Four spring race weekends in a row, and more on the horizon after a 10-day break at home

If it hadn't been for the weather-related cancellation of the NICA race in Bridgeport in mid-February, it would have actually been five events in a row. What a way to start the 2026 officiating season! You already read about my trip to Puerto Rico, where I was assigned to a UCI race, so no more about that. Thanks to my $500 flight-voucher delay ex-Puerto Rico I had only a two-day turnaround before I had to leave Lubbock to drive to Longview in east Texas.

The weather gods had mercy on our third scheduled NICA race of the season at 29 Pines. (The season opener in Troy had also been cancelled while I was still in Tokyo.) It's a long, long drive to the piney forests, and both going and coming back I stayed with friends in the Dallas/Ft. Worth metroplex. Friday night I found shelter with Shawn, one of Judy's distant cousins (and so we playfully call each other "cousin" as well). It was a special treat to spend some time with his sister, Suzi, and their mom, Betty, who live just around the corner; we had seen each other last year when 29 Pines was a first-year venue for our league.

With Betty and Suzi (top) and Shawn and his GF, Andrea

The race course at 29 Pines is deceptively challenging, with wide-open park-like pastures and meadows that give way to punchy climbs among the pines in the second half. The race was open only to our North Conference athletes, with the southern division battling it out at the same time in Aggieland's Millican Reserve. Yep, we've grown so much that the majority of our races are now happening at two separate venues, on the same weekends, with separate crews.

Jessica, who this year works the North Conference call-ups

From left, JJ, Cole, Robert, and Carlos

Cole and his daughter Ezrie, former racer and now medical staff

Future State Champion

Before I knew it, the last wave of middle schoolers had departed and already returned to the finish line, and it was time to start driving back west. I spent Sunday night with my old buddy Keith on the northwest-side of Ft. Worth, thus being able to avoid Monday's insane metroplex traffic. It was great to catch up with Keith and his partner, Cindy, both of whom I had seen last in 2024 on the way back from Missouri. Damn, time flies. Thank you guys for your hospitality and friendship!

Texas played host to a rare USA Cycling National Championships the following weekend, in the form of Collegiate Gravel Nats. I had actively lobbied to get assigned to this inaugural championship, which was relatively small (about 125 collegiate riders) and had piggy-backed upon the much larger Valley of Tears gravel event in Turkey, Texas. This small Panhandle hamlet is about 110 miles north-east of Lubbock, close to Caprock Canyons State Park (you may remember the photos of the buffalo last fall when Sandy and I went out there to hike).

Thanks to the proximity of the event this one was a two-day affair, driving included. Sandy had been able to adjust her work schedule on fairly short notice, and together we left Lubbock on Saturday morning, arriving in Turkey by noon. I was the only assigned official for the USAC race, which was run under slightly different rules than the "outlaw" Valley of Tears. Vanessa, USAC's Technical & Events Manager, and Kyle, USAC's Director of National Events, were on hand to help with the event, but in all honesty, it was the organizer of VoT, Micah (himself a longtime former USAC employee), who did the brunt of the work.

So I did what one does in a situation like this: I looked busy, displayed my official aura, and acted as an ambassador for our governing body. In other words, I had a great time! Aside from playing with any heavy equipment she could find around town, Sandy enjoyed especially Saturday's dirt crit (with some heavy-hitting pro men and women lining up), a 20-minute affair in "downtown" Turkey, which is better known for its Bob Wills Day than bike racing. Valley of Tears offers a combined purse for the pro riders (equally distributed between men and women) of a whopping $45,000, so you can imagine what kind of quality field that attracts.

We spent the night in the historic Hotel Matador in the eponymous town, about 20 miles south of Turkey. The three ancient school-marmish sisters who had previously owned the inn had moved on (or passed away), and now the charming hotel is run by a Canadian/German couple who have elevated the experience of staying there. Highly recommended for a night away from the bustle of bigger cities!

