NOW and Novartis for MS will be racing BC Superweek from July 4 - 15, in the Lower Mainland of British Columbia, Canada.  BC Superweek consists of several independent races: some several stages, some one day events.

It promises to be a week and a half of hard, aggressive, fun, and exciting racing.  Professional teams from all over North America are coming to show their colours, and I'm especially excited to be there with my team: NOW and Novartis for MS.

Check out www.BCsuperweek.com, and follow #BCSupereweek on Twitter!

Canadian National Road Cycling Championships 2013

 BRONZE AND SILVER at the Canadian National Road Cycling Championships

Lex Albrecht: Canadian National Road Cycling Championships 2013. Photo © Pasquale Stalteri / All rights reserved

The Canadian National Road Cycling Championships were held in St. Georges, Québec from June 20 - 23 2013.  I race for NOW and Novartis for MS, an American team.  Since I'm the only Canuck, I was on my own, which is an exceptional situation.  No teammates, no staff.  A lot of extra work, but a welcome challenge.

Lex Albrecht, Canadian National Road Cycling Championships.  Time trial.  Photo © CanadianCyclist.com / All rights reserved

The first event was a 28km time trial (TT).  I went at the rolling course on my Specialized S-Works Shiv TT bike like I meant it.  I put in a solid effort.  I had installed a special chainring to help me go faster on the downhills but the plan backfired a tiny bit.  The chain wouldn't stay on the ring near the end of the race.  Lesson: never deviate from SRAM components.  Regardless, I'm proud of my 7th place finish, and am even more motivated to keep working on my TT.

Photo: D. Gagnon

The next day was a 110km road race around St. Georges.  To recover in time, I used my Travel Roller .  I bring that Travel Roller with me, EVERYWHERE.

On the road course, there were some really rough sections on the road (deep crevasses, huge potholes, sharp, rocky gravel), some good climbs, and rolling hills. 

I played it safe for the first part of the race, saving my energy for the end.  At one point I let my guard down and let myself get shuffled too far back in the pack.  As the riders hammered up a hill in front of me I decided I needed to step my game up.

I counter attacked another rider's effort, hoping to get away from the pack who was already tired of chasing the previous attack.  I wanted somebody to follow me or bridge up to me, so we could work together and stay away.  But, I saw that I was floating off the front solo a little too long and let up on my pace.  As the gap shrunk, one rider bridged up as a precaution before we were "absorbed" back into the pack.  I was a part of a small group that would finally break off the front on a difficult part of the course, leaving the rest of the pack chasing.

BRONZE MEDAL
In the final kilometers, we were a select group of only 5 or 6 riders being chased down.  I took the 2nd last corner with just a bit too much precaution and had to make up for it in the final few hundred meters.  I sprinted up the last pitch to a 3rd place finish.  Especially after crashing out of Nationals in 2012 with a nasty concussion, it was good to be back on the podium.

2013 Canadian Road Cycling Championships podium. Proud to wear my Nuheat pin! Photo: B. Poredos

A quick interview with Pedal Mag after the podium ceremony.  Photo: B. Poredos

Canadian National Criterium Championship race was two days later.  I still "Travel-Rolled" and rode my bike on the day off to make sure my legs didn't seize up.  I did some mechanics on my bike, and mixed and matched some cassettes on my Rolf wheels to find the perfect combination of gears.  I needed something fast enough to launch fast attacks and to be in contention for the final sprint, and something easy enough to fly up the steep uphill pitch that we would climb 24 times during the race.

Greasy hands, again.  It's important to have an idea of how to take care of your own bike!

The crit was fun, and hard, but that's the way I wanted it.  I raced one of my most aggressive races of the season, throwing attacks at the peloton and trying to make a break stay.  The peloton dwindled down considerably by the end but no breakaway succeeded.  

Lex Albrecht, Canadian National Road Cycling Championships. Criterium.  Photo © CanadianCyclist.com / All rights reserved

SILVER MEDAL
With less than one lap to go, I put in a hard effort at the top of the climb that seemed to tire a lot of riders out.  I drilled it.  Leah Kirchman of Optum chased and caught up through the final corner that she took fast and hard, and shot past me.  I pounded the pedals until the finish line, not even daring to look behind me.  That earned a silver medal in the end.

