Bike Race Season 2016!

Although I had raced already this season, this was a special day as it was Gavin's first race day as a JM9-10 (Junior Men 9 - 10 year old's).  We were headed down to the Denver Federal Center for a Circuit Race.  It's a four mile loop that is repeated for a set amount of time.  My race was for 75 minutes while Gavin's was for 20 minutes.  Here are both of our bikes next to each other on the top of my car as we get prepped to head out.

Gavin doesn't ride for a team, though there are a few that seem to have members his age.  He rocked out his Colorado jersey and black biking shorts.  It turned out to be a bit chilly during the morning in his race so I actually put a pair of my black arm warmers on his legs and they seemed to fit just fine.  This is a pre-race picture all set to go.

As the course was pretty big, they actually lined up the JM 9-10 with the JM 11-12 groups all together.  As you can see, it was a fairly large group.  Here is Gavin on the starting line to the left listening to the official instructions about the course before they start them off.

One whole lap took the entire 20 minutes of the allotted race time for his category so we only got to see him come through one time.  This is right before the finish with Gavin in a bunch of three coming in hot.  He was actually closing in fast on the guy right before him and they went shoulder to shoulder a bit and the other kid lost control of his bike and crashed which also sent Gavin crashing through these white barriers just as they crossed the line.  It was actually fairly terrifying, though more so for Tara than for me.  We dropped the cameras and went sprinting to see how they were doing. 

Gavin actually threw up right as we got to him which made us fairly nervous about a head injury.  We held him right in place as people attended to both kids.  After the medics took a better look at Gavin and his helmet, we made the assessment that he likely threw up because of the effort in his first race rather than hitting his head.  There was no damage to his helmet and the barriers caught him on his arm and leg and mostly broke his fall but left some good bruises.  The other kid was fairly skinned up as he crashed more in the road.  After a while and some bandages and time to get collected, Gavin was all smiles and no worse for the wear.  (In fact, afterward, he said to Tara, "It's OK, Mommy, crashing is just part of racing."  Wonder where he's heard that before...)  A little scary, but I guess he got his first race and first crash out of the way all at the same time.  He says he had a great time (outside of the crash) and seems eager to race again, but we will likely take it slow and not push him into it.  I am so proud of him for at least trying to race and having the courage to line up and put it all on the line.  In the end, I think he got 4th out of 6, but the result wasn't really the focus.

Snow Fun

I love to see pictures of my boys getting along!!  It reminds me that it really happens sometimes :)

They do best when they have a common goal, so on this particular day, their mission was to make a snow wall/slide on the deck from Dad's grill to the ground.  And they succeeded!  Looks like they went right to work in their church clothes.

Gage in U8 Soccer

This turned out to be quite the unusual soccer day for us all.  As with most Saturday's during soccer season, we have a game for Gavin and a game for Gage.  However, Gage got to pull double duty here because most of Gavin's team didn't show up for the game for some reason.  Gage was all suited up in preparation for his game a bit later (as was one of his good friends, Gabe, that plays on his U-6 team), so we just decided to put them in with Gavin's team.  Gage and Gabe both are pretty solid players at their level and, although the kids were a bit bigger, they got right in there and fought for the ball just as they normally would.  The only questionable point was when Coach Gerrid decided to put Gage in goal, which I had to quickly overrule after a minute or two.  Six year olds are just too young to be able to effectively protect themselves from a shot that is coming in and it's a bit dangerous.  Gage had a great time, and I was so proud of him stepping up to help his brother!

After a bit, the rest of Gavin's team trickled in and Gage eventually went back to watching for the second half.  Above, you can see Gavin in goal as I think he had an infected toe for this game and could barely move.  He is probably better out in the field than he is in goal, but he tries real hard.  The funny part is that I think he likes to be in goal, but I think at this age it limits ball skill development too much to spend a considerable amount of time in that position.

Here's a picture of me next to the goal giving Gavin some coaching on goalie skills.  I can't quite tell if he takes in the instruction I am giving or doesn't want to hear it from me.  There is always a fine line to walk when coaching your own kids.  You want to be able to put on "Coach" hat but it's sometimes hard to separate that from the "Dad" hat at the same time.  I am thankful that I have been able to coach his teams for the past few years.