The biggest race of my life. The junior world championships. The race was set to begin at 9 am. We awoke early at 5:45 so as to get to breakfast at 6. We finished breakfast and went back to the room to get dressed for the race and pack up a bag for after. We headed down to the bus at 7:45 to ride over. We took a quick team picture before riding to the course. When we got there we went to sign in... it was really cool because it was like the pros. We walked up on stage while being announced and signed a big board with our number on it! We then stood for team pictures then walked off. We then rode to the USA tent to relax until we went to the start. While in the tent we talked over our plan once more as well as put warming oil on our legs because it was chilly! We headed over to the line eventually... I saw Thierry (my uncle) as well as Max (my cousin) on the way over. I did roll out then got called to the line. We got called 7th as a team because we are 7th in nation cup points. When I was sitting on the line I saw my parents and Morgane (my cousin)! We were off right at 9... it was fast and hard from the get go. I got pushed to back a little bit and was fighting to move up. It was a 126 km race. We did 9, 14 km laps. The course was basically flat... a little elevation but not very much. There was 170 starters.
We finished the first lap in 18 minutes... so we were movin! The race was intense it was the best juniors in the world. There was a lot of breaking because people were nervous... some of the breaking was so crazy that people were skidding side ways sometimes blowing out their tyres because they were wearing all of the rubber away. People were also taking all kinds of risks because it is the biggest race! I was pretty much using all of my energy to move up and try to hold position. It was really hard to hold position in the field because it was constantly circulating. During the last 3 laps there were multiple big crashes the worst coming on the last lap where there was a big pile up on a turn coming off a decent. The last was inside of 5 kms to go and it took out our sprinter. The race was very chaotic but you also had the best riders in the world so there was a lot of crashes that should have happened that didnt. A break got away with about 20 kms to go that looked like it was going to stick it had French and Belgians in it. It was caught on the climb to the finish! France won with a guy from the field while 2nd and 3rd were from the break away. I finished 56th... first for the US. We could have done better without those crashes but thats racing. After the race it was great to see all of my cousins and parents and coach! We looked at my computer and we had averaged over 43 kph (about 28 mph) for the entire 126 kms. I had also burned 4000 calories and we had raced 2 hours and 50 minutes! I had also hit a top speed of 75 kph... on a semi flat course! After the race we rode back to the hotel to shower off and get lunch. Then some of the boys headed off to go to the bakery I went to watch the pro womens race with Addy and Alexis. It was pretty cool to finally be able to relax and watch a world championships race in person. We walked around a bit and also hand crafted an american flag... well we had the flag and put it on a big stick! After the race was over it was back to the hotel to get dinner. Dinner was great and after Alex, Colby and I went and got a mini pizza to share... it was so good! Well now for the big boys race... 160 miles for them. Most of the big names are here! Its going to be exciting! Also good luck to my mama! Shes running in the Berlin marathon today! Im watching you on TV mama! Well thats all for now! Stay tunned for a run down of the pros race! Thank you for all of the support!
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