Doge

How long after the start was the 1st hill?
How long/how hard did you warm up?

topflightpro

I tried to do my standard warm up, which usually consists of rolling around easy for 45 min. or so with a couple of short little efforts to get my legs going. It usually works pretty well for me. My legs didn't want to peddle much at all on Saturday morning. Adding to my trouble was that it was one of those morning where it was in the low 40s and really bitter cold when warming up, but nearly in the 70s 10 min. into the race. I was shivering while warming up, but I pulled my arm warmers down shortly after the race started.

The first short punchy rise - it's probably not fair to call it a hill - was about 4 miles in. The race was a 7.5-mile loop, with the bigger hill coming at mile 7 or so.

And I should be clear, these are hills, not mountains, not extended climbs. The first rise was probably a 30s effort. The second one is really a 2-min effort. So, these are not long climbs. But the first one was steeper, and the second one starts steep, then levels out. I got over the climb fine, it was recovering on the flat afterward that was where I was hurting and fading.

Right now, I've just been really tired though. I'm not sleeping well at all. I'm getting maybe 4 hours of sleep a night. The rest is spent tossing and turning.

My coach also thinks that I am having a hard time recovering from a mountains ride I did a few weeks ago. She thinks that the long extended climbs leave me with a deep fatigue that I struggle to recover from. I think she may be right. Last year, I was riding really strongly early in the year. I even commented to a teammate that I was feeling stronger in January/February than I had in several years. Then I did a big mountain trip. I rode stronger in those mountains than I ever have, and put in rides I didn't know I could do - in terms of both distance and elevation gain. (Unfortunately, I was having issues with my PM and Computer, so I did not get good power data from the trip. Those issues have since been fixed.) But after that trip, my riding and training completely fell apart. I couldn't do anything. It also didn't help that I crashed a month after that trip and separated my shoulder, leaving me unable to hold the bars for about four weeks, but even before that, my legs were shattered.

Doge

It can take a long time to recover from going too deep. When first starting with his trainer 3 years ago my son was told to stay in bed 10 hours. Son replied he couldn't sleep that long. The response was it didn't matter. That he needed 4-5 hours or something for his mental rest and 10 for his legs. That he could read a book or do homework in bed. Most adults don't have that luxury. But it was good advice.

The 45 min warm up is longer than most the coaches I see having racers do. Team Sky was playing with warm-ups and found there was little difference warming up real early and ending 30-min-1hr before start and vs starting the race hot.
For us/my kid and the elite juniors in general, warm-ups left to finish close to race start with all the other stuff going on are difficult to get all the other stuff done. Formula that junior and much of the team adopted was warming up less time, on a trainer, say 30 min, but going over AT (using HR NOT power) a couple times after the first 15 min. Then getting ready/number/dress/food etc. That being said junior skips warm-ups to his peril sometimes in long RR where he thinks it will start slow. But then he also looses that getting prepared ritual and will then forget food, jacket etc., so while he ends up warmed up from the ride, he ends up un-prepared. I expect that is less of an adult problem, I'm waiting to find out. I've noticed a high correlation between good warm-ups and good results.

TheKillerPenguin

@topflightpro - Has your coach prescribed rest given her thoughts on going too deep?

topflightpro

TKP - She is starting to. It's something we didn't really realize was happening until relatively recently. So, we are adjusting as it becomes apparent that this is an issue.

TheKillerPenguin

Fair enough. Hope the rest helps!

Cosmic Hawk

Did the Makaha Time Trial (USAC) out here in Hawaii yesterday. Came in 1st for my Division and third overall.

320W average. I tried to rent a full disc wheel but everywhere was out. 2nd place was about 25 seconds ahead. The wheel may or may not have helped me catch that time. I'm a Cat 5 racer so whatever. Haha. I had fun and I was pretty surprised to be so high in the overall rankings.

wktmeow

Nice job!

