Criterium = Nascar for Bicycles

Shout out to Jeni - Are you watching breakfast at Wimbledon? We used to watch together when I was little (usually somewhere in there Martina would school someone in the game of tennis) Right now I'm watching Federer v Nadal in the 4th set. Good game. Federer is taking it at this point. This is a huge day sports day for sure! Wimbledon mens final, World Cup, and Tour de France. Which one is probably most watched by Americans?

Speaking of sports we jogged 5 miles yesterday! Sticking with it an having a good time. We ran in a popular trail for horse riding. As you can imagine there's a lot of fancy footwork needed to avoid the landmines. Our new goal is to race the Seattle Half-Marathon which is the week before Thanksgiving.

What is a criterium? Redmond's Derby Days was yesterday. Along with the usual food and carnival there are criterium races all day. Sounds mathematical to me somehow. Here's the def from wiki
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Criterium

Basically it is Nascar for cyclists. The course is a series of streets in town closed off usually less than a mile in total length. The racers go round and round for a set amount of time and crazy speeds. The last ten minutes are a number of laps based on the average lap time. In Redmond we watched the men's pro race last night. It was cool. There were maybe 100 guys on bikes zipping around in a big square block for 60 minutes. As I joked with Chris we only had to make about 20 seconds of chit chat before the racers came around again. To add excitement every couple laps the announcer would ring a cow bell and annouce over the microphone a prize for leading the upcoming lap. I wouldn't have guessed professional athletes would care but they really kicked it into high gear on those laps. Some of the prizes were a case of Gatorade, a box of powerbars, 20 dollars cash (that was a favorite).

We grabbed dinner at a place with outdoor seating on the corner of the race to eat and watch. There were women's pro and amateur racers dining next to us. We eavesdropped, not that it was too hard, and they were definitely in competition for who earned the most cash by the end of their respective race. I gathered that it is tough to win the whole race but doable to win a lap. Kept the lap averages up and the race interesting to watch.

We stayed at Derby Days after the men's pro race, last of the day, and watched an average Blues Brothers cover band and waited for the fireworks. Redmond opted to not have Fourth of July fireworks in favor of a Derby Day show. They were really cool. Definitely better colors these days and really cool effects. Do you know what I'm talking about? They are different I can't explain it. As Dad and I would say, "GCF! good, clean, fun."

With that, Federer wins Wimbledon! Not a big surprise. Next up... World Cup.