HPCX

After a week of sickness and long hours at work, I happily lined up in my fifth row start position for the HPCX, aka. Garden State worlds. Ok, I made that last part up but it might as well as have been since this was like the who's who of the Men's Cs in Jersey, only with folks from PA, DE, CT, and NY in attendance. The start had us racing up a deceptively difficult slope, first on pavement and then on grass. I'd say I was at my best for the first part of this race, tri-poding through corners and passing folks to move up into the top 10--nevermind I thought I was going to have a heart attack. I guess since some NYVelocity dude ran me into the tape on the far side of the course on the second lap only to fall right in front of me and then give me the stink eye (really?! how is this my fault, when I've come to a complete halt?), I can blame this and not the fact that I blew up not long afterwards trying to chase back. But really it was too late, I watched the front trio--some skinny guy in a blue skinsuit and two larger dudes who were appropriately aboard Giants--ride off. I'd see them occasionally for the rest of the race, but less frequently as time passed.

At the end of the race, I was just happy that it was over and as I stood recounting my 45 minutes of glory with my friend Shawn, the skinny guy in blue introduced himself as the Professor's brother. It was nice to meet and hang out with Oishikatta and his wife afterwards, although I wish I hadn't spent most of that time coughing uncontrollably.

Incidentally, Oishikatta won my race--his first win, ever (I think)--which I found strangely familiar and even comforting.

Word. Here are couple of photos from the interwebs: