Dougy...waiting for breakfast

 

Mosport

Last weekend I reunited with fellow Ontario racers at Mosport Raceway. It's a great circuit and a very well organized Ontario Cup! Merrill won the sprint for 1st, with myself in 2nd, and Julia in 3rd 

The Swan

So Jeff and I are on a bike ride to Ayr and we stop at this pond. Off in the distance is a beautiful swan. Fortunately Jeff has 5 million times zoom on his camera and we got some pretty cool shots! We waited around for a bit and the swan starts swimming closer and closer...Jeff taking picutures the whole time. What we originally thought was a timid bird, soon proved to be quite the opposite. I was sitting on the rock next to the swan, when all of a sudden he/she decides to lurch out of the water and see how I taste. It brought back all those memories of me as a child being chased and pecked on the bum by just such a creature at Waterloo Park because I wasn't fast enough with the bread crusts! 

Home again!

One of the best parts of travelling for me is coming home! It's spring now and I'm overwhelmed with feelings of happiness. I'm so grateful to have such incredible family and friends!

Giving out FREE beer after the race at Sea Otter

 

Sea Otter Classic

So this looks like a mountain bike race...and essentially it is with various mountain bike races going on all weekend. The elite road race was slimmed down from a three day stage race, to a single event on the race track. Even so, the race was spectacular! The women completed 23 laps with sprint points and mountain points throughout the race to keep things fast (as if the climb wasn't hard enough!). Victory Brewing finished off the California racing with style. We placed 1st in the sprint points, 2nd in the mountain points and 2nd overall. As this was also one of the biggest bike Expos all year, we were able to race right infront of our sponsors and show them how far we've come as a team! 

It can happen so fast!

This is what we saw behind us as we were driving back to Santa Rosa on a rainy Monday. A car ahead of us spun out and the traffic came to an ABRUPT halt. Fortunately Mike is an amazing defensive driver! He took the van with trailer in tow onto the grassy median. As we flew past cars on either side he kept it in control the whole way, not once overreacting to the fishtailing trailer. On the other shoulder, an 18 wheeler was doing the same thing! Unfortunately Laura and Ryan weren't so lucky. A 7-up truck couldn's stop quick enough and smoked them from behind. No one was hurt and if all goes well, 7-up will buy them a new car :-)! 

Getting ready for YOGA

Between races we stayed in Santa Rosa, home of Brenda Lyons - yoga instructor extraordinaire! Here, Kirsten and I are getting all our props for our 1 1/2 hour long session of stretching beyond what we ever thought possible. Thank you Brenda for the wonderful workouts! 

A couple of spectators at the race in Ojai

 

Finding an internet connection at the coffee shop in Ojai

 

Rain, Rain, and more Rain

I'm a little behind on my blog site. This is a photo of Ojia from our host house. It's a beautiful place with so many different types of trees! I kind of felt like I was in a rainforest though. It seemed as if the rain clouds were caught in this valley and had trouble moving on. The day of the Garrett Lemire Memorial Crit was sunny. Garrett Lemire was a cyclist who was killed in a bicycle race when a car pulled out into the peleton. In his memory, his parents and brother have organized one of the best crits I've ever raced.  

Along the way to Ojai!

 

Riding to Ojai

The plan was to find a nice road that parallels the highway so that we could get a ride in rather than sit in the van all day to Ojai. We almost timed it perfectly! As you can see from the picture, after just 1km we hit dirt. Fortunately it didn't last long. 

Redlands Crit