Blythewood Omnium

The Blythewood Omnium was a three stage Omnium just north of Columbia, South Carolina. The stages were a 4k prologue, a 60 minute crit, and a 36 mile circuit race. The prologue was a very fun course. It went downhill to a hard 90 degree left, down a long rolling straight to a 180 to a right, left, right, left, right sequence of turns to an uphill drag of about 500 meters to the line. It was very short so I went all out from the gun pushing hard the whole time. I didn't fly through the turns but I didn't take them easy either. By the time I got to the sequence of turns at the end I was very tired but pushed the whole way home. I was pretty satisfied with my effort and I should have been because I won. My Boyd Bow and Aero was super fast and I was super happy to win the first race I did with my teammates. My teammate Boyd Johnson got second, my teammate Thad Dulin was 4th, and my teammate Kyle Knott was ninth. We did very well.
Going into the crit we planned to get me into a break that I could win out of. The race started out very aggressive. After about ten minutes a break formed with Thomas Brown and Ben Zawacki (Mountain Khakis), an Aerocat rider, a Hincapie rider, and Noah Metzler and myself from Team Globalbike. The break worked very well for most of the race. With about 7 laps to go I started attacking my brains out to try to get away solo for the win. Noah was also attacking a lot, but then we started coming up on the field and lapped them. My teammates Boyd Johnson and Trey Miller were perfectly positioned at the back to bring Noah and me to the front. Then with 3 laps to go I decided to go straight at turn 1 and crashed. This is possibly one of the dumbest things I have ever done and I am sorry to anyone else I may have crashed. I got up and finished sixth. Noah got third. My team rode very awesome today and I am very sorry for what I did at the end of the race.
The next day was the circuit race that was 13 laps on a 5 k circuit with a 500 meter climb every lap. The race started off fast and aggressive. A break of ten went off early. Mountain Khakis had 3 riders in the break, Hincapie had 2 riders, and Kyle Knott from our team made the break. I tried to go with it but I just couldn't. With 6 or 7 laps to go Boyd, Trey, and Thad started bringing the break back. They got the break back with 3 or 4 laps to go but 1 Mountain Khakis and 1 Hincapie rider were still off the front. The last 3 times up the climb I felt great and was attacking over the top. The second time I attacked I got a gap with 1 Mountain Khakis and 1 Hincapie rider on my wheel. They wouldn't work because they had teammates off the front and the group reeled us in just before the last ascent of the climb. Mountain Khakis attacked at the bottom and I was right on them and I jetted by them. At the top I was at my limit and the pack was on my wheel. I decided my best bet was just roll the last 400 meter to the line as hard as I could and hold on. I got passed by riders and ended the race in ninth. Thomas Brown (Mountain Khakis) who won the crit the day before ended up beating me in the omnium by one point. I am really sorry to my teammates who slaughtered themselves for me that I did not win. They worked super hard for me and I wish I could have gotten a win for them. Thanks to them again for all the work they did for me. Next up is Dothan Cityfest in Alabama in two weeks. It is a very fun crit.