"Where Did Our Sprint Go"

Sung to Holland/Dozier/Holland's Supremes hit, we realized that without Nicky pushing us this summer, our sprints left something to be desired. We were left in his wake all night. Frank and I were usually the last to pop off his wheel during the intervals. I guess we've become used to sprinting from mid the 20 mph's to lower 30 mph's, but we were setting up toward the finish at 28, 29 and the rest of us were unprepared to start the sprint at that speed, even after sitting on Nicky's wheel. He usually dropped all but the most accomplished wheel suckers. Since he has won a lot of the Tuesday crits this summer, Nicky can be expected to be stronger, but you should be able to do absolutely no work in front, then come around at the line. Didn't work. Finally I just tried to go around at 400 meters and do lead out like Renshaw does for Cavendish. Behind, Frank was on his TT bike, so he was a bit hesitant to work a sprint in due to it's squirrily nature, but judging by the last two weeks, he should do fine once he is on a road bike.

Fortunately, Nicky, Frank and Noah did Loving a bit later (water break) so Caryn, Michael, and I chased Kurt up. Being relatively new to the sport, Kurt lacks some of the finer ascending and descending skills, so I caught him on a downhill turn, but I was giving it full gas to catch back on. Quite impressive uphill sprint he has.

I was finally able to get hooked up with 43 by way of one of our faculty, so we are planning on getting W a SMU jersey, even if he plans to wear it on a mountain bike!