Originally Posted by
stevegor
You guys are telling me what I should and do already know.
When I was younger I would feel like I'd let myself and my bunch down if I missed one turn, (pull), on the front during a race, in fact I would do extra turns to cover for other guys who were struggling. This usually meant I was totally knackered at the finish line. Even now I sometimes push till I vomit.... I'm not real bright, am I?
I think NOW is the time to use the smarts and leech off the young ones
pcad is totally off base on this. I have talked at length with the world champ guy and raced against him quite a few times now. He is very open about discussing tactics and usually has ways of getting the same point across:
"get someone else to do the work as much as possible and save it for your one big move. once it's time to make that move, put everything you have into it."
the biggest thing is that he can make this strategy work within countless different tactical situations, whereas a less-experienced rider (everyone else, virtually) might not be able to. I've seen him do it. He just always seems to have a magical intuition when it comes to being invisible until the "right place, right time" when the winning move happens.