It's not easy to race after driving 20 hrs! That's just how I want to preface this report. This was a Cat 2/3 combined race featuring many national caliber teams and even some international squads. It was a fast paced, 281 weighted average watts, 184 bpm, 50 min sufferfest through beautiful downtown Waukesha, Wisconsin. The course was phenomenal, featuring beautiful pavement, and a brief uphill, and then a blistering hairpin turn back onto the finishing stretch. I held my position in the middle of the pack the whole race, despite having to unclip and put my foot down behind a crash after about 15 min of racing. At the start/finish line on the bell lap I took a flyer from the group and went into the next three turns first but didn't get much of a gap. Heart rate for the last lap averaged 199 bpm, and after that acceleration I didn't have anything else left in the tank for the finishing sprint. I ended up mid pack, but still on my bike, which I will call a success.