While Saturday had been stinking hot, with a strong southwest wind, Sunday morning's temperature was barely reaching the mid-40s and the wind was howling from the north. Typical Texas spring weather! But everybody had a great time, nobody got blown off the bike, and by noon we congratulated the first American collegiate gravel champions. The Skyhawks from Fort Lewis College in Durango did the almost impossible by sweeping the top four spots of the podium in the men's race.

The college kids' race had been "only" 49 miles long, the medium distance for the Valley of Tears event. So, it took a while for the "long" course athletes—pros and amateurs alike— to finish their 93-mile race (there was also a short version of about 19 miles for those less ambitious), but nobody seemed to mind because there was free barbecue & beer for everyone in the spacious backyard of the Hotel Turkey. What a class event. By the time Sandy and I finally left for home I had talked to more than a dozen or so old friends whom I had not seen in ages, people with whom I used to race or who had lived in Lubbock. Really, to get paid to "work" such an event is almost embarrassing.

Enjoying the good life at our Airbnb after the long drive to Burnet

It was a good thing that Nats had been so close to home and we were able to return to our respective homes on Sunday night as the next race weekend came only four days later and started with our long drive to Burnet in the Hill Country. Sandy was looking forward to the Reveille Peak Round-up because her grandson, Zane, was going to race in the combined North/South event, and he was going to be accompanied by his parents as well as sister, Scarlet. We had rented a very nice Airbnb less than five miles from the venue, a comfortable, well-appointed double-wide right on Buchanan Lake. Sandy and I were the first ones to arrive as the San Marcos bunch had to first finish their work week. We had stopped at the HEB in Burnet to load up on groceries and booze for the weekend, and after getting settled at Blue Haven we enjoyed margarita juice and watched the resident Egyptian Geese.

Roy, Melanie, and Scarlet arrived before it got dark, and we ate pizzas out on the deck, with Sandy just beaming the entire time—she is the happiest when her family is within reach to hug and kiss! Zane had not joined them as he had a robotics competition with his high school team on Saturday; the competition went so well for them that he and a buddy couldn't leave San Antonio until late Saturday evening and finally arrived at the Airbnb close to midnight. Ah, to be young again and be able to get up the next morning and get ready for the race, without having had a chance to pre-ride the technical course. 

The RPR race set a new attendance record in our league's 15-year run. A total of 559 high- and middle-school athletes started in perfect conditions, and the lack of any reportable injuries was a Reveille Peak first. It all went smoothly, and it is always such a joy to see so many kids and parents and other supporters enjoy themselves. Our race crew is amazingly dialed, and we're all friends. We had some visitors from the relatively new Nebraska NICA league, and they were duly impressed.

An hour after the last racers had crossed the line, an expected cold front moved into the area with a huge drop in temperature and winds that produced wind gusts in excess of 40 mph. Texas weather! But by then, our family was happily in the Airbnb for a final meal, this time inside. Monday morning was cold, and bucking a headwind and well aware of the spiking gas prices thanks to this idiotic war with Iran we stayed below the speed limit, race #4 in our rearview mirror.

In the week since then I have finally started to ride again with some regularity, tough as it is after such a long period of being mostly off the bike. This past weekend, Wes and Susan joined Sandy and me for a nice home-cooked meal prepared on the recently repaired Kamado. (I found a local mortar wiz who was able to re-attach the propane burner assembly. Thank you, Nick!) The live oak tree is in its final phase of shedding this year's leaves, and I have started to putter around the backyard, which is coming out of its dormancy. 

Well, all this domestic activity won't last for very long since this weekend another North Conference race in Gainesville beckons, and after the Easter weekend the final two NICA races and a trip to New Orleans are on the calendar. But right now, I still have three days to ride and enjoy my own bed!

Jürgen

A UCI mountain bike race in Salinas, Puerto Rico, and an extra day (plus another two nights) in San Juan

Initially, the start of my bike racing season had been scheduled for the weekend after my return from my around-the-world trip. But horrendously crappy weather all across the state meant that the NICA North Conference season opener in Bridgeport (northwest of Dallas) was cancelled, as was the concurrent South Conference opener in Sugar Land (outside of Houston). To be quite honest, even though it was a real bummer that we couldn't race, I was not too distraught to get an extra few days of decompression time before flying out again.

