"The 33"-Road Bike Racing - Congrats to cmh

For winning the OBRA Road Race champs (Mst. 40-49). Good job ya old geezer.

edit:

and it was an awesome finish- really close. cmh didn't know he won so he was looking at the other guy and the other guy said cmh had won. classic.

Excellent!! Congrats.

Big ups!

Nice work :beer:

Whoa.

CMH, you're 40...or older?

I feel like I should call you sir whenever I see you now.

Congrats on the win, by the way. You've been on top of your game this year, from what I've seen. Well played.

cmh, congratulations! 40 - 49 is always a very fast group and to be the best of 'em is a big feather in your cap.:)

well done. congratulations.

Congrats!

I get stoked just winning one of the sprints on a group ride.
Congratz

Congrats c! :thumb:

Yay for the old guys!

:beer:

nice!

Thanks for all the kind words.

Here is my race report:

The race was 3 laps on a hilly, but by no means mountainous 16 mile course with a 1k not too steep finishing climb (4-5% maybe?). I was discussing strategery with my only team mate present before the race and he made the call. "This will be a battle between Nike and Z-team". The '08 champ is a really fast sprinter on Nike and was riding with a really strong team mate or two, and Z-team is always strong in the masters in OR. So, I went into the race watching for breaks with those two teams represented.

On the first lap I felt pretty mediocre. On the backside hills I was working hard to stay in the pack, but we were still spread out from the shoulder to centerline. I was thinking 'Damn ... it feels like we should be lined out single file at this pace ....' So I decided I better hang out and conserve energy on the first lap. Two guys that I didn't recognize got away and got maybe a 30 second gap, but couldn't get any more than that. We eventually caught the break on the finishing climb of lap one.

Laptwo I felt better and moved up to the front. The pace was on and off and it was hard work up some of the hills, but we were lined out single file at those times so I was good with that. A couple little breaks went, and I went with a couple larger attacks to make sure nothing big got away without me, but everything was swallowed pretty quickly. Then, early in lap 3 another break of 2 got away and got a good 20-30 seconds (not sure who was in this break, but someone in the pack said one of the guys won the race a couple years back). On one of the steeper pitches with about 10 miles to go '08 champ's teammate attacked hard and bridged up to the break like they were standing still. He looked strong and I thought they may have a chance to stay away. Apparently Z-team thought the same so they started working and occasionally attacking trying to bridge. '08 champ went with every attack and made sure nobody could bridge without dragging him to the break and I hopped on his wheel every time. That kept the the pack together until Z-team's hard pulls, along with pulls from a few other guys brought it back together with 3k to go.

From this point on it was positioning and setting up for the 1k finishing climb and I stayed glued to '08 champ's wheel. We hit the base of the climb and the pack spread out shoulder to centerline briefly until a couple little guys surged up the center. '08 champ grabbed their wheel, and I stayed on his. The pace stayed hard enough so there were no attacks until '08 champ went at 200m. I started to come around him at about 150m to go and initially I could barely gain any ground. I was thinking cool I could hold 2nd place! Then with 50m or so he started to slow just a bit and this gave me a huge mental boost. I dug deep for a couple more seconds then threw my bike to take the win by a few inches. Not a glorious win if you are a climber or breakaway type, but I rode to my strategy and crossed the line first. I'd post the finish line camera pic, but it is 650k and I can't seem to shrink it under 100k. Note that there were a couple really fast 40 yr olds that chose to race the Mens open race against the kids. Had they raced 40-49 race they very well may have changed the outcome.

cmh

sweet report. sweeter results.

Great work, and thanks for the report, cmh.

Do you have a link to the finish line pic?

Here is the finish line pic. Always throw your bike!

And notice 2nd and 3rd place are on Nike and Z-team - the two teams I was keying on. My team mate called it well.

Great job! Did you get the state champ jersey?

Great report and congrats cmh. The look on the guy's face who came in second is classic.

Well done! Nice report too.

Great report and congrats cmh.

I will get the jersey. And by the way, it is really lame that the winners don't get one as a prize. Instead I have won the right to purchase a jersey. OBRA should make the promoter of the state champ's races spring for the jersey. They can up the entry fee if needed by a couple bucks but since there isn't any prize money they shouldn't have to do that.

I will get the jersey. And by the way, it is really lame that the winners don't get one as a prize. Instead I have won the right to purchase a jersey. OBRA should make the promoter of the state champ's races spring for the jersey. They can up the entry fee if needed by a couple bucks but since there isn't any prize money they shouldn't have to do that.

Yeah yeah yeah. I know. At least the price dropped from $40 to $25.

Freakin' sweet... congrats! :beer:

Great ride. Awesome photo.