I did the Ontario 'Dare to Race' crit yesterday, 3 times - e3/4, e3, and p123

E3/4 felt ok. I had a teammate in the field. I mostly just followed and sat in. Teammate got to the front with 3 to go and I was on his wheel. I suggested he pull off/take it easy and let the swarm come around but he may have misheard me as he was leading it out coming into 2 to go. One guy attacked at corner 3, so I jumped to follow, but he blew up shortly after and I decided to keep the momentum going for a ~1.3 lap flyer. Unfortunately a couple guys decided to chase and dragged up the field to me. I got caught at the last corner and rolled in for 14th.

E3 - Lots of attacks going. I tried to follow any dangerous moves, and was in a couple of short breakaways. Then, with about 15 minutes to go, there was a move of 4-5 guys with a bit of a gap, and it was starting to rain again. I figured with the rain falling, the pack would be moving a bit slower through the corners, so I knew I wanted to be up there. I sprinted away from the group to make sure no one followed, then I bridged for about 2 laps before latching onto the break. Somehow I was still feeling pretty fresh, so I started rotating right away. I tried to take some big/strong pulls, as I was worried about getting caught, and it felt like we were going too easy. On the last lap, some of the guys were starting to look around, and I took advantage of a moment where a couple of the guys on the front sat up for a sec to cat & mouse it. I jumped between a couple riders and just pushed it as hard as I could to the line. I just barely edged out a big sprinter dude for the win! It was my first time in a successful break, so that was pretty exciting too.

P123 - Just sat in the back and practiced cornering mostly. These guys take much tighter/faster lines than I'm used to, especially in the damp. A break went about half way through that the group seemed happy with, so it was a nice easy pace for the rest of the race.

echappist

nice job. they must be complaining about your aero position afterwards

wktmeow

@scheibo , nice job at CCCX this weekend as well! Just saw your team's FB post about it, looking forward to the report

scheibo

3 races and a win! congrats! aren't breaks fun? two laps of bridging sounds pretty difficult though.

scheibo

CCCX #2 Bay View Circuit Race

Cat 4 - 1/15

After my first breakaway success in the 3/4s at this race two weeks ago and my 65mi two-man break last weekend I decided I needed to be in a breakaway. There were 6/15 all on one team in the field, and I kind of hoped one of them would join the break so I didn't have half the field chasing, but in the end I wanted to see what would happen if I caught people on the backfoot. Basically, my game plan:



Lined up at the front and opened up the race with an all out sprint right from the clip in. Someone from the large team was a wheel length or two back before the first turn, but there was a rise out of the turn and I dropped him pretty quickly. 2-3 hard laps to get a 40s-1:10 gap, then just tempo for the rest, got half a lap on the field (~2:00-2:30). Really nice to decide the race in the first 5 minutes and then spend 45 minutes victory lapping.

Takeaways
- This course *really* works for breakaways. I think like 75% of the races on it this year have been won with breakaways.
- I still don't understand why a team taking up half the field can't figure out how to work together, but w/e, it works in my favor.
- #2 and #3 in the field sprint were #1 and #2 two weeks ago, so if I hadn't changed things up I probably would have been fighting for scraps again.

Cat 3/4 - 2/10

Sort of tired from the first race but I needed to podium at this race to get the last point for my upgrade (other riders have told me I probably could have gotten the upgrade with 19 points, but I figured I might as well do it fair and square). Despite the field knowing that I attacked from the gun in the first race, I planned to do it again (not that I expected it to stick, but maybe I'd shell a rider to two and then prepare to do another attack later). However, the race started before I was ready so I wasnt able to clip in and jump right away, instead I had to wait until after the first turn. I put in a bit of an attack up the rise out of the turn and the field followed, but on the downhill there was a lull and I was given a couple metres so I started sprinting on the downhill to punish them for letting that gap open. This got a huge cheer when I passed the Start/Finish, presumably because everyone can appreciate aggressive racing.

