Cracked in the Descents

The Tour of Ardèche is probably one of my favorite stage races.  The volunteers and organizers are über enthousiastic and the race courses are absolutely breathtaking.  And absolutely hilly.  Which I like.  Half-like.  The long and gruelling uphill climbs are AWESOME.

After too many crashes this year and maybe a bit of mental blockage, and perhaps the heavy number 13 that I was wearing on my jersey, I was embarassingly nervous in the descents, getting shot out the back of the pack every time my HED wheels wanted to spin at breathtaking speeds around the sharp, steep corners of the Ardèchois descents.  The HED wheels wanted to but my head didn't agree.
I was most disappointed because as I fought to bridge the huge gaps I made, that were sometimes in the ''minutes'' and not even ''seconds'', I felt in such good form and fitness.  I would have rathered to have burnt those matches fighting the race up at the front.  Priority number one, get home and get my descending guts back, because they were there once, and I don't know onto which piece of asphalt they got smeared, but I'm getting them back.

I've been in this situation before for other reasons, and whenever I've had a goal that I've been this adament about reaching, I've done it. 

I'll be going downhill like nobody's business again.  Like Pierre Elliott Trudeau once said, ''...just watch me.''