Climbing Out of the Devil's Den; And Then Around It!

We're half way through Joe Martin now and things are going decently well. Starting with the TT on Thursday, we had a pretty good team performance with Jonny and me landing in 5th and 7th respectively. We hoped for a little bit more, but we were still with in striking distance if we were able to steal some time bonuses or just attack the race and get a gap. So that meant we went into yesterday's stage with the goal of being on the offensive. The race was pretty full on all day. The big escape of the day had two of us in it, Chris and Ty, which was a good situation for us because Ty could likely win the stage if the group stayed away. The big problem though was that several guys who were decently placed in the gc had made it into the 20 man group. It created an interesting scenario for us because our ultimate goal is to win the gc, but we of course want to win stages too! We ultimately made a difficult decision to chase our own men, hoping to leave the group to finish just in front of the peloton and give Ty the chance to win the stage, but then have us finish close to them in order to stay in the gc hunt. In the end we kind of lost everything as Ty cramped up and didn't win the stage, meanwhile Jonny and I got caught out by a late crash and lost some time. We're still within striking distance though, and today's stage is harder than yesterday, so hopefully we can work together to try and put the pressure on, going for the overall. And of course if that doesn't work, hopefully Murphy can make it to the line with the group because he is definitely the fastest here. Lots to play for and take into consideration! Stay tuned for the wrap up.