This attack ended up splitting the field, whittling the race down to 4 riders after the first lap with one rider putting in a big bridge to make it 5. We had a pretty perfect double paceline going on, very short, focused pulls, pretty much making it clear no one was coming back. I didn't really do any work, just kind of pulled through and sat a little off the back, skipping a pull or two and looking tired. I always get nervous attacking out of a group which is pacelining well, but I did it anyway, dropping 3 of the riders leaving it down to just me and one other rider. We worked to get a 40s gap and I then knew I had my upgrade points. I attacked him once or twice to attempt to go solo, but other than that we mostly worked together and I let him pull more. In the end, despite not working very much and letting him lead me up into the headwind at the finish I wasn't able to come past for some reason (still not fully sure - was I tired? he only did the one race, so maybe that helped. I think I should have shifted or jumped earlier or something? I think I partly also didn't care as much because the extra upgrade points wouldnt be helping me?).

Takeaways
- I liked that I was able to dictate the race, force all the splits and in general be aggressive. I worried when I first got into bike racing that I would never be able to be aggressive as I'm generally pretty reactive/passive, but somewhere along the lines I seem to have figured it out.
- I'm disappointed I couldn't come off his wheel at the end for the win. I really can't fully understand why I didn't, and in the end it might not be that important, but I think I played the second race perfectly (when I attacked, how I worked in the break, how I positioned myself for the finish) and would like to be able to point to results as proof of that, but I guess I don't get to.

TMonk

nice racing @wktmeow! That sounds like a blast.

aaronmcd

Chico Stage Race Cat 2

Our team had 6 guys, Justin was our designated GC guy.

Stage 1 – Thunderhill Circuit Race

Course was on a different track and the same raceway as last year. Smooth pavement and a few turns that the field had incredible difficulty navigating. Many guys ended up on the grass throughout the race but no crashes. Plan was to keep it together and let Justin crush it in the RR and TT, but since this is the same plan most guys have, nothing was getting away.
Before the race, I noticed my cable was squeaking when I shifted. A teammate said it was likely breaking, but it was a fairly new cable. Turns out my shifter was breaking, and stopped working midrace. Stuck in a decent gear though. I thought the field might hesitate and give a move some leeway with 2 to go, but as I moved up to go for it I saw Justin had the same plan. He and 2 others held it to the line (he got 3rd) and I rolled in midpack.

Stage 2 – Paskenta Hills Road Race

After the circuit race I went straight to the bike shop. They didn’t have 10 speed ultegra shifters. They had 10 speed 105 but I’d need to buy both. Or they had 11 speed and I’d need to buy both and upgrade components. I figured I’d take the opportunity to go 11 speed. By the time I got back to the Airbnb, showered, changed, went and got dinner with teammates, waited for a teammate to get seconds, got back, waited for another teammate who had tools, and replaced the parts and got to bed it was midnight.

I slept 5 hours and got ready for a 90 mile road race.

2x45 mile laps with wind, rolling hills, and a few miles of decently packed gravel near the end.

I sat at the back for a while. Pace picks up and already a couple miles in 2 guys popped off in quite mild crosswind. Turned to the tailwind and it really takes off. Fast pace, occasionally difficult even on the fairly flat terrain. Hit a few rollers and guys are hurting. Someone threw a vest or jacket in the feedzone causing a crash and our GC guy went down right on his face and had to drop out. Another teammate stopped and escorted him to the hospital for stitches. The pace skyrocketed after the crash, splitting the field for a while. Many caught back on and many didn’t.

The gravel this year wasn’t bad at all, but I did lose a bottle. I had diligently been drinking equal amounts from each bottle in anticipation of this and only lost ~175 calories to the gravel. We climbed to the finish area, a few guys sprinted for bonus points (the tech guide didn’t mention this but they told us at the start that we had a bonus sprint so whatever). After a few attacks, 40 miles to go, I sensed the pack would be willing to chill for a while so I attacked seated and they let me go.

