And on the 5th day

I felt better than the 3rd...
The crit went off last night with most of the horsepower in attendance. The whole group stayed together for the first 5 minutes and then the attacks came. At one point, there were 7 or 8 up the road and the group (well, 6 or 7 of us) actually worked in unison to bring it back. It was a very hard chase, but the bunch came back together at about 25 minutes and the pace slowed for a few laps.
@ 35 minutes in, I caught the tailend of RW and Der Kaiser plotting and spread the information through the field. When Der Kaiser went, so did the entire group. No soup for you...!
A couple of laps later Charles rolled off the front and a few guys joined him. They stayed out for quite a while. The chase began and only a few decided to help out in the effort. I took several pulls and then sat in to recover for the finish. On the penultimate lap, a counter move of 4 rolled away, including RW, Derek, Doogie and Toby.
Everyone in the group sat in, looking at each other, so I just put the hammer to the mat and figured I'd pull it back together. After my 35+ mph chase down the backstretch, I caught the 4 and looked back for help...I was it!
Unfortunately, the huge effort, combined with my earlier work in chasing breaks, completely shot my wad. I crossed the finish line with one to go and sat up.
The finish came down to Charles, Derek and Toby with Charles winning...again. The remainder of the bunch was split all over creation.

Overall, I felt really good, both mentally and physically. Ending my 5 day block with a hard effort was perfect. I am, in fact, very tired this morning. No riding today or Thursday.

PT update: The noise I heard on Monday was indeed the wheel beginning to come apart. Shrews called yesterday and told me that I had several cracked eyelets on the Mavic rim. Super...

Over and out...