be a good day for me to be in the break, so I followed the first attack which turned out to be the right move. Unfortunately I didn't have the legs to stay there going up Sierra. Former world cyclocross champion Lars Boom was driving it on the front even though we already had a good 2 minute gap at the bottom of the climb, and as a result I just got dropped.

Davide Frattini and Scott Steward from Team Type 1 were behind me though and we tried chasing back to the break after the climb. We closed the gap down to about 50 seconds but could not get any closer, and after 70km of being off the front we decided to sit up even though we still had 5 minutes to the peloton. Staying in the bunch after that was super, super hard and I was really glad to make it through the day.

After that I was completely blow, my whole body ached to the touch and I was exhausted beyond belief. It came as no surprise then, that the next day to Bakersfield I wound up in the 60 rider grupetto that formed on the long climb half way through the stage. That was a nice easy ride and I really needed it given how tired I felt. Because of that I managed to recover slightly and have better legs going into the Big Bear stage.

Big Bear was just about survival for me and getting bottles for Rory, Mark, and the rest of the guys until I couldn't anymore. I had good enough legs to make it through the first half of the stage but I was completely on the ropes when they finally called grupetto 140 km into the 217km day. That gupetto was actually super hard still and towards the end I had to sag climb a few of the steeper pitches just to hang in there. But I made it, and we finished 30 minutes down for a total of 7 hours on the bike.

That night I was so destroyed that I got a fever, couldn't eat much, and couldn't really sleep. I went to bed at 9:30, woke up again at midnight, and didn't get back to sleep until 4:30, just in time for the 6:30 wake up. But somehow I felt better and the legs were not quite as sore as the previous morning. I still soft-peddled the TT so that I would be competitive on the last day. It felt nice, it was the easiest TT I have ever ridden.


It turned out to be just the right idea as I made the front group of 40 riders when Garmin drilled it on the first climb of the day. Specifically I got dropped with Jens Voight, but Cancellara and Andy Schleck waited for him and then rode like motorbikes to bring him back up to the front group. Sitting on the wheel on the flats at 60km/hr was actually harder then going up the climb for me. I was pretty gassed the second time up, but stayed in the front group with the help of the caravan going over the top.


The third time was pretty easy, and Marc said he had good legs, so I got on the front and started working to bring back the break to give him a chance at the stage win. After a few km, Matt Wilson from Garmin came up and started helping and together we kept the group lined out all the way to the bottom of the last climb.


After that I was done and just rode in at my own pace to finish the race and the tour. I ended up finishing 10 and a half minutes down, the last rider inside the time cut in 37th place on the stage. Marc had some bad luck and needed two wheel changes in the final 10km which cost him any chance at the win, but at least we made a good show of it and I got plenty of TV time out of working.

It was an experience unlike any other and now I know what to expect for the next one. I can definitely compete on this level, I just need a bit more time and experience to do it properly. It was a great tour and any other stage race in the US is going to seem like a piece of cake in comparison.

Gila Monster in pictures

Soon after the start a big break went in on a gentle cross tailwind climb. Morgan and I were in it

BISSELL had 3 riders in the move and the highest placed rider as well so took a lot of responsibility to drive it. However at the start of the second climb of the day, Morgan set a wicked tempo and dropped two of their riders.

Then we settled down a bit and Burke Swindlehurst and I spent most of the climb trading off pulls while most of the rest of the guys suffered behind.

Then on the final climb Burke attacked a lot but was pretty marked. I made one counter move, but then Darren Lill countered me and got a good gap. I was left behind with Burke and Morgan, everyone else was dropped.

At this point, Burke may have been really hurting because he said that he would "not chase his friend" Darren. So we eased up a bit, not wanting to drag possibly the best climber across to Darren. This allowed for a general regrouping, but instead of working together to bring back Darren we spent the last 15 miles of the race fruitlessly attacking each other. I got away by myself with about 15km to go, but the gradual climbing turned into gradual descending and I got caught again.

Even without any real cooperation we still almost caught Darren on the line, as you can see the sprint for 2nd in the background.

But almost isn't enough, and it was still a sprint for 2nd between Burke, Pat McCartney, Caleb Farley, Rob Britton, and I. Rob had been sitting on for the entire time after the second climb so he ended up having the freshest legs and took second on the line, but I managed to use some decent tactics to play the sprint to my strengths and took 3rd despite being one of the worse sprinters on paper.

I was a bit disappointed since I think I had the legs to win, but it was still my first NRC podium so I really can't complain too much.

I also have to give a huge thanks to Lyne Lamoureux of podiuminsight.com for her wonderful race coverage and beautiful photographs of the race. Its the next best thing to having television coverage.