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Update – Andy was a bit worse off than the original assessment out on the road. Surgery on hip tomorrow and then 12 weeks non-weight bearing. Please keep in your thoughts and prayers, and send him an encouraging word via email or facebook.

What an amazing day today with temperatures approaching 70 degrees by the end of the ride! A couple quick notes for next week:

1 – We are going to bypass Camp Winnie completely next week, taking the Cook Springs cut-off road instead. There are just TOO MANY dogs on the Camp Winnie road. And they all appear to be fairly suicidal as at least two of them darted out into the road at full speed with one of them taking out Andy in a bad accident (see the recap below). Fortunately, I believe Andy is OK, but it could have been much worse!

2 – DO NOT CROSS THE YELLOW LINE!!! Several people were crossing the yellow line today during the attack zones. This isn’t a rule just for the end of the attack zone in the sprint. It applies to the ENTIRE attack zone. So if you are stuck behind slow people, that’s too bad. You’ve got to find a way around them on YOUR side of the road!!!

And now for the recap … the Camp Winnie attack zone started out harmless enough making it down the first hill and then up and over the second one. On the downhill on the other side, two little white dogs darted out from the side bolting towards us but fortunately pulled up short on the side of the road. This was still enough to cause some chaos as people hit the brakes and the ricochet carried to the back of the group. Nobody went down though and we continued on our way. We made it to the longer gradual hill when Miro (Alabama Masters) and Darryl (Tria Yellow) took off getting a good gap.

Flying down the next hill, John Adams got caught up in the loose gravel on the outside of the road and was the first victim of the ill-fated attack zone. Fortunately, he popped right back up minus a little bit of skin. The rest of us where ahead of John’s wreck and slowly pulling the two leaders back in. As we closed in and began ramping up the speed for the sprint, another suicidal dog bolted right into the group with us going close to 30mph. The first thing I saw was the dog on its back, legs in the air, and I thought to myself “this can’t be good”. Sure enough, as I looked up, I saw Andy Maddux in the air somersaulting ahead of the dog landing hard with his bike continuing to bounce down the road ahead of him. Darryl and Miro were still ahead so they didn’t even know anything happened and continued on in the attack zone, whereas the rest of us stopped immediately to check on Andy. Fortunately, after a few minutes, Andy realized he was OK, minus a lot of skin, a cracked helmet, a bent (or maybe broken) derailleur hanger and hopefully nothing else. (See update at the top of this post). Bob’s Bikes sent out somebody to come pick him up with Joe staying behind to wait with Andy. Thanks Bob’s! And thanks Joe! The rest of us continued on in a neutralized zone.

Camp Winnie –
Darryl Seelhorst 5pts + 1cbp
Miro Novak 4pts + 3cbp

Next up on the attack zone menu was the Vandiver KOM – Mimosa combo zone. We rode up the climb with a fairly steady pace with only one or two attacks. Heading into the switchback corner at the top, Justin Bynum (Tria Green) rolled off the front with nobody chasing. Shortly after the corner, though, Pat unleashed a monster attack. I tried to catch him, but couldn’t quite do it with the two of us passing Justin just before the line. Behind us, I believe it was Darryl Seelhorst and Will Hibberts taking fourth and fifth, but I’m not sure in what order.

Vandiver KOM –
Pat Allison – 5pts
Brian Toone – 4pts
Justin Bynum – 3pts + 3cbp
Darryl or Will – 2pts + 1cbp
Darryl or Will – 1pt + 1cbp

Pat tucked and led us down the hill at over 50mph. On the steep climb to the railroad tracks a group of about 4 or 5 came together. Then with a little bit more cat and mouse leading onto Mimosa the group had swollen to maybe 6 or 7. During the attack zone, there were a lot of attacks and counter-attacks, but eventually it was Justin and Miro rolling off the front. At some point we came within 10 meters of reeling them in, but as everybody looked at everybody else to see who would close the final gap, our pace slowed and the two leaders ramped it up again staying away to the end — which goes to show that if you are in a break, you should NEVER give up until the pack has actually caught you. Behind Justin and Miro, our group got larger and larger as more people chased back on. For the final sprint, there was maybe fifteen of us together trying to work out the downhill/uphill sprint with Chris Allison taking it for 3rd, followed by Pat in 4th, and then Will holding on for 5th even after dropping his chain towards the end. Ahead of us, Miro came in ahead of Justin.

