We, being Katharine, Dotsie, Tina, Kristen, Andrea, Jim, Frank, Chris, and I, are in Spain right now where we have been racing the last couple days mostly up hills. Well not all of us just the six of us, being everyone but the boys. Yesterday was the beginning of our late racing Stage Race here in and around Bilbao, not pronounced Bill_bay_0 like I thought. We started off with an up hill team TT, which was kinda interesting because there is not much drafting involved… and the best part about a team TT is the drafting…
And then today was a road race where we were flying down auto routes along these awesome mountains at fast speeds to get to the downhills just in time for it to start raining… Now I like slip and slides but not on hard grounds so I was a bit scared to slip and slide. And I haven’t been on one this summer so I knew I hadn’t perfected the manuever…

So today, Katharine got the most aggressive rider (called something else, but close to that name) because she put in a super super super strong attack, not once but twice pretty much back to back. Since she was my buddy I moved up to the front to counter her and after Andrea countered, I jumped and found myself off the front with some buddies. We came to the bigger climb with about 20 seconds and then headed up to come down the screaming fast slip and slide downhill into town where Dotsie got second in the field sprint and 3rd for the day!!! Wahooo… she is speedy!!

So tomorrow we have another climbing day, but the good news is I think it is suppose to be nice out so I can start working on my biking tan line again.

We are on a tight schedule for internet time so I may or may not be able to update here in Spain where the bulls run wild, but for sure in Italy.

Katharine got a super cool award so pictures will be up for sure in Italy!! and maybe videos we have been working on if we can figure out how to get them up…
Have a good night,

:)Chrissy

ps… we did actually see bulls on the road the other day

Now that I have been in Montreal the last couple days riding around and racing I have finally figured out how to prepare for these races next year.

Most of the roads don’t have pot holes they have crater holes and if those are missing there are endless rumble strips, but get this, they didn’t have to put any in. Here in Montreal the roads create their own rumple strips which only means one of two things…

I either need my mountain bike next year or a water bed!!

Yep, that is right. I was thinking today after the race that you know they say (someone says) that visualization is a great thing to help improve what ever you want to do better, better. Well, I would think dreaming is part of this visualization thing so…

if I have a water bed then I will be ready for next year. This is true because as I am dreaming I will be bouncing all over the place, just like I do here in Montreal as I am racing. I should really improve my skills for next year and be ready for whatever crater hole or rumple strip there are. Heck sometimes I even dream of racing so look out or get yourself a water bed.

So in other news we had the WC here in Montreal which went around in loops for about 3 to 4 hours with a hill in it. It wasn’t just an every day hill… it was hard hard hard. I am sure you already know what happened since this was a couple days ago, but if not…. geeze you are worse then me on keeping up.  

Today was a 3 hour crit… really there were 23 corners in about oh let see between 11km and 15 km. No it didn’t take us 3 hours to do 11 to 15km, we did 8 laps of it. I am pretty sure we average 76mph, or 128kph. Yeah really, can you imagine… wawee

So now it is getting late and I have to go let some air out of my mattress to simulate a water bed so I can be ready for the next couple days!!

And here is us after the 87mph, 145kph race…

Sweet Dreams of whatever you like to dream about,

Or good morning if you are not about to go to sleep…

:)Chrissy

ps… I am next off to Philly and then Europe so hopefully I can steal (and by steal I mean use… don’t worry if you are my roommate, I won’t take your computer) someones computer over there

pss… or maybe I will update it sooner since it is one of my new years resolutions

psss…. here are some pictures

 of us eating dinner (no eating is not cheating…)

or just one more