Penultimate Month of Racing

After a solid block of training in Mallorca it was time to head to Sweden for a weekend of racing. The weekend consisted of a 1 hour crit on the Friday night, 190km UCI 1.2 road race on the Saturday and an open 130km race on the Sunday.
The crit was a square with 2 straights that were cobbled. It was fast from the start and didn't let up until the finish with some strong uci continental teams controlling it for a sprint. i managed to stay around 20th all race and tried to attacking with 5 laps to go but was soon brought back by colo quick. In the end finishing near the back of the front group in 22nd.
The following day was 11 lap course including the crit circuit, it covered 190km and was pan flat. The team managed to get Pierre in the break of the day. I was fighting to stay near the front most the race and then once the break was nearly back all the counter attacks started. I was following most of them for the team to make sure we had a guy in one if it was to stick but none did. After doing that my legs weren't good enough to make the front split in the final lap. This adds another get round to my tally but not the result I was after.
The following day was an open 130km sportive race thing which, Hiski and I rode full gas from the start. Mainly for a good days training. I managed to clock the 2nd fastest time of the day for it.
The weekend after saw me head to Astana, Kazakhstan to race in a post Tour De France Criterium. This was a race I was looking forward to doing and some massive names in cycling were racing. The biggest name being Chris Froome. Also we were staying in a Marriott hotel. It was some trip to be going on. The crit was on a flat square course. It was fast from the off with no breaks sticking. I tried 3 times during the race but the pace was that high it was so hard to keep it up once off the front. With 5 laps to go I managed to do a lap solo and get a bit of tv time as the race was live on Eurosport.
Then the next race was my Regional championship weekend. Not a great weekend real. In the crit I managed 3rd after being worked over by the local elite team. Then on the Sunday it was time to try defend my 2 time Regional championship title. I was marked out the race from the start with everyone following me or looking at me to pull riders back. Unfortunately the course wasn't hard enough to ride away from the others. It turned into a very frustrating race and one to forget.
With no racing until China I had 2 weeks of training to do. The first week had more volume then the second week was harder efforts leading into a the days before flight where I was taking it easier.