Racing in Wisconsin

Hey everyone, wow its been a long weekend for the Wisconsin cowgirls. On Saturday we went up to the Menomonee Park Criterium in Menomonee Falls. It was a rather early morning since we had to leave at 6 for the 8:30 junior’s race, but the course was fun. It was fairly flat with one or two small hill and lots of sweeping turns and ended up being more like a short circuit race than a crit. Marcie and I both raced juniors, it was a fun, but fast race, since the girls and guys race at the same time and some of the guys are cat 2’s and 3’s. Anyway I stayed with the main pack for the majority of the race along w/ Katie and Ashley from IS corp. At the last turn I dropped back out of the pack because I didn’t want to get caught up in the rather sketchy sprint which usually finishes out a juniors race and ended up taking 2nd overall for 17-18 girls. Marcie also had a good race she rode w/one other 15-16 girl off the back of the pack and ended up taking a strong 3rd in her age group.

Marcie during the juniors race

Next up for both of us was Women’s 4’s. There were some small attacks throughout the race that were quickly chased down, and the field ended up together going into the last turn. I was up near the front and as soon as we were around the corner everyone took off, and I was able to take the sprint. Marcie finished in the field with a solid 11th. Overall it was a great race for the Cowgirls.

The start of the sprint

At the finish :-)

Day two of this weekend was the Great Dane Velo Club Criterium (#2) and the weather could not have been better. It was a high of 76 degrees and sunny. They day started with the juniors race which was once again fairly fast, I lost the pack and the beginning of the race and so I was on my own for the first half but then as I was being lapped L one of the guys kindly pulled me back into the field and I sat in for the remainder of the race. The Cowgirls ended up taking 1st in the 17-18 Girls and 2nd in the 15-16 girls.
Next up was the women’s 4’s for Marcie, it was one the biggest field that race has had all year, Marcie had a good race, but we don’t know where she finished yet. After 4’s I didn’t have to race till 5 so I took Marcie on a ride around Madison and we put in some quality homework time before heading back to the race.
The Women’s Open was a great race, the first several laps were full of lots of small attacks and it was tough, I sat in, chased the attacks and just kept wishing the a break would make it so that things would settle into a rhythm of some sort. Eventually an attack was successful and I made the break along with Sarah from PRC, Rachel and Katie from IS corp., and Kristin from Kenda Tire. We worked well together and kept the break going till the end. I ended up being the last one around the corner before the sprint and subsequently took 4th. Not to bad for my first women’s open race, I learned a lot, including that I need to work on my sprint.


Overall it was a great weekend for the Wisconsin Cowgirls, I'll post pics from Great Dane tomorrow!