And so I left Lubbock last week (exactly a week ago!) on Wednesday morning for DFW. After a relaxed couple of hours in one of the Admirals Clubs, I boarded the direct flight to San Juan to fulfill an assignment to a UCI event. I had paid ($225) for an upgrade to First for this almost five-hour long flight. The days of counting on the complimentary upgrades are over as AA has by now totally reneged on its promises and keeps selling upgrades until a few moments before departure instead of starting to fill these seats at the 100-hour mark with their loyal elite customers. (For today's flight back from Puerto Rico to Dallas they wanted first $1,040, then dropped that to somewhere around $600 and then back up to $840. Sorry, but that is more than what I am being paid for working the three-day long event, and I have a comfy exit row seat. Airlines are suffering a drop in loyalty behavior across the board, and it will be interesting to see whether anybody realizes that retaining a customer is much cheaper than trying to win a new one.)

I arrived late at night in SJU, around 11:20 pm. Thankfully, I had been able to get in touch with the race organizers with less than 24 hours before my arrival, and somebody came to pick me up and drive me the 75 minutes from the airport (north coast of Puerto Rico) to an Airbnb in Salinas, on the southern coast of the island. The competition of the Tropical MTB Challenge 2026 didn't start until Friday morning, but with all the recent extreme weather I had not wanted to leave my arrival to chance and thus had an extra day on the ground.

I always cast a watchful eye on Linda when she explores the 'hood

The Airbnb was a modern, clean place with a small pool; my colleague Linda (who arrived at noon on Thursday after an initial red-eye flight from her home in Portland to New York and then onward to San Juan) and I stayed in a spacious and airy upstairs apartment for the duration of the competition, while the race director, Hector, and his GF Yvette had a separate ground-floor apartment. Since Linda and I didn't have a car we had to rely for our transportation on the organizers who dispatched two volunteers, Axel and Vianca, to take us to a supermarket to buy some breakfast supplies (nothing in the immediate neighborhood) and shuttle us to and from the venue. It all worked out very well, and I can't praise the organizers and their helpers enough for everything they did for us.

Our best friends for the weekend: top photo, Axel with Linda and me;
Hector and Yvette at dinner with Linda y moi;
and at the bottom, Vianca with her husband and their son

As mentioned, the event was UCI sanctioned and featured both short-track (XCC) as well as cross-country (XCO) races. The chief commissaire was my old friend Leandro, with whom I had sat through and passed our initial UCI International Commissaire course 20 years ago in Switzerland. It's always good to see him, but it is sobering to think that I am 70 and he still is just 47! Leandro lives in south-eastern Argentina, and the last time we had run into each other was in Araxá, Brazil. Another old commissaire friend of mine was Betzaida, a Puerto Rican commissaire who had been on two of my crews in two mountain bike races and the San Juan 70.3 triathlon back in the days. It was so wonderful to see her and chat between fulfilling our respective duties. And then, as at almost every race, there were another half dozen faces whose names I don't remember but who come up to give me a handshake or a hug. It's pretty embarrassing.

What a treat to see both Betzaida as well as Leandro!

The setting of the Tropical MTB Challenge 2026 (one of two UCI-level events in PR within two weeks, the next one taking place this weekend in Rincon, a race that I have worked in the past) is the Albergue Olimpico, a large sports and recreational complex that features an Olympic-sized pool, an archery range, baseball diamonds, and a waterpark, apart from outstanding mountain bike trails. Every day, Axel or Vianca would pick us up at the Airbnb at the scheduled time and we'd be on-site for however long it took.

Every night, we'd pile into Hector's fancy Jeep Gladiator and head out for dinner, courtesy of the organization. Twice we were joined by the outgoing president of the Puerto Rican cycling federation, Roberto, a high-strung, fast-talking gregarious man who seemed to be holding court the entire weekend. The small port of Salinas has several seafood restaurants, right on the water, and that's where we had delicacies such as carrucho (conch), pulpo (octopus), and camarones (shrimp). Add to that various massive (and often, fried) appetizers and the late time of night for our dinners, and sleeping soundly became impossible. But dang, the food was so good.

