USGP rounds 5&6, Portland, OR

Holy shit...Portland was a mess. Very similar to the mess that was the CX nationals in '04. Cool course, really sticky mud for the round 5 on saturday. After much rain overnight, they changed the course a bit and it was a bit less muddy, but no less epic. Rachel had a rough time w/ her shoes and cleats on saturday and finished in 11th. On sunday she got a great start, and was riding in the top 7 when things started happening. Things like Lyne B. crashed and ended up getting soaked from neck to toes. She pulled out right around mid-race, too cold to go on. I yelled to Rach that she had dropped out and to keep going hard. The next lap Katie C dropped out and i lost a bit more of my voice yelling at Rachel. She was catching Wendy Simms (who looks better in a dress than her b/f Norm, for sure) and i gave her the time gap. She caught and passed her the next lap, taking over 4th. With a lap to go, she was 15 seconds behind Alison S, and going faster. If the race had been a lap longer, Rach would have caught her and finished 3rd, but she ended up in 4th, a great result after saturdays problems.

I also helped out Stu Thorne w/ the cyclocrossworld.com guys, we had 2 guys per rider, Stu and Mike from Mavic Neutral support taking care of Tim Johnson, and Marc and I taking care of Jeremy Powers.

Bring on Nationals!