6-20-09    THE DRIVE

The trip to the camp was pretty boring and my legs were screaming to ride. I hate having to sit down and not move for that long which was 3.5 hours. I drank a lot of water too and that made me have the need to pee a lot. I'm glad we got to ride with the team though because they definately kept me company while in the car. Vincent played some wicked awesome music from his i-pod too. Half the drive down here was spent talking about Vincents cool shaved legs and how they would walk around camp without vincents top half. We also shared our music of inspiration. We played music that gets us all pumped us before a race or big event. I played "I Won't Back Down" remade by Hello Kelly. I sing it in my head during a race and it really gets my blood going. That'st the trip down and Vincent's legs sure do look good!

6-22-09 DAY 1

I woke up at like 5:30 because the sun was shining right in  our window, but I went back asleep and the alarm went off at 7:00. I had to wake up my roommate. He is really cool. The breakfast was ok. It was like being at aschool again. I went and did nothing until our ride at 9:00. We went on a 3 hour ride and it was fun. The funnest part was climbing the 2 mile hill back up to our building. It was a very relaxed and laid back ride compared to my rides. When I got back I jolted for the showers and then I just chilled for a while, becasue I really want to be feeling good for tomorrows TT. I cleaned my bike before dinner because the Mechanic said it was pretty dirty, because he worked on my front deraileur. A clean bike is a happy bike. The dinner was nice, chicken and rice with a salad. After dinner we had a meetng that explained to us how important Core Strength is and like 15 different ways to train you core strength and we had to do each one. It was very fun and a relly good learning experience. I called my coach afterwards and asked if he could throw in some core strengthing in my workout schedule. We also got some jerseys that say USA on then that we have to wear during the TT tomorrow. After the meeting a lot of kids came and hung out in mu room and I had a lot of fun with the other kids. They are very funny guys. Our riding leader, David just informed me that a bat is loose in the building and to keep our doors shut so we dont get attacked. I'm super excited and nervous about the TT so I'm gonna go to sleep now so I don't ware my self out. It was a fun and successful first day of camp. P.S. Vinces legs were lookin good on the ride today.

6-23-09 DAY 2

Once again I was woken up by the sun at 5:30, but easily fell back asleep and didnt wake up until 7:00 when my alarm went off. We had a nice pancake breakfast with eggs to get us carbs for the TT. I got ready for the TT, pinnedmy number on my USA jersey we recieved and headed downstairs. We went for a one hour warm-up ride and then sat around for 30 minutes while everyone got weighed. By the time the TT started our legs were stiff. I was the 4th guy to go so I was lucky. My start felt good and fast but it started hurting after about a minute. It was all uphill so the course favored me and I took advantage fo it. i was cranking it for most of the time and only finished like 5 seconds behind the guy in front of me who was Alex the surfer dude. When I finished my legs were goo. They were so loose and wornout so I was satisfied with my TT performance. I'm not sure my time but Im very curious. I hope my power is in the top ten because I really want to impress coach Mark and the other leaders. I really want to exceed in my cycling career as soon as possible so I can get over to a training center and get super good and then go kick some Europe butt. Our dinner was nice today. We had spaghetti and meatballs with a brownie. Afterwards we watched Alex or as  we call him surfer dude, tarzan or Joe Dirt, rock out on the piano. I then just hung out with some friends until they posted our times from the TT. I was the 6th fastest time overall with a time of 4:32. The guy who won got 4:20 so I did pretty good. I was the only 15 year old near the front and everyone, except Matt Lipscomb were 17 or 18 who finished in front of me. We have a 3 hour ride in the morning so Im gonna hit the hay.