Roberto and two of our volunteers

Yvette and I

Linda and Hector

Mofongo y churrasco

Tostones y pulpo

Something fried, like so much of the food ...

Monday morning came quickly, and Vianca showed up on time to take both Linda and me back to San Juan. I had planned all along to stay an extra night on the island as I had a soon-to-expire IHG-group hotel certificate to burn, and Linda on short notice changed her departure to Tuesday as well: Her nephew works for one of the big hotel chains and had offered to get her a preferential family rate, and it looked as if the weekend's nor'easter was going to throw a monkey wrench into her travel plans anyway, so why not extend the paid vacation?

Linda and I parted ways when Vianca dropped me off at the Hotel Wave Condado, just a few blocks away from the beach in this popular tourist area of San Juan. Since it was early in the morning and my room wasn't ready yet to be occupied, I went for a nice, long walk around the Condado lagoon and some of the adjacent beaches. The scenery was quite different from our bike race venue.

After check-in and the excitement of a Dumpster fire outside of the hotel (the Wave is currently undergoing renovations and something flammable led to this six-fire-extinguisher blaze outside of the lobby) I hailed an Uber for six bucks to go to Old San Juan. It's really something special to walk around Americas' oldest European-founded city, at now exactly 505 years, going back to 1521 and the Spaniards. Castillo San Felipe del Morro is currently undergoing some restorations, but it's impressive to see ramparts that have withstood centuries of attacks by cannon balls and hurricanes alike. What a history! No wonder it's one of the many UNESCO World Heritage Sites.

I didn't have any sightseeing agenda as it was late in the afternoon and I had visited before the beautiful and history-dripping peninsula that cradles the San Juan harbor. I simply walked around, enjoying the quiet afternoon with its beautiful colors, the fresh breeze, and the general Old World ambiance. My quest for microbrewery #641 came up short-handed when it turned out that I had arrived at La Taverna de Lupulo on the day when they were having their annual employee appreciation party. And so I walked across the street and listened to some salsa and enjoyed three 8.6 oz baby cans of Heineken for an even $5 while the bartender continued to groom his hair.

Dinner was in an outdoor restaurant that Linda had recommended, but by then the streets were already starting to get really quiet and I didn't feel like hanging out for too long. Another 10-minute Uber ride and I was back at my hotel, which had not burned down during my absence. Thirteen hours later it was time to check out, Uber to the airport, and get ready for my flight back home.

Walking up to the gate, after an unexpectedly pleasant hour in the Priority Pass Lounge (AA doesn't operate an Admirals Club in San Juan), I heard a PA announcement seeking volunteers for my flight to Dallas. I honed in on the check-in agent, asked for the details and guarantees (such as keeping my exit row seat in case that at the last minute they would not need me after all), and then went into a 30-minute holding pattern until it was official: I would have $500 in travel credits in hand, get a free room in the San Juan Airport Hotel, and even be given a $12 dinner voucher to tide me over to Wednesday's 8:00 am departure. 

As it turned out, the room somewhat resembled a decent prison cell, and the "patio" where I happy-houred with two Whiskey+Coco looked like a jail yard, but overall it was a small price to pay for $500 off a future flight. And let's not forget, I got to watch the tragicomedy known as State of the Union Address, featuring America's worst (or best?) comedian.

Today's flights worked beautifully, albeit not direct to DFW but with a detour via Miami, but I knew that beforehand. It almost looks as if my last flight to Lubbaville will be up front, without the extra $125 co-pay that they tried to extort earlier.  (Never mind what I wrote in the second or third paragraph, as that was before my voluntary bump.) With a bit of luck, in two hours I'll give Sandy a big hug and we'll head to la casa, for a couple of nights before the next race. Yippy!

Jürgen