Dunnigan Hills RR
 

Hey Racer Ex it's 3:30pm already. Where is your kick @$$ race report? We have been waiting 2.5 hours for it so far. lol. Ok, just giving you a hard time. We on BF are waiting to hear...


Anyone else do this? (Saw Racer Ex and Pizza Man)

All I can say about my race is !bleepity bleep! It went a lot faster from the gun than most of the women's RR's. 24-26 mph for the first couple of miles at least. I did better than I thought I would all things considered. Don't know where I placed, but I know I wasn't last. lol.

What did people think of the course?

What category/race where you in? I'm on a small team and atleast half were racing that today, so I am anxiously awaiting any details.

Since Ex has atleast a 3 hour drive to get home I'm guessing it will be a bit. :D

He is supposed to carry a Blackberry so he can give us immediate results on BF!!!!

Here's my report.

35+ 1/2/3 - 2 laps (86 miles).

Don't be fooled by the name, Dunnigan Hills is the flatest road race I've ever done. There were many riders who I had never seen before, the kind of guys who never go near a race with anything resembling an actual hill.

This was another of those wake up at 5AM, out the door by 5:30 races that my wife hates so much. Then, for some unknown reason, all of the starts were delayed nearly an hour (how many times did I hear "I could have slept an extra.......")

When we finally rolled out, as a joke, I attacked on the overpass about 0.1 miles after we rolled out and I got a gap. I pushed it for a little while and built up about a 1 minute advantage. I really didn't want to ride nearly 90 miles solo and was really hoping a small group would bridge up to me, but after about 8 miles I could see the whole pack was only about 30 seconds back, so I sat up and rejoined the pack.

As the race went on, I was reminded why I hate flat road races so much. I usually end up about 40-50 people back on a narrow road with riders all across the road and no room to pass, so if anyone attacks, I'm stuck back in traffic and can't do anything about it. It took a few miles of riding on the windy side of the road near the shoulder to move back up into the top 5 or so.

Me and several other riders started attacking, if not to get away then hopefully to shed a few of the hangers on before the inevitable sprint finish. Dropping guys is SOOOO much harder in a flat race!!!
I was never able to get away (why are people always chasing me down?), but after about 40 miles a few riders who had some teammates were able to launch a successful breakaway.

I wasn't interested in helping drag the peloton back to the break, but was instead trying to break away, either solo or with a small group and bridge up to it. Then in the middle of one of my attempts, we came up to a pothole. I went right, the guy on my wheel went left and clipped his teammate, the blogger king's front wheel sending him to the pavement at about 32mph. To make matters worse, someone about 20 riders back didn't see this and plowed into him at full speed. I heard that he may have a broken collerbone, but I sure hope it's not that bad. :(

I started coasting at this point to see if he would get up and back in the race, but he was still down and the other riders all started going by. We soft pedaled for about 1 mile, then guys started attacking again, so it was back on. Non stop attacks by about 5 or 6 of us didn't manage to break us free, but this (in addition to the crash) had our chase pack town to about 12 riders, and we were bringing back the breakaway. We caught the break with about 5 miles to go and after several sprint, sit, sprint, sit intervals everyone was content to soft pedal and wait for the last 500M - overpass to flat road finish.

I didn't get on a very good wheel as we started the sprint up the overpass (at least it was a bit of a hill) and over and I had to go around and try to move up on the outside of the pack to the finish. Since sprinting is not a real strength of mine, I was happy to finish 9th out of the 15 or so in the sprint.

It was fun, but exhausting and I don't think I'll be back next year.

Next weekend is the University Circuit Race in Santa Cruz with a 400 foot climb on every 3 mile lap. Now that's my kind of course!

^^^^ nice report. Good job bringing back the breakaway.

So when do we get to see a showdown between you and Racer Ex??

He beat me by about 15 seconds in the Esparto TT last week, but if he does Sant Cruz next week, the 35+ and 45+ race together, so we'd be in the same race.

And I'll be buying Pizza a beer after University no doubt (though I'm still waiting for my Esparto victory brew). Pizza= very slightly less power + very much less weight + 400' climbing per lap- several years = Offthebackistan + Ex.

Besides, I'll be micro managing my race within the race and not concerning myself with the youngsters.

This, in cycling race report circles, is known as excuse foreshadowing.

My Dunnigan:

45 Open.

In addition to our field there were TWO 45+ 4/5 fields of around 50 riders.

Cowards, one and all :(

Delayed. I could have slept in an extra hour, had I been able to sleep 12" from an air conditioning unit humming loudly and blowing cold air directly at my head...Motel 6. Argggg.

Pre race conversation with GWHBNAH: "You wanna go from the gun? It'll be fun!"

So at .3 miles into the race we were doing 35 MPH (Data for this race brought to you by SRM. SRM: The choice of Champions!)

Barring the little kickers, bounced between that and 28 MPH for the first 8 miles till we had things sorted out. 14 riders left.

Midway through the race a two man break got off without representation from my team, chasing was most lethargic, we had around 12 racers at this point as every hill had an attack. I countered a move, found myself by myself, put my head down and made bridge attempt for next 5 miles, trying to sit on 300w. I ended up at 303 NP. (Data for this race brought to you by SRM. SRM: The choice of Champions!)

Much chasing ensued so by time I was almost on the break, the pack was on me.

No successful attacks on the long flat leading the the finish overpass, but several attempts.

Come up on the overpass in great position, lift off the saddle and my legs locked up completely. Pedaled through the cramps, drafted, unleashed my mighty wooden legged sitting 809w (Data for this race brought to you by SRM. SRM: The choice of Champions!) sprint and came across in 5th, about 2-3 seconds behind GWHBNAH who won. He rode smart, me, not so much, and my body revolted due to lack of something...

Frustrating fun, all in all.

Here's the data, brought to you by SRM. SRM: The choice of Champions!

Dunningan Hills RR:
Duration: 1:44:32 (1:45:50)
Work: 1610 kJ
TSS: 167.5 (intensity factor 0.981)
Norm Power: 294
VI: 1.15
Distance: 41.615 mi
Min Max Avg
Power: 0 1059 257 watts
Heart rate: 120 234 158 bpm
Cadence: 29 129 96 rpm
Speed: 11.2 35.8 23.9 mph
Pace 1:41 5:22 2:31 min/mi
Crank Torque: 0 887 220 lb-in

nice report guys. I guess asking you if you like the srm better than the ergomo might be a stupid question :D

How about a recovery race at sky tavern on sunday.

edit:
Heart rate: 120 234 158 bpm
I think your heart might have blown up.

I'm guessing that was some electrical interference. More like 177/178. Not gracing Sky Tavern with a reply, other than I hope you and a rocky 20% are very happy together.

Nice reports, and nice choice of champions :D.

I had to tattoo SRM on my hiney and agree to mention SRM at least three times per paragraph to get them to agree to sell me an SRM: The choice of Champions.

Good stuff. Sort of sorry I missed it. But pancakes and coffee at 10 is a good replacement. Congrats for just making it out there.

Any Cat 4 race reports? Trying to figure out what I missed. I'll make it up with 86 miles on my own tomorrow.

See you all at University. Very much looking forward to it. Oh yeah, then there's San Ardo too ...

Nice reports (as usual).

1 hour delay? Terrible.

Racer Ex,

Nice report, good job, see you next week.


I had 4 teammates race in Cat 4. I actually got to see a lot of their race bacause our 35+ field went by them about halfway through the race, then they passed us back, then we passed them again. There were several break attempts that were caught, but I think that 3 guys did manage to get away and the rest of the pack came in together sprinting for 4th.