Snowball Suffering

The Virginia Beach Wheelmen showed up on Sunday to the Sportsplex sporting their new uniforms. It was also going to be the first time this many of them raced together. With addition of Kyle O'brien after last Snowball they showed up 6 strong. James Goyet, Jon Nisbet, John Gray, Tim Shockley, Kyle O'brien and me (Joshua Goyet). During our warm up we decided who would lead who out, and I had mentioned I would try to get in a break, but I didn't feel my legs were back to where they should be. So they knew to watch me and counter attack if I got dropped from the break.
So the B race started off good. There were a couple of jumps and a couple of people away. But they weren't too far and it didn't look like it would stick.

I was riding near the front when I saw a couple more look like they were going to attack. I jumped on D-bo's wheel and before we knew it we were in the break. A couple of the riders thought the entire pack had caught them and just sat up. That left 4 of us.
Three of the four were working. And it seemed like every time I pulled was the headwind part. My pulls became shorter and shorter and I was burning out quick. It was still very early in the race also. So I dropped off to head back into the pack. At this time Nisbet was covering a break. He saw that I had dropped off and so countered and made it to the break. I got to the front and blocked immediately when the pack caught me. Tim spent a lot of time at the front after that and did an excellent job of covering any attacks. James also made is way up a lot and worked to bring the race back together after primes. John and Kyle needed upgrade points so they sat in to try and get a high placing in the field sprint. I did what I could, but I was pretty tired. Jon won the race and the other John got 4th (I think) in the field sprint.
The B race was harder than the one two weeks ago. The Virginia Beach Wheelmen had a good showing. I want to thank the guys from All About Bikes Racing also for helping us block near the end. That gave the break an even bigger lead.

After the B race Jon Nisbet, Tim Shockley and myself changed numbers and raced the A race. I was going to use this race as a motor pacing race.
And that's pretty much what I did. It was harder than two weeks ago. A break didn't get away until later in the race. So there was a lot of attacking and the wind was impossible to get away from. For the most part we all sat in the back and watched and just tried to survive.
A break of some very strong riders got away and immediately go a half a lap lead. I pulled off with three to go to watch the sprint (that and my legs were cramping pretty badly). It was a long sprint but Keith took it at the end.
Nisbet ended up getting second in the field sprint. Overall it was a great day of racing.

See everyone next week at the VBW Smackdown.