Stage two: HCTT

Okay, so this photo has nothing to do with bicycling or my trip, but blog posts are just so much cooler when the include pictures. That happens to be my good buddy Peter snagging some bagel bites and ranch during my wonderful last night in ketchum before I left for this trip.

Anyway, stage two was a mother. 700 Meters just straight up san fernando hill. Okay, not straight up, but for those of you from the norcal scene picture a tt up bohlman. They said it was only 700 meters, but when you're bleeding from the eyes and it feels like your legs are on fire 700 meters seems like 100 miles. I went out too hard and totally blew towards the top. The climb actually stair-steeped in 3 sections making it really hard to judge. I hit the last section way overgeared and felt like I was riding through sand as I slogged my way up the last 100 meters.

I thought I had really blown it. In typical Ryan fashion I got really down on myself, but when the dust settled I had actually done a pretty siolid ride. 1:59. Not too shabby considering the course record had been 1:52. Some jerk decided to run a 1:49 though, and two other guys got me landing me in 4th for the stage and 5th overall. Turns out there were time bonuses for the first stage. Oh yeah, for the second stage too, and the same guy won both, putting me 30 seconds out after his 10 seconds on each stage. Yeah, time bonuses go 3 deep. Just missed 'em each time.

Slack-diggity had a solid ride as well, less than 2 seconds back from me, slotting him into 8th place overall.

We all rode home so tired we could barely see and and showered, ate and climbed back into bed as fast as we could to try and sleep a few winks before we had to be at the circuit race for a 1:00pm start.

Brutal!

In other news there is a Trini concotion called Bake and Shark. Bake is like a deep-fried dough/bread thingy, and shark is deep-fried shark, and Bake & Shark is one of the most delicious (and probably most fattening) foods I have ever tasted. We went out one night in p of s to eat the vendor food in Savanah park and it was awesome! On top of all the fried goodies we hit up no fewer than 3 juice stands and sampled all manner of exotic fruit concoctions. Erik ventured so far as to try Seamoss, a type of seaweed blended with god knows, which we were later told was greatly beneficial to a man's virility. The actual words were: "it'ol make yuh prick like dis!(Indicating clenched fist and forearm). I drink it when I wona hav bebies." Hilarious.