my58vw

Several months ago I started writting for the local clubs news letter about things in relation to cycling, from types of bike to components, to riding, etc. Since I have started racing they have asked for articles in regards to racing and in particular gearing them to people considering racing and those interested. This is my second article to this effect, the first in regards on how to start racing, teams, equipment, etc. This month I am writting about a raceers perspective, my first five races.

Attached is the article. I would appriciate some feedback on it. It is in adobe acrabat so it should work on everyones computer (I hope). It is not edited but should be fairly free of errors.

Thanks in advance. By the way the race story is not of one particular but a combination of elements from my first five races. I tried to capture the elements of criterium and circuit racing to make it graspable to everyone reading the article.

ZackJones

It's an interesting read. If you can squeeze it it add the definition for criterium. Also, could you list the definitions at the start of the article instead of the end?

norton

I liked it....It did seem to capture-create that criterium energy I've observed from the sidelines in downtown Northampton races.....Your prose seems to flow along much like the race....


Needs a good edit for mis-spellings...typos..etc

my58vw

I agree with the mispelling, I can write but I can not spell That is why I have an editor!

Agreed, will put a definition of criterium in the definitions and throw them into the beginning.

Thanks again... any more sugestions

DXchulo

I can't wait for the spelling/grammar Nazis to get a load of this!

Guest

Here I am.

Seriously, though. I don't get concerned about spelling with drafts. They are corrected during spell check, and I assume everyone will do one.

Overall, it looks like you've captured the essence of the peloton. To be picky, I would like to see the explanation of the words within the article, not listed out at the end. I haven't seen very many articles where they write up a mini dictionary at the end. I would expect that if you listed the words at the end to define them, then it means that people aren't going to know what they mean during the article. So why make them wait until the end?

The majority of your sentences are fragmented and incomplete. Sometimes, this is a good thing. Like now. I fragmented the previous sentence to show what I mean, but I wouldn't use this throughout an entire article. It makes the article seem choppy and disjointed. Sometimes, the sentence structures are off because you are missing punctuation. Other times, you seem to be missing key words, like conjunctions. Still other times, sentences are just fragmented and incomplete. I would suggest a series of rewrites to correct this. I like to write an article and read it aloud several times. This helps me to determine if I'm missing punctuation or if the sentence is too long, too short, etc. After you've rewritten the article, try it and see if there's a difference in the before and after versions of your article.

There's a sentence I didn't really care for: "...the cool liquid quails the pain for a second." Quails may not be quite the word you're looking for to describe this phenomenon. "Quail" means "cower", like when you shrink away from something in fear, and it's also a type of bird. Perhaps better words would be "masks", "dulls" or "numbs". You could rewrite that part into "Your quads scream in pain, your breaths come in ragged gasps, you grasp the water bottle and gulp its contents, and the cool liquid momentarily numbs the stabbing pain in your legs." There's one rewrite that would help to spice up the drama a bit and draw people right into the peloton and feel the pain and suffering from doing such an intense race.

Actually, there's a few things I would do, but it's a bit of work since it's in pdf format and not in word. It takes too much time to go back and forth. With word, you can copy and paste. So do this- rewrite it, clean it up a bit, and add a link in word for us to review again. Unfortunately, I don't think I'll be able to look at it again before Friday, and it really is an interesting read.

Good luck with it.

Koffee

Guest

P.S. Try to be more descriptive and not use the same words over and over. That gets a bit too repetitive.

Koffee

my58vw

I will do that tonight and see how it comes out. I can give you a word file with the next revision. Thanks for the constructive comments.

Guest

Sure. If you can even email it to me and hold off until Friday, I can give you a more thorough look through, make some recommendations and get that article looking pretty tight and spiffy.

Koffee

norton

Quail= mis-spelled quell...to quiet or pacify

pinky

This is going to sound quite negative, but part of my normal job is copy editing so...
You use way too many passive (-ing) verbs, which really takes away from the action of the race, so change them to active whenever possible.
Choose a rhythm and go with it. Flowing works with this situation but you almost fight to keep it choppy-use conjuctions and commas as previously said, and possibly use dashes or hyphens (I forget which is which...hah).
I'm not a fan of repeated references to the actual speed. I don't care if the pack is at 20 or 40 mph, however it much more visceral when you read something like 'the dashes on the pavement blurred solid as the pack accelerated' yada yada-show don't tell.
Your opening and closing sentences are horrible. They need to be a hell of a lot more concise and punchier, you want to grab the reader, not get him lost. (Try breaking both of them into 2 sentences, especially the last where you open and close with "bike racing")
There are things like word choice and structure but that would involve a lot more effort and time than I have to give at the moment.

All that said its a decent start. Keep writing, and pay attention to the small stuff, its really quite important.

theopowers

I think it does a very good job of capturing the excitement and intensity of a race. It could definitely use some good editing, but I'll leave that to your actual editor.