Mimosa –
Miro Novak – 5pts + 3cbp
Justin Bynum – 4pts + 3cbp
Chris Allison – 3pts + 1cbp
Pat Allison – 2pts
Will Hibberts – 1pt + 1cbp

The second KOM of the day came when we made it back to Karl Daly. And just like last week, there were fireworks from the very beginning of the hill. Haha, just kidding, actually we rode more than 1/2 the hill at talking pace as everybody was tired and nobody wanted to try to stick a 2 mile climb from the bottom. So we were pretty much all together with less than 500 meters to go when Chris Allison attacked. I grabbed his wheel for a couple seconds and then launched out from behind him hitting my max heartrate for the year so far (196), burying everything into it. But alas, it wasn’t enough to gap Pat, so he came around me with about 50 meters to go. I held on for second with Will Hibberts coming in 3rd, followed by Chris in 4th, and then Jim Brock in 5th!

Karl Daly KOM
Pat Allison – 5pts
Brian Toone – 4pts
Will Hibberts – 3pts + 1cbp
Chris Allison – 2pts + 1cbp
Jim Brock – 1pt + 1cbp

No getting lost this week, I hope everyone enjoyed the new route up to John Rogers via Brownlee Hills Rd (gotta love a nice little 12% climb at the end of a ride). Seriously, though, that road is only a mile and a half long, and it is a gem of a road either way you go on it. Just watch out for the trains at the bottom. Once we made it to John Rogers, I decided to have a little fun and launched out from the very beginning straight into a headwind. People strung out behind and eventually caught me (maybe 30 seconds after I attacked?). The sprint was tricky, though, because it was into such a horrendous headwind. The sprinters dominated this sprint for the green jersey:

John Rogers bridge sprint:
Sammy Flores – 5pts + 1cbp
Ed Merritt – 4pts + 1cbp
Pat Allison – 3pts
Jim Brock – 2pts + 1cbp
?????? – ???pts + ???cbp

As always, fill in the blanks for anything I have missing. Or email me or add a comment for anything I’ve gotten wrong. Again, two things for next week:

1 – We are skipping Camp Winnie – it is too dangerous with so many dogs out there. I believe I counted a total of 6 dogs coming out onto the road to chase us with two of them bolting straight into the group including the one that took down Andy. So we will head on out to the Cook Springs cut-off road which adds a few miles, but we will skip Mimosa to bring the total mileage back down to about the same as this week. Will had a great route suggestion that would take us up Grants Mill Rd instead of Hwy 78 on the way back over to Karl Daly. Look for that next week or the week after!!! Plus, for the truly adventurous maybe we can start the KOM from the 35-40% gradient canoe landing by the Cahaba River. Ummm, maybe not.

2 – DO NOT CROSS THE YELLOW LINE. DO NOT CROSS THE YELLOW LINE. DO NOT CROSS THE YELLOW LINE. Do not cross the yellow line at the beginning, ending, or anywhere in the middle of the attack zone. Do not cross it period!

Finally, the team competition really heated up this week with Alabama Masters vaulting to the lead due to Miro’s domination of the points today. They now have a 1 point lead over my team followed by Pat’s team in third.

OK, really, this is the last thing. We had four strong ladies turn out for the ride today – Hallie, Kat, and Amy. I was so busy with the craziness of the ride, I didn’t see how y’all placed in the Mimosa attack zone. Please email me or update me in the comments. Thanks!

UPDATE from Kat on the women’s results. Mimosa was pretty much a wash because only Hallie (awesome, congrats!) made it over the top with the front group of guys. So the only points for the day are going to be based on the positioning during the Camp Winnie attack zone when the bad accident with Andy vs suicidal dog happened. And this is how those points shook out:

Hallie - 5pts + 3cbp
Kat - 4pts + 3cbp
Terry - 3pts + 3cbp
Amy - 2pts + 3cbp