Amanda Miller

Blue Mounds Road Race

Thursday was the Tour of America’s Dairyland Blue Mounds Road Race. The course is the 2016 purposed Olympic road course. It’s a pretty challenging course. Here’s the profile.

The first part of the race was neutral down “Blue Mounds” hill. After that it was relatively flat with some quick rollers and a few long descents. The climbing didn’t really start until about mile 8 as you can see from the profile. After that, it flattened out some more. It wasn’t until the feed zone hill was pretty brutal. Not sure how long it was, but it seemed to go on forever. It started out steep and then backed off. The women’s pro/1/2/3 did two 22 mile laps. The end of the race finished going back up “Blue Mounds” hill. It was a 1km climb with a pretty steep gradient. It leveled off at the finish for the last 200meters.

Our race was off at 9:15am. There were about 25 girls starting the race. I had one teammate – Kate Ross in the race. Team BH, Vanderkitten, Verducci-Breakaway, and Kenda Tire had multiple girls in the field as well. The first part of the race was pretty tame. A few girls threw down some attacks. We were trying to split the field up some. It definitely would have helped to pre-ride the course so we knew what was coming. The first climb came. I set tempo up it trying to split things up. We reached the top and there were 8 other girls left. After some slight hesitation, we all go organized and started rolling turns. Once to the feed zone hill, I set tempo up it again, hoping to shed a few of the riders. I got to the top and looked back to see Devon Haskell of Team BH on my wheel. We put the pressure on and created a gap. We stayed away for most of the 2nd lap, but got caught again before the last time up the feed zone hill. When the chase group caught us, we all sat up and spun out a bit. Things split up again on the last time up the feed zone hill. There were 4 of us together at the top. We reached the bottom of the climb together. Devon set pace up the first part of the climb. We dropped the other two riders mid-way through. At about the 200meter sign, I attacked and held off for the win. Tour of America’s Dairyland is a “stage race”. There is an overall leader’s jersey and the whole works. Here’s some pictures from the day.

Podium shot. I got to chug some of the best chocolate milk I’ve ever had!

Way too many jerseys on for as hot of a day it was. And jeans….what!?

The course was awesome. One of the best I’ve done in the midwest. The women’s race could have been a bit longer though. The men pro/1/2 did 88miles, and we did 44miles. 66miles seemed like a happy medium. Otherwise, it was a great race and I had a blast. The weather added to the grueling factor of this race. It was 110% humidity. I am not used to such thick air. On the first lap, I was seriously concerned about how it was going to affect my race. Definitely wasn’t getting enough oxygen and didn’t feel like I could push myself as hard as I wanted to. Once I found the rythym, things got easier.

Anyway, that’s all for now. More updates to come!
-A