Another Fine Mess

The NVGP seems to have more than it's share of bad weather.

last year was close to perfect, but 2 years ago in Minneapolis manhole covers were being blown out by the water pressure from the storm.

Last night was a return to awful weather as the rodes dried out from the day's thunderstorms just in time to get soaked by the night's thunderstorms. Luckily we had just finished getting the expo tents up so I had some shelter from the rain, but it was just windy enough to get me wet and chilled before I coudl go get the raincoat from the car.

After holding the women's race to try and let a storm cell pass they ended up doing call ups just as the skies opened. I was stuck under the farmer's market which ended up being the best place to watch the race as turn three caused carnage all night long, not just crashes but gaps being created by riders unwilling to take too many chances. In the end Kristin Armstrong was incredible lapping practically everyone and 2/3 of the filed getting pulled. it was all for naught though because despite having a podium presentation the officials neutralized the race overnight.

The men's race was even more of a cluster if that's possible. Once again things got strung out from the get go, but there was some wicked racing with O'Bee/Olson off the front and Kelly Benefits organizing the chase while Rory sat on their wheel. I figure that Health Net pretty much had the stage win in the bag when a moto crashed on the course and in the confusion they neutralized the race at the start/finish and it was all brought back together. There were a few choice words said by the riders who had been in the lead as they worked their way back up to the front but by then the officials gave the peloton the choice and the vote was overwhelmingly not to race.

There's definitely some upset riders if you search the WWW.

Hopefully today goes a little better