Hi all, well I decided to make a race report too, since most people have heard about the guys races I thought I'd fill you in with the womens racing especially for you girls I thought you  may be interested. I'm not sure if you're all familiar with the Columbia Plateau stage race it takes place in Heppner Oregon and it's a point to point race so everyday we ride to another town and sleep in the gyms there. There are alot of pro teams and BC riders.  

We went from Heppner to Ione, Ione to Fossil, Fossil to Heppner. Anyway after 18 hours of traveling on Thursday,  Friday morning was the first stage 88 km (55 miles).  

Stage 1: As the first race took off, the pace was pretty slow at first but the head wind was terrible, all the girls were really anxious handle bars and wheels were touching,  there were a few crashes as everyone was struggling to staying closer to the front. At about 10km I flated my rear tire and the follow vehicle was fairly quick at changing the wheel. I took off as fast and hard as I could to catch the pack , with a head wind I had no idea if I would catch them but l did after about 10 minutes. The race picked up a little and most people stayed together until the first feed zone, I thought it was neutral but I was wrong! The Subway girls attacked in the middle of the feed zone as some of us were getting water and I hung on as long as I could but they took off. The pack was split but as the race went on many of us rejoined. with about 30km to go I dropped my only water bottle left and I started to bonk so I just tried to hang on and I stay! ed at the very back. At the sprint finish I finished 5th in the pack 10th in total, 2 min from the leaders.  

Stage 2: The next morning was a 3km time trial up hill, and I was hurting so bad, but I came in 11th place which was good I held my spot and was only 6 seconds from 4th place.

Stage 3: Same day as the TT. was 101km to Fossil. I was actually feeling a little better than the first day, the pack was more relaxed. The first 12km was all uphill so we hurt right from the start. The attacked happened somewhere near the middle of the race and I held on for a bit to the top pack of 6 people but me and the Christine Fletcher (the 2004 winner) dropped off and were on our own between the lead pack and a huge pack behind us. So we could see the lead pack slowing and didn't know if we should attempt to catch, we thought we would need more people to reel them in so we let the other pack catch us ( stupid mistake) when they caught us only about 4 of us were willing to do any work and everyone else just sat on so we tried  a couple of breaks but they would just bridge and sit on. Our pace got fairly slow as nobody wanted the front and my bike started making really loud rattling and I think everone was nervous around me because it sounded! like it would fall apart so I was cautious for the rest of the race. So it came down to a sprint again which i don't like because the ones that sat on the back always have sprinting energy ! and I came in 10th overall again. 

Stage 4: The longest and most painful 140km of my life . We did 5800 feet of climbing, one climb was 20km it took almost an hour. This race was a fairly fast pace right from the start there was not much recovery because on the decents everyone was clinging on and nervous because we were all so close together. The pace stayed hard but there wasn't any real attempt to break away until after the last hot spot ( hot spot is like a prime in the crit there is a sign that says : points in 5km,  1km & 200m) I missed nearly every sign and so I didn't sprint for any, they gave points to the top 3. So the last one I saw and I was near the front so I went for it and I got it. As soon as that was over one of the Subway girls attacked .But I caught on and it seemed like attacks never stopped after that, but I was able to hang on every one. Those girls couldn't lose a few of us, so they'd slow and other packs kept catching up . On the 2nd feed zone they started sprinting and I caught someones wheel and crashed! But I got up so fast and just went and I hung on to one girls wheel as she dragged me back to the top pack. So we got on and they slowed and the other girls bridged again. And the attacks just kept on coming until the end! The last 10km  was pretty much all down hill and it was pouring out so it was slippery and hard to see but I stayed right at the front. The finish was on a hill, and I passed a lot of people on that last hill and I came in 4th.  

Anyway after about 350km of racing, I learnt more in this stage race than all the other races i've ever done combined.

Alex Wrubleski