Castle Cross wrap-up

Thanks to Dale for offering to drive the Stud Wagon, the 35+_4 crew made it to the race course before the sun came up.  It was windy and freezing cold.  I thought it ended up being a great race on a fun course, but our performance was not as good as we were hoping for.  Maybe everyone was affected by Robert Brudenell's kind words of encouragement during the first couple laps.  "Slow down, High Plains, you're going to blow up!"  Maybe we can offer him some advice next time there's water to cross.

I went over the bars for the first time and Armin flatted once, and this was all before the Juniors' race had even started.  I then produced an extremely weak start and got swarmed on the way up the hill, turning my front-row start into about 25th place by the time we reached the slalom course.  Where, as expected, there were a few crashes and general piling up of riders.  I clawed my way back through the field but barely got into the top 10.  Other notable finishes were Paul in 19th, Armin in 27th, and Dale in 36th.  Other HPMers were observed in a few other categories:  Matt with 14th place in the 35+_3s and Al with 18th place in the 55+.  

Lori came out complaining about tired legs from her 5K running race on Saturday (where she set a personal best time of 23:16).  She then proceeded to ride a really smart race, right into the top 5--also a personal best for her.  Too bad she was told on Monday that she's being sent to China for three weeks.  The Westminster race this weekend may be the end of HPM's points in the SW4 category.  Unless......Lisa?  Put that camera down and kit up!

One thing was made very clear at that race: the Natural Way team is onto us.  They came with an army of riders on Sunday and tore us up, scoring more than twice as many points as we did.  We're looking pretty solid in 2nd place for the team points, but that will be a big gap to cross to catch Natural Way.  Especially if they keep putting three in the top 20.  But don't give up the ship.  Since the Natural Way guys read our blog now, the HPM strategy discussion for the Westminster race has been moved to the secure encrypted top secret password-protected HPM site, located here.

Everyone eat lots of turkey and cranberry salad, and see you on Saturday.