carpediemracing 

Got lapped a thousand times in the Tues Night race.

tetonrider

little late on this report from hood about 10 days ago, but better late than never. haven't had too much worth reporting here despite solid training and a bunch of travel. "personal bests" feel good but on race day what really only matters are speed and results.

2 years ago i was dropped on the 1st day of the 1st climb at hood, never to see the pack again. it was my 3rd or 4th race (photos of this stage race are what inspired me to take up bike racing), and in hindsight the fact that i thought i had a chance to win is funny. there's something for bravado, but boy did i have no idea how overmatched i was.

fast forward exactly 2 more years. i'm no pro, but i have worked very hard on dialing in my equipment, tactics and training, to wring what i've got from my meager sponge.

on the 1st stage RR, i thought i might have a chance to win based on a 2nd place finish last year, but a rider put in an amazing ride--solo breakaway from literally the first pedal stroke. i made a judgment call not to go as i thought the chances for success were minimal and a ride like that surely would have destroyed me for the weekend. any bike racer has to be stoked for a ride like that.



stage 2 was the scenic gorge TT--a brutal 19-mile course with climbing and, typically, wind--lots of it. last year i was blown clear across the center line at least twice with 39mph gusts. it was the only time i've been freaked out on the TT bike so much that i rode the horns for a while. for the past year i have ridden the same TT position and have made damn sure that i can handle my bike well in the windiest conditions. that day dawned with 4-8mph winds. that almost never happens in hood river. wow. rode the best i could and didn't need to look at power or my time to know that i left nothing on the course. cruised to the place where i was staying afterwards. the race results were being reported live, and when i got out of the shower my buddy called out to me that i had the best time of the day. i couldn't believe it and celebrated for a minute. then i asked him how the rider from stage 1 did. was his solo move a fluke or a sign that he was just a beast?

well....it seems the live timing site stopped reporting results after mine, so the theoretically faster riders' times had not come in. took about an hour of waiting and feeling like an idiot before the result was confirmed: yellow jersey! i was absolutely stoked.

how many times can you say you passed your 17-minute man in a TT?


I'd trade it all for a functional pedal...

stage 3 crit: hood's crit is technical. i don't get to ride many crits, but i've evolved from someone who was scared of them (this was my first ever crit 2 years ago; i was terrified and got pulled) to thinking i had a shot to win (3rd place last year). well, something happened between the conclusion of my warm-up and the start of the crit. when the gun went off i couldn't clip in. actually, i was able to clip in but not stay in. i assumed it was operator error or something wrong with a cleat. had to pedal with one leg and deal with the other periodically coming out. i considered stopping at the mechanics' tent but was worried that this just might be a cleat/maintenance issue and that i could lose time if the decision was unfavorable, so i just stuck with the pack. when it came time to sprint i stood up (why?) and of course popped out. held it together to cross the line in the pack. bummer. really wanted a win in this one.

immediately after i discovered that the blade on my keo blades was cracked clear through. they've never taken a pedal strike. maybe there was a hairline crack that finally gave up the ghost before the crit--it's now something i'll check during pre-race maintenance.


Major respect for my competitors.

stage 4 is the queen stage -- 72 miles, 8200' of climbing. you descend, climb for ~1h, descend, climb for ~45', then descend and climb for 40' to the finish. it was cool with rain on the horizon. i was inspired by the conditions.

it may sound silly but i did not have a single thought about 'defending the jersey'. i felt a race leader needs to win a stage on the road, and this would be a great feather in the cap. when a 2-man break (including the 2nd highest placed rider, just 14" behind me and a really nice guy) formed immediately on the 2nd climb, i was caught out. i hesitated thinking someone else might close the gap. of course not: all eyes were on me. i tried a bunch of times and failed to bridge, solo; i retreated for a few minutes. the pack would not let me go but would not do the requisite work on their own. no surprises there.

something snapped in me. i just didn't care any more and decided to make it a race. whenever i've stepped up to the table in the past i might have said i was all-in but i secretly had a twenty in my pocket. not today. i went to the front and did the damage i could. i knew better than to look back or ask for help: i might see what i've seen in past races when ones thinksthey are causing havoc but really just have smiling riders sitting on their wheel. i railed the descent and got right back to the business of attacking the 2nd big climb. when the road backed off, i shifted down. i knew that riders would see the slight plateaus on this stair-stepped climb and think something to the effect of "ah...if i can just do 20 more pedal strokes i can ease up for a moment." hell, my legs wanted me to ease up on those plateaus. wrong. click click clunk--i'm going to hit it harder. when a rider came up alongside me, swinging his bike out while out of the saddle i would match the pace then lift it just as he would slump back into his saddle. i imagined that would have to hurt.