Lex Albrecht, Canadian National Road Cycling Championships. Criterium podium.  Photo © CanadianCyclist.com / All rights reserved

It is great to bring home the hardware and represent NOW and Novartis for MS in "my" country.  I want to thank my team, NOW and Novartis for MS, all of our sponsors, as well as my partners for their support.

www.nuheat.com

I love riding and racing regardless of results, but I definitely know that training hard at PowerWatts Premier studio in Montréal, Québec is really paying off.  (If you want to learn more about PowerWatts, click HERE to follow them on Facebook)

Tour of the Gila 2013

Tour of the Gila: 5 day stage race at altitude in the New Mexico Desert.  It's windy, it's dry, and there's a heck of a lot less oxygen up there than what most riders are used to. 

The thin air makes it a lot harder to recover from every effort.  It also makes it quasi-impossible go hard enough to make my legs hurt.  My breathing goes into the red-zone before it can happen.  As if my body cannot get enough oxygen to the pistons to let them go hard enough to BURN.

I spent a total of a few hours in the K2 Altitude Room at Power Watts several days before leaving Montréal to race Joe Martin (a race at NORMAL altitude!) and Gila. 

Lex Albrecht in the K2 Altitude Room at PowerWatts Premier Stuido in Montréal.

The first day was relatively flat and downhill, until the final 10km where the road shot up.  And up, and up.  The finish line sits at just under 8000ft.  At the bottom of the hill Mara Abbott (Exergy 2016) attacked, and Claudia Haussler (Tibco) followed, only to "blow up" a few minutes later.  In the end, Katie Donovan, the star climber of our team, finished just barely behind 2nd place on the 1st stage of Gila.  Alison Powers finished in 4th.  I was 12th out of the 62 riders that day.

Stage 1 Podium: Katie Donovan in 3rd place.

1	Mara Abbott (Exergy TWENTY16)	3:19:48
2	Kristin McGrath (Exergy TWENTY16)	0:01:58
3	Kathryn Donovan (NOW and Novartis for MS)
4	Alison Powers (NOW and Novartis for MS)	0:02:10
5	Andrea Dvorak (Exergy TWENTY16)	0:02:28
6	Claudia Häusler (Team TIBCO)
7	Anne Perry (DNA Cycling p/b Plan7)	0:03:01
8	Joelle Numainville (Optum p/b Kelly Benefit Strategies)	0:03:20
9	Jade Wilcoxson (Optum p/b Kelly Benefit Strategies)	0:03:32
10	Scotti Wilborne (Leborne Development)	0:03:34
11	Joanne Kiesanowski (Team TIBCO)	0:04:20
12	Lex Albrecht (NOW and Novartis for MS)	0:04:24
13	Janel Holcomb (Optum p/b Kelly Benefit Strategies)	0:04:55
14	Rushlee Buchanan (Team TIBCO)	0:05:04
15	Amy Charity (Vanderkitten)	0:05:16

Stage 2 ("Inner Loop") began early in the morning at Fort Bayard.  The peloton split and regrouped several times.  In the end, Katie Donovan, Robin Farina and I were with Alison in the final group.  Robin Farina get into a non-general-classificaiton-threatening break just before the finish.  She just missed the podium, but that was okay.  Our priority was to either gain time on Mara Abbott for Alison Powers, or not lose any.  We didn't lose any, as Mara was in the same group as Katie, Alison and I.  We wouldn't have let her off the front.  Mission kind of accoplished.  (Janel Holcomb of Optum got away early and stayed away SOLO in the end, to win the race.  An impressive ride by Janel!  She blew the field away).