Rode tempo for a bit waiting, got just enough of a gap that the eventual flurry to chase didn’t quite make it but a small group did. 5 of us started rotating, one guy dropped out and 4 of us picked up a minute on the field.

Unfortunately I was hurting, and watching my power I realized I should NOT have been suffering so much. The lack of sleep caught up with me too soon. I had to sit on and suffered the scorn of 2 of my breakmates instead. Finally at mile 76, I blew up completely. What was left of the pack sped by, eventually caught my breakmates, and I slogged in a long ways back. That was upsetting, knowing that on a good day I’d have had the energy to help drive the break and we may have had a half chance of staying away.

Stage 3 – River Road Time Trial

I was really beat up after the road race and previous night, slept almost ten hours, but that wasn’t enough to be mentally motivated or physically recovered enough for the 8 mile, out and back TT. Rode with clip-on bars in the 35 degree cold at a pathetic 24 mph, 267 watts (85% ftp)

Stage 4 – Steve Harrison Memorial Downtown Criterium

After a nice brunch and some sitting around the legs were feeling a bit better. Not quite good enough to play at the front on the short, L-shaped course, but good enough to move up through the pack, realize I didn’t have any business being near the front, and drift back again. Sat in and tried to move up again in the last few laps when everyone else is also trying to move up. Managed to get up to a decent mid-pack (27th) for the finish.

One of our guys finished in the lead group of the road race and with a mediocre time trial managed to snag a couple upgrade points. Still, 13th is pretty disappointing for one of the biggest teams out there.

The shifting issue really sucked, and I had no warning until race day. Other than that, I maybe could have added more noodles to my mongolian barbecue the night before the road race. May have helped put off the bonk, but 5 hours of sleep just isn't anywhere near enough.

revchuck 

@topflightpro - FWIW, a warmup that works for me is 10-15' Z2, then 2x2' at ~110% with 1' RBI, then 4x20" hard with 20" RBI. Short and sweet.

aaronmcd

I read something that suggested for warm up a few minutes z2, 5' at threshold 20 minutes before the start, then a few more minutes zone 2. I've tried it and I do seem to feel better jumping into hard efforts if I've had those few minutes at threshold. Especially on days when I'm not feeling 100% and the first couple minutes at threshold feel bad, but somehow prime me to do more. Sometimes I'll cut it short if I'm already feeling fine. I never do hard efforts for warm up.

