Unintentional CX workout

I had a great weekend with 2 fun races, more on that in a sec, so I wasn't quite ready to head back into work on Monday. I walked into the building at 8am to find some signs kindly letting me know that the elevators were broken and I would have to use the stairs. All the way to my 10th floor office. So I shouldered my road bike, CX style, and started hiking up. On the way up, I passed several red-faced forms leaning against the stairwell gasping for air, and I tried not to hit them with my bike. Mid-morning, I had to go down again to help a co-worker bring down some boxes to her car (they weren't light boxes). The lobby of the building was an interesting scene. People would walk in, look at the signs, stop. Look at me, standing there, look at the maintenance guy, look at the signs, walk over to the stairwell and look up it, incredulous. Then they would ask, as if the signs were just a joke, "really? really? I have to walk up 16 flights of stairs?" And our wonderful, ever-calm maintenance man would explain that there was a fire-sprinkler malfunction, and that yes, if they wanted to make it to their office, they would have to walk up the stairs. Just about every person acted personally offended that they would have to take on that task. I was amused.

I had to help carry several boxes today, meaning that I went up and down the 10 floors five times! And I even counted the stairs - 196 per time, which makes 980. I'll probably do 20 more, just to make it an even 1000. But I'm not complaining. It was pretty amusing to see everyone's reactions. The smokers were really struggling - the need for a cigarette pitted against the prospect of climbing the 10, 12, or 16 flights of stairs again? Tough call. Especially when they faced a good chance of heart failure on the way up. As far as I know, no one has suffered any serious injuries, and I'm going to count it as a CX workout.

Oh and the races!
Yesterday was the Benicia Town Race - a crit, with a nice roller on one side, and a downhill to a flat sprint finish. I liked the course, but last year I crashed out at this race in the 2nd to last corner and dislocated my shoulder, so I was a little wary of that. Once the race started though, I didn't think about the crash any more, my thoughts were only focused on getting a top three finish, in order to get the points I needed for my cat 1 upgrade. I had awesome teammates in the race, and everyone knew what they had to do. I went up the road with Mel Metzger in an early break, but we got pulled back in a few laps. Then there was a counter attack and a break formed with Mary Ellen in it. Eventually that break came back too, and the field got antsy again. I managed to grab a prime in there somewhere, and I think it was right on that lap that the next break was established. I was a bit cross-eyed trying to hang onto a wheel, so I didn't quite notice, but then I looked back and the field wasn't there anymore. So off we went, a break of 6. We rode hard for about 3 laps, but then settled down, and I knew my teammates in the field wouldn't be chasing.

Pretty soon it was 2 laps to go, and it was time to think about sprinting. I sat 4th wheel until the last corner, and then moved up on a perfect leadout wheel. With a couple hundred meters to go, I jumped and sprinted hard, just barely beating second place to the line. It was a great win for me, and got me the rest of the points I needed for the upgrade. It's now been submitted, and I'm just waiting for it to be official...

Thanks so much to my team - they all were totally committed to helping me win the race, and we pulled it off!