This is the result breakdown:
   (Solo Break: 1)
   (Small Break before the finish: 2-5)
   (Lead group: 6-19)
   (Other riders: 20-61)

1 Janel Holcomb (Optum p/b Kelly Benefit Strategies) 3:29:00 2 Shelley Olds (Team TIBCO) 0:00:48 3 Jade Wilcoxson (Optum p/b Kelly Benefit Strategies) 0:00:49 4 Robin Farina (NOW and Novartis for MS) 0:00:56 5 Joanne Kiesanowski (Team TIBCO) 0:00:59 6 Lauren Hall (Optum p/b Kelly Benefit Strategies) 0:01:27 7 Claudia Häusler (Team TIBCO) 8 Alison Powers (NOW and Novartis for MS) 9 Chantal Blaak (Team TIBCO) 0:01:32 10 Scotti Wilborne (Leborne Development) 11 Rushlee Buchanan (Team TIBCO) 12 Kathryn Donovan (NOW and Novartis for MS) 13 Mara Abbott (Exergy TWENTY16) 14 Amy Charity (Vanderkitten) 15 Andrea Dvorak (Exergy TWENTY16) 16 Lex Albrecht (NOW and Novartis for MS)
The 26km Time Trial was on the 3rd Day.  It was cold and windy.  So cold I wore long fingered gloves and arm warmers.  (I have yet to receive my long sleeved skinsuit. For the moment I wear a borrowed one from my teammate Beth Newell).  I decided to go with a less aero-dynmaic front wheel at the last minute, in hopes that I would have a greater chance of not getting blown off my bike by a huge gust of wind.  In hindsight, I'm not sure if it was necessary. Warming up for the TT on our S-Works Amiras.  We raced on our S-Works SHIVs. I was baffled to find out that only 4 other riders had beaten my time by the end.  Race winner: ALISON POWERS, my teammate!  She gained time over the leader, Mara Abbott.  The race organizers had watermelon for the riders at the end of the race.
Alexis Ryan getting watermelon for her teammates after the Time Trial Delish!  Thanks Alexis, and thanks to the Tour of the Gila race organizers and volunteers
1 Alison Powers (NOW and Novartis for MS) 0:39:23.41 2 Janel Holcomb (Optum p/b Kelly Benefit Strategies) 0:00:10.92 3 Kristin McGrath (Exergy TWENTY16) 0:00:51.05 4 Mara Abbott (Exergy TWENTY16) 0:00:56.01 5 Lex Albrecht (NOW and Novartis for MS) 0:01:07.25 6 Shelley Olds (Team TIBCO) 0:01:24.70 7 Claudia Häusler (Team TIBCO) 0:01:31.09 8 Rushlee Buchanan (Team TIBCO) 0:01:35.69 9 Jade Wilcoxson (Optum p/b Kelly Benefit Strategies) 0:01:44.37 10 Andrea Dvorak (Exergy TWENTY16) 0:01:59.16
The criterium in downtown Silver City was fun, and NOW and Novartis for MS raced a very agressive race.  We had coffee on the same day to celebrate our teammate's birthday (Olivia Dillon) The final day finished with a long climb, and Mara Abbott (Exergy) won all over again.  Katie Donovan and Alison Powers fought the entire climb to bring her back and did a great job.  Alison finished 2nd overall in the 2013 Tour of the Gila thanks to some REALLY spectacular riding and great teamwork from NOW and Novartis for MS. Alison Powers (NOW and Novartis for MS) 2nd place overall at the 2013 Tour of the Gila (Mara Abbott- Exergy 2016 in 1st, and Janel Holcomb - Optum in 3rd)  FINAL TOP 10 GENERAL CLASSIFICATION: 1 Mara Abbott (Exergy TWENTY16) 11:44:29 2 Alison Powers (NOW and Novartis for MS) 0:01:32 3 Janel Holcomb (Optum p/b Kelly Benefit Strategies) 0:02:42 4 Claudia Häusler (Team TIBCO) 0:03:03 5 Kristin McGrath (Exergy TWENTY16) 0:04:34 6 Andrea Dvorak (Exergy TWENTY16) 0:06:38 7 Jade Wilcoxson (Optum p/b Kelly Benefit Strategies) 0:08:01 8 Rushlee Buchanan (Team TIBCO) 0:08:27 9 Lex Albrecht (NOW and Novartis for MS) 0:09:06 10 Kathryn Donovan (NOW and Novartis for MS) My next race: Gatineau Grand Prix in Gatineau, Québec.  I'll be racing with the Canadian National Team for this one!

Lance Armstrong: Lance Isn't CYCLING.

Read Gene Pereira's article in the Feb. 22 2013 edition of the Barrie Examiner (online HERE ) to find out what Lex Albrecht has to say about the whole Armstrong affair.