when i caught the 2-man break on the 2nd climb, instead of easing up, i kept going. it wasn't until we neared the top of that 2nd climb that i dared to turn around. i knew i'd been working hard and trying to drop myself...but what would i see?

it was a pretty huge lift to see just 5 riders or so left. i have no idea where the others fell off, but i knew i'd ridden 90% of the field off my wheel. one of the remaining riders was just 14" behind me in the GC.

the rest of the race was pretty uneventful. we cruised up the final climb. i still had the thought that i could win the stage, but some cramping set in during the last 5k. i managed them but could not match the attacks in the final few hundred meters. it wasn't until that last 1km that i ever had the thought to 'defend the jersey', and my hard pace was enough to limit the damage. i was gapped by 6" in about 200m and lost 2" to 2nd place. i'd kept the jersey but was passed by the 4 riders who were with me.

the perfect ride would have had me crossing that line first in the yellow jersey, but i cant complain. i took myself to new depths. i'd earned some respect from fellow riders (many talented riders in this field). and i guess in some ways it was a good thing that i truly had nothing for a sprint--i'd given it all earlier in the race.

so sad that this was the final edition of hood. it's a race that has difficult moments for everyone, but also amazing moments. it's impossible not to smile when the columbia river gorge first comes into view about 25' into the time trial--just as you are suffering badly. the race is both cruel and heartbreaking. i'll miss it.

i won't lie: i soaked up my time in the yellow jersey. who knows it if will ever happen again. i'll be working even harder than i have before, but you just never know.

thanks for reading!

chasm54

Epic, tetonrider. Terrific stuff.

thechemist

Fantastic report tetonrider! great job

ttusomeone

Nice job tetonrider. That race sounds awesome.

shovelhd

But you kept jumping back in, and you didn't exactly sit on the back, either. I kept thinking of how much good this must have been doing for you.

carpediemracing 

Incredible progress. One thing that struck me is just how comfortable you look on your bikes. Your form is really solid, nothing awkward, nothing odd looking. You look like a pro or at least like you've been racing for decades. This shows a lot of effort on your part in dialing in your position, to have compressed all that fitting work into just a few years.

valygrl

Nice work & results Tetonrider.

carpediemracing 

I wanted to focus on high effort, like interval type ones, rather than plodding along in the group after getting lapped. With the ability to get back in after getting shelled I wanted to do a big pull, get back on if possible (I couldn't - I chose to do long-as-possible pulls instead of repeatable ones), then do it again. My goal on my first pull was to pull that group back to the main group but I couldn't quite do it. I finished it off with a solo sprint, which was, ironically, slower than my top speed in the race before I got shelled.

shovelhd

Bask in the afterglow, teton.

Flatballer

Helluva ride teton. What cat is that? And yeah, you look like a pro on your TT bike for sure. Perfect looking position.

echappist

soon on his way to cat-2

waterrockets 

+1 great report, and huge congrats!

mattm

Nice job teton!! Hope you can repeat at Cascade.

rkwaki

Nice...
Btw you have some fancy stuff

Andy STi

Teton, are we going to see you in the 40+ 1/2 at Cascade?

ttusomeone

Nashville Cyclist Crit Cat 4 - 30 minutes. There was a smaller field this week. I decided to sit mid-pack for the first several laps to see what everyone was going to do. About 7 or 8 mins in I'm on the outside of a turn where I have always been on the inside - I was trying to take different lines to move through the pack. I'm on the wheel of the guy in fron of me and he all of a sudden darts left and there's a safety cone directly in front of me. I went down and luckily didn't take anyone else down with me. Some road rash on my legs but that's it. Jogged over to the pits and got my free lap. Got back in at mid-pack again. Was just going to sit there for a while but the guys around me weren't holding lines and a few guys bumped a couple times. I didn't want to go down twice in a race so I moved up to towards the front. It was about 15 minutes in and the group had just caught a guy that had went off the front so I counterattacked. I got a good 6 or 7 second gap quickly and it was holding for the next several laps. I started seeing the laps cards and thought it might work. Nonetheless, I got caught with 2 to go. I used everything I had in the solo break so when the group caught me a quickly went OTB. My team mate did counterattack when I got caught and he ended up with 2nd.

tetonrider

thanks for the comments, everyone. i appreciate them. i know the report was a bit dramatic, but i think that hood lends itself to the drama. i tried to tell the story of the weekend more than just list results.

