La Vuelta de Bisbee

I'm on location in Bisbee Arizona at the oldest and most prestigious cycling stage race in AZ. The town here is beautiful and the weather has been great. Perfect conditions for a bike race and a tan. I'm with my Rideclean team racing with 4 team mates (Brian Forbes, Mark Assmunstad, Dan Vasichek, Kyle Colavito, and myself) in the Pro 1-2 race. The race is 4 stages over 3 days. Here's a quick recap.
-Pro 1-2 field size - 85

-Stage 1 - 3 Mile Uphill prologue - Let me first say that I am not a time trialist. In the prologue I ended up 31st...not great...but not bad. My time wasn't too far off the leader. Mark got 10th and Kyle 12th so we will work for them. I rode all out, but maybe started off a little too easy. It definitely wasn't easy at the top though because on the way down I had to stop and puke...must have been a good effort. I coughed for a about 5 hours after. Ouch.

-Stage 2 - 80 mile Road Race - Pretty much the race is us and some other American teams against a team from Mexico named Tecos. They have 4 guys in the top ten and are pretty much controlling the race. We tried a couple time to send guys up the road but each time Tecos would pull it back. It pretty much stayed together till the last series of climbs when it started to shatter. I hung in there and finished with the main group scoring a 25th spot, moving me up to 24th over all. All the Rideclean guys finished up at the front which was cool. So Mark and Kyle moved up a bit.

- Stage 3 - 8 mile Time Trial - The time trial had a pretty wicked cross wind. Did I mention I wasn't a time trialist. I took 25th. I guess I pretty much must be the 25th best rider because that seems to be my spot these days. Mark took 4th and Brian 5th so that's rad. They will both move up the overall.

- Stage 4 - 90 mile Road Race - The road race is tomorrow, so we'll see what will happen. Hopefully it will all stay together and then I'm sure Tecos will be firing all sorts of amigos up the road on the final climbs. The race is cool. We start in Bisbee and cruise out to Tombstone and around and bit then back over the pass and finish on a tough climb right outside of down town.
There is over 6,000 ft of climbing, so It's pretty much like racing to Payson maybe a little longer in mileage.

So check it out. The team is staying at the coolest hotel. It's called the School House Inn. http://www.schoolhouseinnbb.com/
It was a school house built in 1917 that has been converted into a bed and breakfast. It feels like we're staying at grandma's house with all the decorations and smell.

Each room is a different subject. Todd and I are staying in the History room.

The History room is filled with history books and antiques from the 30's and 40's. None of the rooms have TVs or phones. It's been awesome. We race our bikes and come back and read. Then we race our bikes some more and come back and lounge and read again. The arithmetic room has a chaulk board with simple math questions.

Some of the stuff in the room. These pics don't do it justice.

If your lucky you could stay in the Principal's Office. Mark and some other dudes are in there.

The hallway is filled with old homey type stuff. Not your typical impersonal, everything nailed down hotel room.

The Tecos guys are staying at the School House Inn too. They have the full set-up. They have mechanics, massages, team cars and vans. They're legit. Hopefully we can put the hammer to them tomorrow and make 'em suffer.

Peace.