Independance Valley Road Race - IVRR

I bailed today. After meeting up with the guys at Speedy Reedy (39 degrees) we drove down to the race. I rode with Mark T. and we watched the temperature slowly drop as we got closer to Rochester. The heavy rain turned to a heavy sleet and then snow mixed with rain, light snow, and by the time we arrived and I registered for the race it was heavy snow (35 degrees). I talked to the four Blue Rooster girls who had just raced (Sara, Michele P., Sharon, Catherine) and they were freezing. They all finished their race and were trying to change into dry clothes. Sharon offered me her chemical hand warmers which she said were still warm. I took these wet soppy cold hand warmers from her and had to tell her that they were not actually warm that she was just hypothermic so they seemed warm!

Then I wandered outside and talked to Carol from Group Health. She had just gotten back from rescuing frozen riders and helped convince us not to race. It was just too much like Tahuya a few years back. I talked to Michele and she was bailing too. We talked to the other Blue Rooster guys and they were not deterred at all. Even our sponsor - Kevin, was all psyched up to race! I can't wait to hear their reports. We drove back to the Lakewood Starbucks and had coffee with Sara and Catherine. It was really nice. They were discussing the pro's and con's of racing with or without glasses in the snow. Having the grit go directly in your eyes or having your lenses get frosted up with snow. I had heard that there was gravel on the downhill but they said they couldn't actually see the road.

When I got home I did a 45 minute workout on the rollers with spin ups. It felt great.