History 5

Fall '04 - Spring '05

The end of the 2004 season was good, but the end of racing was welcome when it finally came. I was eager to be able to take time to bring my fitness level up to par with the elite category. I bought a Computrainer and rode it. A lot. The computrainer is one of those things that you love and hate at the same time. I would really hate to ride a regular trainer for hours, but having the computrainer's variation makes indoor endurance rides tolerable.

For the fall semester I sublet an apartment in DeMun. I could see Forest Park from my bedroom window. At the end of the semester/year, I turned 21. It was fun. We also had team camp that winter. The team's sponsorship changed to Mesa Cycles. The new kits were orange and black. The camp was a lot of fun with rock climbing included.

The second semester I worked for Monsanto as part of their Web Solutions department. It seemed like that dept. was a catch-all for creative projects that needed to get done. Overall, it was a great learning experience. I was given great challenges and opportunities in the form of Interchange '05, which was an international conference held at the Chase Park Plaza Hotel in St. Louis. Other times during the internship I felt I had to create challenges for myself.

In any case, the training was decent. The job afforded me a routine that I could count on. After a couple of weeks in Tucson at the turn of the year, I continued to train. I won the St. Charles Cycling Classic in early April. To be honest, there wasn't any real competition there. Luca, my teammate, was the probably the strongest rider there. It was a confidence booster either way. The next weekend at Hillsboro-Roubaix the team missed the breakaway, but I won the field sprint. As you can see, I was meaning to give Luca (left) a lead-out, but he had no need to come around me (center).

To be honest, there isn't much to report from this time. My personal life sucked, so I rode my bike. I guess it showed cause I could actually do things in the elite races. Work at Monsanto slowed down my training, but since I wasn't spending time on anything else, it wasn't that bad.