Wow, what a way to start off the US racing season! Ten days touring California, loosing personal affects, driving way too much and dealing with crazed Lance fans. Though I am beat, I want to do it again.
This year yours truly was working the expo with Trek and thus part of the traveling circus entertaining the crowds at each finish line. Each day began with a two hour setup, followed with a full day at the booth and finished with a two hour tear down before driving a hundred plus miles to the next town. Somewhere in there we had to eat and try to get some sleep while attempting to keep up with projects back at the office. Yep, a full schedule at full tilt.
My last day in China.
Ed Note: I added some photos and a video to yesterday's report.
Most of the riders loaded into the bus this morning with a few sticking around for later flights. Tara and I weren't flying home till 8pm tonight so we had one last day to spend in China. We said our good byes finished breakfast and hit the Good Luck Beijing desk (the promoter) for some help with the taxi. They walked us out the door and found us a taxi that would take us to the Wall, wait for us and then take us back.
DR takes it and the sky is blue.
I was up late last night running errands for Mike. Namely I was printing out today's schedule and sliding copies under the doors of our riders. I then stayed up too late watching the Empire of the Sun. Never saw it before, liked it, cried. I think I hit the pillow for sleep around 1:30ish, way too late. To make matters worse today was an earlier day. Thankfully I had woken up a couple minutes before Romero's call at 6:30am to chat about Jill's SRM.
I have never been this wet before. Okay, maybe at the beach, in the pool or in the shower. No, I think there is less water in a shower. It's like my whole body just decided to perspire from every pore at the same time and it forgot to stop. Small rivers are forming on my arms and legs and I am having trouble seeing past the waterfalls over my eyes.
A quieter day, or not.
Some of the riders beat me to breakfast this morning. Maybe that was due to my staying up till midnight last night. Krystal and Amanda are still afraid of the majority of food at the buffet. They don't seem to be vegetable eaters though Amanda swears that potatoes count.
Jet lag can be a killer for those who don't fight it. We're already starting to see the battle won and lost and the trip just began.
I am working with the US National Team in Beijing, China at the Olympic qualifier and UCI BMX Supercross event. Mike King is running the program, I am wrenching and the riders are Jill Kinter, Krystal Hime, Mike Day, Randy Stumpfhauser, Kim Hayashi, Amanda Geving, Kyle Bennett and Donny Robinson. Donny has been here since the 1st participating in an Olympic media tour. The rest of us, including about ten other US riders, arrived yesterday.
The inaugural San Francisco Grand Prix, the latest stage of the BMC Software Grand Prix Series, occurred this weekend amongst throngs of spectators. This was the first time that a major cycling event had occurred in San Francisco since the late eighties when the Coors Classic attacked Fisherman's Wharf.
The day began as usual with riders signing in, teams lining up their cars, riders begging for more air and team managers and sponsors preparing their VIP's for rides later in the day. The difference here was that hundreds of people were milling about the the start line area. Okay, we were stationed on the Embarcadero which is always full of tourists, but these people were all chatting about how they hoped to get a chance to see Lance Armstrong. Not the usual San Francisco tourist discussion.