it's not always easy for me to find the motivation to train hard, travel far, and race with the knowledge that i'm going to suffer. (not easy for anyone, to be sure.) sometimes coming home with something good to report here is a way for me to dig a little bit deeper, as i know the racers in this community understand the highs and lows.

thanks for noticing, cdr. i have worked very, very hard at my positioning. i'm no pro, but i am pretty in tune with my body. i've used the help of a good friend who recently attained the highest level of certification from specialized's bg fit program (side note: i never knew there were levels, and i didn't realize that there are only something like 60 or 70 in the world at the highest of those levels), but i've also found that my position is always evolving, and the "fit" is a starting point rather than an end. i didn't take up cycling until later in life, so, yeah, i'm trying to play catch-up.

andysti--i'll be at cascade for sure. it's a family trip, so while i haven't committed yet to a field (when does reg close?) i feel like that may not be quite my time to upgrade and jump into the 1/2 field. i have some big goals and a desire to be in this game for a while, so i'm pretty conservative when it comes to upgrading. i like to make sure i've learned all i need to learn.

also, a good friend and national champ told me "only upgrade to cat 2 if your goal is to be a 1."

so many people here have given me lots of help, like racer ex, shovelhd, and cdr to name but a few. i can honestly say that this help has improved my riding and racing, and i am appreciate of all the feedback. hope everyone's having a great 4th!

tetonrider

kind of neat. the rider who finished 2nd in the GC in my field wrote up a great summary of the weekend and it is available here. it was pretty cool for me to read what he was thinking and feeling as we raced. i'm glad to have earned his respect, as he (and many others in the field) were both strong and classy racers.

walnutz

Driveway Series-Austin, Speed Loop. Cat. 4/5

My best race of the season. Follow some attacks/chases, got a solid pack finish which was my aim. I've been out a few times this year and couldn't hang. I finally got my act together today and felt like a player in the race instead of like I was hanging on for dear life. This was the most smooth/consistent 4/5 race I've been in yet. It didn't bunch up too bad up the corkscrew or at the lower turn, for once.

I love the Driveway.

valygrl

Just curious - does Driveway have a women's race?

walnutz

Yup. https://drivewayseries.com/Info/Sched...1/Default.aspx

mattm

Davis crit p/1/2. It was about 108f out or so.. good times. Fun course!

Fast Freddie, this year's natl champ, was there. Some pros from Kenda/5-hour energy were there (one won I think).

I survived. Tried to get in a few early moves but nothin' doin'. Good training!!

Back wheel seemed to want to slide out on corner 3 for some reason..

Ended up 20-something I think. Two crits Saturday.

caloso

Nate English. Good job. A lot of guys abandoned.

I did the Masters race immediately before yours. I had to pull myself at Lodi due to the heat so my only goal today was to finish with the main group and maybe take a hard dig or two. Managed that, so I was satisfied. I didn't expect to like the new course, but it wasn't too bad.

plantrob

Chesco Road Race, M45+. Four 13-mile laps on rolling terrain. The race had the distinction of being the official PA road race championship, although I doubt that had much effect on things. Still, there was a field of 40-50 strong riders. I had one team mate in the race - the one who's been riding away in the first lap in all the races he enters this year. Sure enough, he did the same this time around, and held the break the whole way. Got beat at the line by his sole break-mate, but since the winner was from MD, my team mate got to claim the state gold medal.

Meanwhile, my terrible pack handling skills (or rather, lack of confidence) had me sitting in the tail end of the pack for the first 2 1/2 laps. The yellow line rule pretty much made moving up a game of skill. Occasionally when the field strung out in a cross wind, I'd burn a small match and move up toward the front - only to find myself back in the same position a mile or two later, unable to hold the wheels I needed to hold to maintain position. I need to race more to work on those skills... In any case, I wasn't much help to my team mate - good thing he didn't need it. The last lap and a half, the race seemed to open up, and I was near the front most of the time, following small moves but otherwise not doing much. Toward the end of the third lap, I found myself off the front after a bit of a climb, and just for kicks kept it going for another mile or two to finish out the lap on my own. But I knew I couldn't hold it on my own, so I reabsorbed into the pack, and continued to surf wheels near the front during the last lap. Which put me in a decent position after the last turn going into the short steep hill 500m before the finish. Climbing is what I like best, so together with a few others I gained some separation from the pack, and managed a 6th place finish. Not too bad for a Cat4 in a strong field, definitely my best result of the year. Extra bonus points to my team mate, who smooth-talked the girl at the VIP beer stand into giving us VIP wristbands, good for some free beer. A fine way to spend the first half of the Fourth of July holiday.