Tour of the Battenkill

April 18th/19th Py made a road trip upstate to the Tour of the Battenkill to help out at the feed zone 2 and support his friends in the EECT and related LI based teams racing this weekend -- the best he could do, as he not knowing about it in time, missed to sign up in time to get a start number. But still what a great get away! He stayed with team members and friends at a nice place close to Salem at the Inn at Beattie Hollow. The nice but small place got a bit over full, but the Inn owners handled that all.

Arrival Friday night, pre race dinner. Debating and discussing things to come and Py got into the idea of attempting a last minute (5min pre start) walkup for getting in into, he was all prepared so far...

Saturday - Amateur Race all CATs.
As many of them started in different CATs and thus different start blocks/times some left early and some later -- Py still was up honestly with the idea to get into the bigger group with his friends and team mates. However, they had a good breakfast at the diner 3/4 toward Cambridge. What Py did not really know by this morning and was that his only chance would have been the CAT5, not holding a racing license -- "wrong" group and time :-( And... this start time was now out of reach, or about to happen as they got back to get prepared.

Still, he got his stuff and drove to teh start, as there was nothing else to do by this time. Went in to the registration and double checked -- no race for Py. So back to plan A, help at the feed zone 2 and take photos... So he did and drove up to F2.

Pretty early, not much going on yet. Heck, that bike outfit all on and bike ready, nice morning and still some time -- he got on his bike to explore the race route coming up from F2 for a couple of miles, including a good dirt road section -- just enough to get the bike a bit dusty.

Back to F2. Trevor showed up and more of the EECT and friends.

On-the-fly feeding or handing out water bottles to riders asking for -- they have be kind enough to supply water to every one and not only the team -- very nice move...

Here a few feed in action shots:

Around noon it got a bit cooler and a little rain set in -- a bit messy, but yet not too bad for the riders.

all the supporters waiting for the riders

Sunday, Py made his own action plan and started out early from the Inn on his bike to tackle the race course before every one else, starting with a offset as well, his very own race lap. A few photos... and at the end of his ride he timed it in a way to meet up with the Pro racers 1st on top of Juniper Hill and later again at the turn into 22 towards Salem.


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Greenwich

Covered Bridge

Juniper Hill, waiting for the Pro teams...

Here they come...

and suffer and skid at times as well...

The leading two riders turning on 22 (12:03:31 camera time, may be off a bit)

the field follows at least a 94s later (CamTime: 12:04:45)!

... notice the poor guy on the right getting pushed off road, Py feels like could happen to him o-)

From here he rode back and finished is lap with about 60mi as well and he did this fun dirt road hill at Juniper Road two times, as he lapped around top view the Pro's once again ++ plus, he carried his big camera with big lens and some more tech stuff all day in his camel bag -- about 2.5 .. 3.0kg extra o-)

Ride Stats of the (Sun) day: