mattm

Yeah - at any rate, good racing! Sucks about the mech issue but at least you know you're firing on all cylinders.

carpediemracing 

Shelled in the Bs, again. Probably 20 minutes into the race. Wow. Totally different from last season, where, on a whim, I did a Sunday P123 race and had no problems just hanging out in the field for 40 miles or whatever it was.

I did coach two fellow dropees on where to sit for shelter in a crosswind curved part of the course where the wind started on the left and finished on the right. One of them, a former teammate's son got shelled early, he was in the wind like mad but directly behind the wheel in front (so no concept of crosswinds). I was teaching him about the wind on that curved bit. He was positioning his bike behind and to the side of me, I was pointing where he needed to be. Then I heard, quietly, "Wow." Heh.

A teammate did a CL buy for me, a big box of Thomas the Engine track and accessories. He brought it to the race. Junior was absolutely ecstatic about it. I should have taken pictures, he was clutching a couple of the pieces like it was Christmas. Took my Pops for a short walk. So it was a good night, my race notwithstanding.

UmneyDurak

Bleh, got dislodged from a group with 9 to go during TNC today. I think my fitness is going backwards, and San Rafael is in couple of weeks. :|

mattm

SJBC crit, won the A's group. No real breakaway, but we just shed people every lap.

"Field" sprint (of maybe 10) at the end, jumped with 300m to go and held everyone off. Tailwind finish, felt like I was accelerating all the way to the line, which was nice.

Rode to it & back, 260 TSS for the day.

Wait you were there??

UmneyDurak

Yeah. I was a guy on red bike with front carbon wheel, and regular back one in SJBC jersey and regular black bibs. If that helps.

Wylde06

5th in last nights club A race. Almost got dropped a few times, got yelled at to not get dropped, but managed to claw back on. One guy attacked like 89 times. Got lucky and Mr. Attack All the Things slotted in front of me coming into the finish and I stuck to his wheel until he jumped and I couldn't stick to him any longer. Plenty of room between me and 6th.


Im happy with that..first A race this year where I haven't been dropped.


https://www.strava.com/activities/646872839/overview

rankin116

That's a solid showing Wylde, nice!

mike868y

First weekend of intelligentsia done and dusted.
Day 1: Beverly - strong (Bissel, Astellas, Bahati) p123 field on a very technical course. made a few mistakes, ended up on the wrong wheel, got popped and pulled. bummed, but I knew what i was getting myself into.
Day 2: Glen Ellyn - 2/3 field on another very technical course. legs felt good but i never felt good with the corners and spent the day tail gunning. about 60 starters, i rolled in 28th just about the last person to not get dropped. i've never worked that hard just to finish a crit before.
Day 3: Willow Springs - 2/3 field, 50 mile road race with a "hill." legs felt good, tried to stay new the front as much as possible making sure no moves got away. with 2-3 miles to go i put in a dig at the front as the pace was slowing up and my teammate (who's looking to get his 1) was in good position so i figured keeping the pace high would help keep it that way. wish i could have done a longer more significant pull, but whatever. filtered back after that, there was a crash, i avoided it, teammate got 3rd, overall a fun day.

after two days off it's back to racing today. they're calling the hill in this course the "leg breaker" and i'm really just hoping it's not worse than the TOPC crit.

mattm

Nice work! Almost getting dropped then not getting dropped is awesome.

tetonrider

yes--always worth having a spare, esp if you are a stage racer.

should be the first step with any new bike/frame purchase.

canuckbelle

Georgia Grand Prix, Stage 1: Road Atlanta circuit race. Women 123. 3rd.

It was super hot and there's a killer 16%+ hill every lap (and right after the start/finish). A solo break went, and the group didn't work together well. A second girl went after her, and they stayed away. I made a couple bridge attempts, but the pack wouldn't let me go. Honestly, I was surprised I stayed with what was left of the peleton (22 started). There were 9 of us left int he pack.

There was a nice downhill with a sweeping turn into the 1-2% finish straight. I descend well, so I went to the front, got a gap without having to pedal, then put on the gas to go from the front. Fortunately, I had the shadows to watch: one was behind me eventually dragging herself onto my wheel with 100m to go...and I put in a sprint, still watching the shadows (I left some in the tank to kick again if she started to come around). Nope. 3rd. Probably the happiest I've been for a 3rd place. Not my kinda course.

Today is a rolling crit.

hack

Well hell ... about as bad as you can start a stage race is what we did today.

Cascade Stage 1. 16 mile TT. 8 out and 8 back. Generally flat with some rollers. Head wind out tail back.

Our GC guy and super TT'er flatted less than 1 mile in. Our backup TT Jr blew up some how and got shelled. I did awful and had to deal with a dropped chain at least 6 times. Dialed the front dérailleur last night and I must have tweaked something too much. Threw down an effort 70 watts shy of threshold in the process. Laughably bad.

Our other few guys just did tempo to save legs. We put 5 of 6 in the bottom 10. Well, at least we'll have some freedom tomorrow.

mattm

Good luck tomorrow!

Like most every team in the Tour, just shoot for stage wins!

canuckbelle

Georgia Gran Prix, Stage 2: Gwinnett Arena Crit. Women 123. First!

We were delayed an hour because of a thunderstorm, which made the blacktop very slick. Pretty much every corner was treacherous. I sprinted from the line into the downhill to take the bottom corner first. Strung it out for a couple laps.

A strong solo break got away, but I chased her down (almost solo, but with some help from maybe one rider: and the break's team was trying to block as much as they could, but I always went straight past them).

Heading into the final lap, my plan was to be first through a little chicane, and sprint to the final corner (because from there it's only 60-70m to the line). Did that, and had a little gap across the line. Woo! 2nd in GC now. RR up for Stage 3 today.

Flatballer

Awesome win. Congrats.

globecanvas

Rockleigh - crash.

The whole drive down I was thinking "eh should I really be racing" and warming up with gsteinb I was thinking "eh should I really be racing" and signing in I was thinking "eh should I really be racing" but I lined up anyway.

Legs felt just fine but 15 minutes in, fast and lined out, the guy in front of me flatted his front tire going into turn 1 and wiped out, I plowed into him, gsteinb's teammate plowed into me. The front guy hit his temple pretty hard, walked away but didn't look good. gsteinb's teammate messed up his hand. I just got a bunch of road rash and ruined my brand new shoes.

I saw him wobble just before he slid out. I just keep wondering if my head was on totally straight could I have gotten around him on the inside.

I also kept thinking "I'm not even supposed to BE here today!"

Heathpack 

Lol, I guess sometimes you're supposed to listen to the voices in your head?

Sorry about your shoes- much better than wrecking your body though.

Now you can get some good rest, guilt free. No choice.

Feel better!

rubiksoval

Awesome! Way to execute the game plan.

That looks like a cool race. Shame it conflicts with our race in TN. Maybe next year!

mattm

Cascade Stage 1 - survived! Which was pretty much the plan.

The masters race was much more civilized, seemed slower (at least until the climb), and way less crashy (no crashes!) than the cat 2 races I've done here previously.

Met @andystI just as the race had started, while I was trying to catch my breath during the first few miles of the race that started on an incline. Damn elevation.. needless to say he did way better than I did today!

Anyway the winning move went in the first few miles (on the downhill), I thought about going with but knew the climb would do me in. So I just followed wheels, and worked on moving through the pack and occasionally skimming/going over the yellow line, and enjoyed the scenery.

Got dropped on the final climb, but at least lasted longer than I have previously, so that's something, I guess. Crit tomorrow!!

hack

Nice! Good luck tomorrow.

My day sucked nuts. After yesterday's collective tt team effort, we just wanted to race hard. After the opening 9 min climb and the looooong descent, we tried to launch some moves. Got a little gap with 10 guys and 3 of us in there. Field and others in the break weren't thrilled about the numbers and it fell apart.

A little while later we had another teammate get away and was ultimately joined by a couple others. They were able to keep it away until the final climb.

I got hit with some bad cramps at mile 70, got gapped off getting bottles from the feed, tried to chase back on, but legs locked up. Couldn't rotate pedals at all. Out the back immediately. Limped in the remaining 20 miles with legs in total agony. Had to dismount quite a few times, too. Totally wrecked.

I pretty much suck right now and may need a lil break here soon.

tetonrider

damn...sorry to hear.

i think if it was a question instead of a statement ("eh should i really be racing?") maybe the response would have been different! ;-)

hack

Also met @tetonrider tetonrider today ... Always nice to put faces to names.

tetonrider

nice seeing you today! you caught me at the end of my 4-minute warm-up. hope we get to talk some more this weekend.

i've never seen more dropped bottles in a field than i did during today's race. had two bounced bottles hit me in the shin. a loaded bottle hurts a bit!

fun racing today.

Ygduf

I raced. Painful.

grolby

Geez, I thought I just had bad legs at Tour of the Hilltowns today. But not just that - I set power records from 4 minutes 15 seconds all the way out to almost 28 minutes. I did over 4.7 w/kg up East Hawley road, STILL got dropped super hard, subsequently cracked, had breathing/core issues and dragged myself in way OTB. As in second to last. As in, 35 minutes behind the leader. As in, getting passed by scrub 50+ racers because I can barely do 150 watts on the final climb. But at least I have a couple ideas to deal with this long-term problem I have of physically shutting down in long hard races sometimes.

As for East Hawley, either 50% of the Cat 3s in New England have better power to weight than I do - which seems plausible I guess, the 3s are fast this year, but goddamn, really, 4.7 w/kg is back half? - or something on my bike is sucking up a lot of watts. If it is, as I suspect, my back hub, it could be it's been dragging me down all season. I did do this race on my cross bike - which was a whole additional bag of hurt - but I used my usual road wheels.

I don't know. There are a couple of things going on, here. This race was super-demoralizing... but while 4.7 w/kg is certainly not enough to win a climby 3 race, it seems weird that it would be total scrub watts. Maybe at this race it is, though. Honestly probably a big part of this is just not wanting to believe I suck that much after all the work I've done to get to the fitness I have. On the other hand, my teammate who made the first chase group and started the climb at the same spot I did told me what he did for 20 minutes on the climb, and I did the math... and it was 4.7 w/kg. To make the eventual 4th place group. Huh. I did have a slow leak in my front tire, as it turned out. So maybe that's the full explanation, along with the heavy bike. But I just don't know.

Sorry, this is rambling and confused. But, well, I'm rambling and confused right now.

ETA: Almost 5.9 w/kg for 5'! WT actual F!?