Originally posted by tomdavis80
The flats you had probably cost you at least 10 minutes and I think you probably would have gotten in the top 5 at the lowest with a perfect day.
Don't succumb to the road rage issue and besides you're on a bike, the other guy's on a car, what's gonna happen to you? Your bike's dead and you're in the hospital, just keep your cool and keep on riding, if you get close calls, don't get ******, instead just thank your lucky stars that you're still alive through all these close calls. Less stress that way I think.
I'm going to focus mostly on the Category races and I don't know how old you are but you could race in Cat. 5 and judging from your performance in the El Tour, you should be able to win or place in several events especially the time trials. Of course, that's not to say that you'd have to contend with me, hehe, but it depends on your age, you may want to race in the Masters 35+ if you're old enough and I think the competition would certainly be to your liking since many of them are veterans of cycling.
I plan on entering the Tucson Bicycle Classic Cat. 5 race in March. Let me know if you wanna ride with me on some days when I come back from vacation which will be around Jan. 10th or so and I'll be there to tear some road.
I don't know if my nutrition is poor, it consists of very carbohydrate heavy diet with plenty of spaghetti and the occasional pizza and usually oatmeal and such for breakfast. I feel that I need to eat more veggies and fruits than I do now though.
Thomas Davis