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May 13, 2004
The Tour de Georgia, then home to smashed glass
By Ian McGregor
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The Tour de Georgia… I only have three things to say; it was hard, I learned more in one week than I did all of last season, and Cipo's lead out train goes really, really fast!
After the best race I have ever done, I finished off the week on the east coast with the South Carolina Heritage series. Pretty fast, but still a lot of fun; even for a skinny guy like me.
I arrived back home just in time to head off and take on Lookout Mountain. However, to my dismay, Mother Nature released some of that fluffy, white stuff called snow; the race was cancelled.
Time to train.
For the first time in awhile I was excited to ride the same old roads around my house. As I headed out for a simple climbing day, I found the main road near my house to have been ground up in preparation for re-paving. The thought of new pavement made me smile. A smile that only lasted until I found myself ridding on this grooved pavement. Man that stuff is rough, and to make matters worse there were small-sized rocks everywhere, they were impossible to avoid. As I was accelerating from a stoplight my front wheel found its way to one of the huge pieces of roadway, only this time instead of flinging my bike, the rock got flung. As most of you have experienced, a bike wheel can shoot a rock pretty hard. This was no exception. Instantly, the passenger window of the car next to me exploded! Dam! I just broke some dudes window. As the driver pulled over just ahead I quickly cursed myself, saying that I was screwed.
To my amazement the driver not only had no idea of what happened, but also once I had explained everything simply said, "Shit happens, have a safe ride." End of story, no yelling, cussing, no calling the cops, just 'have a safe ride.' A few hours later, while stopped to get some water I phoned my Dad, Officer MacGregor, to make sure that I had done no wrong. I guess according to the law in matters with road debris there are not faults with any parties involved, so it really is just a 'shit happens' kind of thing.
As the training continued the week went on. Soon enough it was the weekend, and weekend equals racing. This time it was the Boulder Stage Race. Good times, I raced hard and trained through looking toward the future.
A few more days of training, the last of which was turned into four hours on the trainer, I was really hoping that we could be done with snow. Then, a few rest days and I will be racing again, this time at the Tour of Connecticut. Wish me luck!
Thanks for your time,
Ian
