I know it's been a few days since the race ended, but I'll post an update on last weeks Cascade Classic anyways.

The criterium was 4 corners in downtown Bend Saturday night. The road narrows between corners 3 and 4 so there was always a bunch of crazy wheel chopping. A ton of people were waiting for a crash at that 4th corner, but it was pretty clean there all night.

The crash, the one that tried to eat my arm, was right after the start finish. I don’t really know what happened, but I was going 30 mph, couldn't stop, hit someone, went over the bars and into a bike. The damage, chainring into the forearm.

Big props to the race doc who put 5 stitches into me right after the race. Someone said he did a sloppy job, but it was dark and I've been looking for a sweet scar for a while now.

Sunday featured the Awbrey Butte Circuit Race. Us and Fly V were motivated to light it up because the course is hard to defend on. After a couple hard laps we had Rob and Kyle up the road and Rob was only 1:40 down on GC. That put the pressure on.

About 10k from the finish, Darren Lill, of Fly V, put in a big attack just as all the United guys were done. It was a dangerous move since it was just Rory, the race leader, left at that point.

Ah, but it seems like there is always someone ready to step up and help. This time, Chris Jones from Team Type 1, was that guy. He buried it for about 5k into the final climb. I guess he was just bored.

It went crazy hard up that final climb anyway but about 30 guys still came to the line together. Frank and Andy sprinted for 2nd and 3rd respectively, so that was nice.

Overall, I was 17th which I’m okay with after my poor showing the first couple days. For the team it was one of those "glass half empty" kind of races. Lots of top 5 placings, but no wins.

The season goes on and the team will be at Elk Grove this weekend. For me, it's Tour of Utah in a few weeks.

It's been another few days here at the Cascade Cycling Classic. The wife is here and the weather is good.

Yesterday's TT was... not that great. Don't have much more to say about that. I just really need to learn how to time trial again.

Today featured the Cascade Lakes road races, the 84 mile one that finishes up at Mt. Bachelor. I felt a bit better than the previous days, so that was good. I covered a few moves, drank a bunch of water and went hard up the climb.

The big drama was the finish. They looped us around the Mt. Bachelor parking lot with cones. Taylor Sheldon, from Garmin, went down hard in one of the corners. It didn't look good, but the word is he’ll be okay.

Rob was ahead of the crash and finished 5th. I was somewhere in that group. After the last few days of subpar performances, it was good to race and contribute a bit today.

Tomorrow night features the Crit in downtown Bend. "Embrace the assh***," was Ben's advice. At least I think he was still talking about the race when he said that.

The wife and I are up in Bend this week for the Cascade Cycling Calssic. It's a cool race with cool housing in a cool town.

The 2 mile prologue was yesterday in the Old Mill District downtown. It went alright. I think I was 17th, but tied with 8 people on the same second. I was on the wrong side of that second.

Through a twisted series of events I came across this fun fact: Manhattan has a population density of over 70,000 people per square mile. So basically I could ride my bike around 70,000 people in less than 8 minutes. That pretty much blew my mind.

Today was the McKenzie Pass road race. It was only 75 miles with a climb in the middle and one at the finish.

There were some dramas over the first climb as the group was coming apart with a bad, or us, break off the front, but we figured it out.

The finish was a bit disappointing for me. I think I was 1:30 off the leaders. Last year was worse so I guess I can’t complain, but I'm really looking forward to a good finish on this course.

Tomorrow features a Time Trial, with the afternoon "off."

So I Netflixed the first two Twilight movies last week. I needed to find out if I'm Team Edward or Team Jacob. I mean the Internet says it’s the thing to do.

Now before you start calling me a "teenage girl wannabe," or something, I think you should all know that Adam Switters has actually read the books. So who’s the “teenage girl wannabe” now? No, the answer is not both of us.

After carefully watching, I have to conclude that I'm Team Edward. I mean Jacob is just the rebound guy. But I guess now I have to watch the third movie to know for sure.

In other news, I just finished watching Hot Rod. Terrible, yet hilarious.

It's official, the word, "epic," has reached, well, epic status. Phil Liggett is now using it everyday on Versus to describe the Tour. It's only a matter of time before the triathletes get a hold of it.

Thus, I think it's time we all move on to something else. I'm going to do my part and officially retire the word from this blog. There, done.

Monday's race? Yes, Stage 4 of The Fitchburg Longso Classic; crit, 50 miles. At the start I got a called up by the announcer, Dick Ring. He said I was a "very fine gentleman." No joke, it must have been the hair cut I got last week.

As for the actual racing part, we had Frank, Kyle and Rob in the break picking off the primes. I finished in the pack to lock in 6th place overall. Jeremy did the same to finish 3rd overall.

Next up for me is Cascade, but most of the guys are off to Michigan for the Grand Cycling Classic.