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Time for a change: The Kimberly Bruckner Journal 2003
Last year the 2001 US Road Champion Kimberly Bruckner left the number one ranked women's team in the US after two years with Saturn and joined the growing force that is Team T-Mobile. With her sights firmly set on the Worlds in Hamilton and the Olympic Games in Athens in 2004, Kimberly's diary is sure to provide compelling reading.
Geelong Women's Tour - 2.9.2, Australia, February 23-25, 2003
Stage 2 - February 24: Drysdale Road Circuit, 84km
Scorching weather and sizzling racing = painful legs
Hi again everyone,
Oh, it was another scorcher today - we felt like we had ridden straight into Africa.
Our SRM's were reading 39 degrees Celsius. In fact, as I was trying to write this on my computer, my hand cramped up into a very odd twisted position and I had to massage it out. Freakish.
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Today's race was an 84km circuit race: 4 times around a 21km circuit. I think the wind played the biggest role in today's race as on one part of our triangle-shaped circuit, we had a cross-wind, then a strong head wind, which discouraged attacks, and then a strong cross-tail wind through the rolling hills section and into the finish.
The Aussies put in some tough attacks today in the midst of the rollers and the hurt was on. I have basically no jump at all right now - I feel like a slug and so those hills were giving me pain. Anyways, the AIS team rode very tough today in protecting their leader, Olivia Gollan. They successfully covered all attacks until the very end and rode a hard tempo for most of the final lap.
As we approached the finish, Judith Arndt of Nurnberger had a strong attack. My teammate, Kim Anderson, had seen Judith shifting out of the corner of her eye and caught on to what she was planning and got on her wheel right away. Then, as a counter, Margaret Hemsley - Judith's teammate - attacked and got away solo to take the win for the day. A group of 5 was on Margaret's heels, including Sara Carrigan, Katie Mactier, Singrid Corneo, and Mari Holden finishing in that order, except for the one that I'm forgetting [Elizabeth Williams-Ed].
No podium finish for us today but I'm confident our team is well on its way in learning to work together. These early season races are such a great opportunity for our new team to work the kinks out and work towards impressive results in the future. Besides, I'm in Australia - I have no reason to complain!
Thanks for reading,
KB
