Travel Blog 2.0

Welcome back, to the second edition of my travels and racing abroad. This time around I am off for three weeks of destruction starting with San Dimas Stage Race, Redlands Bicycle Classic and ending with Ft. Davis Hammerfest. From the look of things, all of these events will be world class, with fields over 150 riders.

The trip started with an entire day of flying, in which true to form, my carry on bag was picked off of my stack-o-luggage, as I was so scatter-brained, I didn't even realize this until I was through security. Good thing some baggage handler pulled it aside and I had a nice little courtesy call about 20 minutes later.

Moving on to a huge layover in Houston, I enjoyed watching a few movies and wasting some time online. I also enjoyed a $10 airport meal, so I could stay half way nutritional and awake.

After a short flight to El Paso, I was glad to be picked up by the team director and get some sleep, as we had to hit the road to Cali at 6:30am. With four of us in the team truck with trailer in tow it was an all day event.

We stopped to pick up Emiliano Jordan in Tuscon, along with a stop at a sponsor shop for some small items. After taking about 2 hours to do what seemed to be an easy stop we continued our voyage, with another planned stop in Phoenix at UPS to pick up our six boxes of team clothing!

At the UPS hub, things went a little more smooth, and the clothing turned out awesome, hopefully we'll be putting up some awesome pics soon. We also had to get some real food, as granola bars and beef jerky only go so far.

We continued the trip towards Pomona, CA; with some Top Gear episodes, some Paris-Nice stages and some naps. We also got to review the TT start list for San Dimas, and I am the first rider off from our team, riding in the 6th slot. Johnny Clarke and Jeff Louder will be blazing up behind me....

Finally we arrived last night at 10:30pm, I got up to the room in the host house we were staying at and passed out completely!

Host housing is awesome, as we had an awesome breakfast spread; with coffee, juice and oatmeal with fresh fruit. Now we are setting to head off for some course preveiws, team meetings, a nice 2-3 hrs ride and then hopefully some rocking lunch.

More to come later and tomorrow....