The one key point I will make, however, is that this article is not about your first five races . It's the title, and you mention in the second paragraph as though it will be the focus, but it is not. It is simply a description of what a race is like. Your readers will be very confused if you tell them your article is about one thing and then talk about something else. You explained in your post that it's a conglomeration of your first five, but that's not clear in the article.

And I'm not sure it would be a very good article if you did. On the other hand, an article about your first five would be very interesting - what your initial expectations were, how each race went for you, things that you learned as you went, things that surprised you, how you developed as a rider, whether others took you under their wing or if you were left to figure it all out for yourself, whether your placings improved as you learned the ropes, etc.

The easy way to fix this is to simply call this article "Race Day" or something to that effect. Your next two articles could be "My First Race" and "My First Five Races". Editors love when writers don't rely on them for new ideas.

zonatandem

Good start; descriptive. Too much repeating the same words: use a Thesaurus if need be. Spellcheck is nice but definitely have a 'real' proofreader check the article before sending it off to your editor.
Spellcheck will not catch errors like "maxxis" . . . needs to have an upper case 'M'.
Keep it up; practice makes perfect!

CAAD5AL

I have to say . . . I liked it. I think you did a nice job capturing the emotions and action of it all. I agree with some of the mechanical advice - be more aware of passive voice, fragments, etc - but all in all I think you did what most writers fail to do, which is paint a picture. The rest is just technical.

With regard to the glossary at the end, as I read it I too wondered if you were going to explain the terms you were using. You need to consider your audience, however, and since it's for your local club, I think you're safe in the assumption that they're already familiar with the terminology. If you were to explain it within the text of the article, it might be perceived as a bit beneath the reader.

I think the word you were looking for was quell, BTW, not quail.

Guest

Ok, that makes sense. That quail just threw me off.

Koffee

theopowers

I absolutely agree that this is generally good advice, but in this specific case I like the numerical references. The audience for this piece is very specific, and most of them will be interested in whether "I could do that?", even if it's not their primary concern. And saying that at a certain point in the race "x performance level is required" allows readers to think of their own cyclometers or ride diaries and say "Hell, I could hang with that" or, like me, say "Sh*t, I'd be roadkill".

my58vw

Here is a revised interduction, it is still in the works but it has most of the elements that I am looking at now. Tell me what you think.

EDIT
Thanks for the ideas, I understand exactly where you are coming from. The idea for the next article about the expectations of racing will be great. I think the feeling from the readers right now is they want an inside look on what a criterium is all about and I think that this is a good idea in that direction.

"Race Day, Criterium" I love! Thanks

theopowers

Here is a very very shoot-from-the-hip rewrite of your revision, just to give you an idea of changes I might make if I was your editor. I would edit and re-edit (and re-edit) my version.You can take what you like from it, and ignore what you don't.

The peloton slices through the wind as it races towards the corner. In the distance a bell rings, signaling that the breakaway riders have crossed the line. A mere ten seconds later the peleton itsef reaches the line, the bell now clattering in their ears like an alarm. The track-side fence blurs as the speed intensifies - today no primes will go unchallenged. Up front, three riders from Healthnet/Citrus Valley Velo attack, leaving the sleeping peloton in their wake, and as the seconds tick away they reel in the riders ahead of them. The roar of the crowd fills the air - the breakaway is caught on the brink of victory, and the trailing peloton is now attacking as well and is roaring up from behind. An all-out sprint erupts just two hundred meters from the line, and the Healthnet team successfully leads out their sprinter! He explodes across the line first, wins the prime, and is instantly swallowed up by the peloton. This sequence is repeated many times as the race continues - breakaways and chases, corners and sprints - and these elements form what we call the "criterium".

EDIT: In any case, I think your rewrite is much better than before. It's more of a cohesive whole, and leads up to the summary sentence (which didn't make sense to me in the original copy).

my58vw

Ok yours sounds much better... I like the style, very exciting. Thanks for editing it much. I appriciate the effort.

theopowers

Oh, it's still yours! I just did many of the things that others have been talking about - adjusted some punctuation, changed some passive voice to active, connected some fragments, cut out some wordiness, etc. Try reading my version side by side with yours, sentence by sentence, and see why you like (or don't like) mine better. Then you can apply it to the rest!

EDIT: Even though I rewrote it a bit, I especially liked your imagery of the sprinter crossing the line and "instantly" being swallowed up by a mass of riders. Excellent.

JamesV

Shouldn't that be

The peloton slices through the wind as they race towards the corner.

Really enjoyed reading the article, my58vw.

theopowers

LOL! I think you could argue the case either way, but as I was reading over my post I was questioning the same thing about "The peleton crosses the line, the bell ringing in their ears".

P.S. (Would it be "The peloton slice through the wind as they race..."?)

CAAD5AL

I think it would be "peloton slices" as it is more or less synonymous with the word "group" rather than "individuals."

berny

"The peleton slices thorugh the wind, the riders race toward the corner".

"The peleton crosses the line, the bell ringing in the the riders ears".

royalflash

nice article- very exciting-I could feel the wind rushing through my hair (through the helmet vents of course)