6-24-09 DAY 3

We had a really long ride today because we had to go to the long hill where we were having the TT tomorrow. It took us 1.5 hours to get there, and 1.5 hours back so we were gone for a long time. The climb for the TT started pretty steep but was reasonably steady and almost flat for a while too. It was 2.9 miles long which is a pretty long climb compared to the climbs in Louisville. Im very stoked for the TT tomorrow. I cant wait. We ate luch as soon as we got done changing so there wasnt the normal big line. We had sandwiches, again. I tried to take a nap but did not succeed very good. We went on another ride at 3:00 which was divided into 2 groups. The cat 2 and 3 riders went down the mountain to practice pacelines and the rest stayed on the mountain and did skills. The ride was a lot more better then it is with the big group becasue instead of doing 20 mph down the mountain we did 35 mph which was way better. We did some high speed pacelines and eshlon pacelines then David lead us out for a sprint. We had to climb back up the mountain which I averaged 5 mph because I stayed back with Matt Lipscomb and some other guys and we went super slow. Jordan Humble, the guy who said I pushed him in a tree was there too, but I think me and him are cool now. He got off and started running for a second then he asked the follow up car if we could stop and take a picture, but they didnt like that idea. I had a lot of fun. We cleaned up and went to dinner after that. Then I just chilled in my room until 10:00 when I went to sleep. I had trouble falling asleep but i got enough sleep.

6-25-09 DAY 4

The TT today was rough. It was almost 3 times longer then the first TT. I felt pretty good and was ready to go. I went hard the whole time and actually felt like I didnt leave anything ou tthere. I was the 4th off so that meant 3 guys in front of me, but I caught all 3 of then. I was pretty satisfied. I was curious all day to see how I did. Afterwards we had to ride all the way back which wasnt so much fun because we were all very worn out. The girl I was partnered with was super cool because she does a lot of mountain biking and I even raced her at chickasaw down in TN. I showered and ate lunch when I got back. We had PB&J and chicken salad sandwiches with chips. After lunch I hung out and then got ready for our afternoon skills. We rode to a parking lot where we did our skills. First I did some turning exercises, then leaning exercieses and then counter-stearing exercises. I learned that in a sharp turn at a high speed I need to push down with my outside foot and inside arm which will lean the bike but help it stay gripped to the ground. I really liked the new turning techniques we learned. After the turning skills we learned that sprinting in a straight line is faster and safer then a swurving sprint. The pro's swurve because they are tired from racing all day and dont care. so we practiced sprinting through a narrow area blocked in by tennis balls that were cut in half. I didnt hit any of the tennis balls the whole time. After that we started to ride back home, but we stopped by the local university to eat some ice cream. The university wanted us to stop and vist so they could tell us about their biking program and camps. I had a ice cream with cookies and cream, sprinkles and a whole lot of carmel. It was really good. When we got back I hung out and watched a movie with Matt Lipscomb then hung out with some othert kids until the presentation. The presentation talked about racing in Europe and they then asnwered all the questions we wrote down, but didnt answer any of mine. Well good night.

6-26-09 THE LAST DAY

I went on a easy ride with one of the older coaches who has been to the town a lot. He showed us some cool places like a huge church that was super cool and a big cross on top of the mountain that you could see for miles away. I would have gone on the hard ride but I wanted to save my legs for Hyde Park Blast tomorrow. That was smart of me. We almost had a wreck on the way back because a kid tried to sprint but his foot unclipped but he caught himself really quick which was lucky for me because I was right next to him. I took my last shower and got all my stuff out of my room and into the lobby while  we watied for Vinces mom. I ate lunch and watched all the other kids leave, but it turned out that Vinces mom had to get a rental truck because she had engine problems on the way down. This was  actually kind of a good thing becasue we helped the head coach clean up and pack up his car. After we got done loading we got to talk to him while we waited.  I asked Coach Mark the 3 questions on my paper. Does farting at the start line prevent cramps? He said he is a big fan of getting out all that extra stuff so yes. Why are Europeans better at mountain biking and cyclo-cross? They have been doing it longer. Whats a good way to train for cobbles? Ride on a dirt or gravel road. We talked about camp and the other camps. I asked him some questions about the National Team and the Belgium trip that Matt Lipscomb was attending. Im very glad she was late becasue I think Coach Mark will definately remember me now. This camp was totally awesome and I hope I come again next year. The biggest thing I learned was that you have to be very dedicated because less then 1% of 1% actually go pro. I think I am one of those 1% out of 1% because I am very dedicated and really do want to go pro with cycling.

-Drew Dillman