Neil Shirley Mt. Hood Classic Diary – Stage 4
5/17/08 - I have to say that the courses here at Mt Hood are some of the most epic and scenic of any race I’ve done. Today was an 18 mile time trial along the Columbia River. The promoters have kept with their common theme, why go around the mountain if you can go over it? 4 miles into the TT they threw a Cat 3 switchback climb in just for fun. It was a beautiful climb with amazing views of the river below and snowcapped mountains all around. I only know how gorgeous the views were because by this point in the race I was already on a Sunday cruise. Well, I guess it wasn’t really a cruise even though I was going slowly it still hurt. My legs were pretty well stuffed from yesterday’s efforts in the break. I tried to push through it and hoped my legs would come around but by the top of the climb I knew it wasn’t going to get much better. I decided not to kill myself and turned it into a tempo ride rather than shatter my legs for tomorrow. I really hate not giving it 100% when I race but I am really hoping that it will pay off for tomorrow’s brutal stage. It’s a bummer fighting so hard to not lose any time at the finish yesterday and then give up minutes today, but that’s racing.
A snow capped Mt. Hood provides a beautiful backdrop for the riders.
photo © neilshirley.com
Ben Kneller had a good ride today, although I haven’t seen any results. I’m hoping Matt Shriver stayed up in the GC hunt as well. I believe Ben Jacques Maynes won again but I don’t know for sure. He is an amazing TT rider, it’s been fun watching him progress each year. Ben, his twin Andy and I have all been racing each other since 95’ when we were 16 years old. We had some great battles on the mountain bike back in the day. Maybe he’ll give me some much needed time trialing advice!
You can count on me racing aggressively again tomorrow. I’m going to give everything and hope it plays out in my favor. I’ll bet you that there will be a few more motivated teams to work in the break tomorrow since it will be their last shot to change the GC.
I think we will be going to the movies later to hang out in the air conditioning. It’s in the mid 90’s today and hanging out in the Westy isn’t so comfortable with these temperatures. Until tomorrow...
