Date: April 29-30, 2000
Event: Xcelerate Twilight XC AMBC / Fat Tire Crit / Athens, GA
Class: OPEN
Category: Pro
Length: 25 mi
Time: 1:47:05
Conditions: Sunny - 75+ degrees
Bike: MARIN Mount Vision Pro
Tires: Kenda Kosmik Lites

Did you do anything special to prepare for this race?

No, I was too busy working on all of this team stuff.

In the last two months how many hours a week have you trained?

In the last month has been bad. I've only averaged maybe 8 hours per week. Cause I've been working on the team van - up all night and all day...... (see photo). I like to get a lot more than that. Closer to 20.

Were you strong from start to finish?

I didn't feel like superman like I wanted to but....lap times were really consistent. They were comparable to the time trial lap time where we did just one lap.

How did you make out in the Fat Tire Crit last night?

The story is the guy who won was on the right and cut across everybody - I don't know if it was on purpose or what - the guy in front of me locked his brakes up - I had to lock my brakes up and skid for about twenty feet. Four people passed me - I didn't even look at the results yet. Everyone was supposed to have 1.5 inch tires on but a lot of the racers had those little one inch tires. There's no way I could out sprint them on those tires. They said they were going to check but they didn't. I'll just have to use one inch tires next year.

When did you put the hammer down today?

The first and third place guys were Canadians and they were team mates. On the first lap the third place guy got in front of me and let the first place guy Bill Hurley get a gap and held it the whole race. So I ended up pulling the whole four laps. His team mate was with me and he wasn't going to chase. Finally the last lap Julian Hine who was third got out front and pulled a little bit - had a few little attacks that didn't stick - and in the second to last climb he kind of pulled over a little bit and let me by - I guess he was going to let me pull and I attacked. He didn't go with me quite as fast and I just kept the hammer down and opened up the gap. It was pretty much fun....I enjoyed racing today.

Did you have any unusual problems with the race?

None. It was a pretty flawless race.

How do you rate the course?

I liked it. I would have liked a little bit longer climbs. I'm not too particularly wild about these big open grass sections. Especially these finish sections. It was a fun course, very challenging. It had everything in it.

Yeah, I didn't see any glitches. It was well run.

If you could do the race again, would you do anything differently?

Yeah, I would have tried to stay with Hurley from the start and not let him open up that gap. I should have chased him down right off the bat. My training has been so bad and the time trial went pretty hard - and last night (fat tire crit) was kind of hard and then we walked down and watched until the pro road race was over (the pro crit)..... I was afraid because I was going so hard the first couple of laps that I was going to hit the wall but I never did - so I could have gone a little harder.

Is there anything you would like to add?

No. Nothing I could think of.