From Aaron's

Not every race day is going to be a good race day - luck has to be on your side too, and unfortunately for us it was not on our side during the Tour of California Women’s Crit. All seemed to be going just fine during the first half of the high speed race - tons of spectators had lined the streets ringing their cowbells with obnoxious excitement, the racers were navigating the hundreds of inconveniently placed bots dots with relative ease, and we were all warmed up despite the chill in the air - until we heard that Anna was in the pits needing a front wheel change. A bit dazed and confused, Anna was seen running through the expo area (above photo) desperately trying to find the closest pit. A bike change was in order since the explosion of her front wheel caused damage to the brake bolt. A frantic lap later Anna returned to the peloton as we came flying through the start/finish line and comfortably got herself back into the race. Then misfortunate struck again - her brakes were rubbing. Anna rolled into the pit to fix the problem, but was told that there were no more “free” laps and therefore was not allowed back into the race. Damn. There was a bit of confusion among the 3 of us left while we tried to figure out whether Anna was back in the race or not, but eventually all attention turned to Erica who became our main priority for a top finish. Despite everyone’s best efforts in the final laps, the finish came and went without any of us making it onto the podium. At the end of the day, we have to remind ourselves that bike racing is bike racing and we aren’t going to win them all. You win some, you lose some but you learn something from every one. Now, we’ll take what we learned this weekend with us into our next race to keep building the team’s strengths.