gerundium

Training circuit race Sleen 11/80

As a season opener we went with the team to a race a little further away. It's a start of season "training" race on a nice circuit (5x13 km). The weather was abysmal, just above freezing with a nice drizzle of rain combined with 5 Bft wind. This meant it had all the ingredients for a super hard spring race with guaranteed echelon action.
Lining up in the third row i was quite well positioned when the whistle blew. After the first turn it was immediately onto a 2 lane road, the widest part of the course, into a cross headwind. I manage to hold a good position in the front with the echelon immediately forming across the width of the road. I am at the tail of the echelon hidden from the wind but i don't need to take a pull because i am just at the spot behind the actual rotation.
I get through this first straight without having to make a real effort at all so i am sitting pretty.
After that we turn left onto a far narrower, more exposed road and this is where it goes wrong for me. The great position on the first straight has saved me energy but also caused me to be boxed in, the turn to the left saw a surge on the left before the turn and i lost a few spots. The guys who were rotating in the echelon come out of the turn still in formation and they immediately continue going full gas. Now i am maybe 5 spots or so too far back and the line breaks. The first echelon is riding away from me while i still have good legs.
i spot a friendly competitor from my same region and we try and set up a chase immediately before the race gets away from us. We start with 5 stragglers from the first group and take hard turns. But we are with less people than the first group and not everyone believes in it, so i trade pulls a couple times with the guy i know until we are with three and the gap to the first echelon is only growing. ****. only half a lap into a 5 lap race and you feel you are already losing the race.
We look back, the first echelon we can't catch. The second echelon is formed behind us and is closing, we bail and drop back to the second echelon where i immediately start pulling to not let the gap get big. coming into that rotation i see two of my teammates made it into the second echelon. Cooperation in this group is good, there is still quite a line of guttered riders behind in this second echelon so the incentive to keep a hard rotation going is very high. This meant it was a battle to stay in the rotation. A few precarious situations happen throughout the first two laps where people try to get in the echelon but end up forced off the road.
From here the race becomes increasingly static. The echelons have formed in the first half lap and now it's a question of cooperation and horsepower. The second group i ended up in slowly got whittled down to ten or so which was the perfect number (it exactly fit in the echelon on the narrow roads). Hope went up because after the first lap the first echelon never really got away from us, the gap remained the same. We were even closing in somewhat. We were with 3 of our squad in the echelon and doing quite a share of the work but over the 1,5 hour race one of my teammates got increasingly cold and couldn't take turns anymore in the last lap or so.
We wanted to catch the first echelon in the last lap, things were looking up and we got tantalizingly close to the first echelon. At some point it was down to 8 or 10 seconds. But when the gap was closing everyone figured someone else would close the last small gap and would skip turns. Because of that the first echelon rode away from us again in the last half lap and we would be sprinting for 8th place.
There was a S curve maybe 500 meters from the line. I went through it in the back half of the group, everyone jumped out of it but there was a hesitation in the group after the initial jump from the turn. I come from the back with quite some speed so i decided to use it and go long on the left hand side of the road. My second jump was **** and i had to sit back down quite fast but i just keep going as hard as i can to the line since i got a small gap anyway. In the end it was too long a sprint / attack and i get pipped by three guys from my group and end up 11th place.

For me a good result because i usually don't perform well in these sorts of races where you need a lot of horsepower. Today it all came down to great positioning throughout the race. I just missed the first group which sucked but after that i never let myself get guttered and kept in the rotation. Which is the easiest place to be.

Video of the first lap of our category (from 4:15):
edit: see some pictures in the picture thread

JoesInBoston

Chico Stage Race - Cat 4/5

Day 1 - Thunderhill Circuit Race (did not count towards GC for my field, 24 starters)

It was 32 degrees at 8AM for the start of this 45 minute race. Not exactly ideal considering I flew in from Boston and landed in Sacramento at 5pm the day prior. It was fairly flat with some awkward turns and one punchy bump after a u turn. It didn't suit me well at all and I was dropped with 4 to go. I wasn't too bummed as I was treating it as an opener for the road race the next day. Finished 16th of 24.

Day 2 - Paskenta Road Race (first race to count towards GC, 76 starters)

For my field this was only 1 lap of the Paskenta loop, 45 miles. Mostly flat with some decent rollers in the middle and a really chopped up road leading into a gravel section close to the finish. I had lined up where I felt was towards the middle, but turns out it was actually the back of the group. I made sure to move up on the roll out. I didn't want to be any further back the the front third of the group for any point in this race. Even with being in the front third of the group, there was a bit of an accordion effect. One racer took a solo flyer off the front pretty early and was out there for a long time. The field didn't seem to be in a hurry to reel him in and he ended up with about 90 seconds on us. After shedding some people off the back in the rollers (says my brother who was also dropped at that point), and almost running people over who were standing in the road in the feed zone, we eventually caught him. I honestly have no idea how many people were left by the time we hit the lead in road to the gravel section, but we hit it hard. Bikes rattled a ton, bottles flew out of cages, there was yelling.....it was pretty chaotic and I was sitting like 8th to 10th wheel for the whole thing. I can't imagine what it was like behind me. I rolled into the gravel sitting in the 6th wheel and didn't look back until we were on the steepest section of the gravel. I had rolled back to about 20th by the end of the climb (in here somewhere: https://www.instagram.com/p/BQ9Yykih...chicostagerace) and noticed there weren't many of us left, but my two teammates were still there! That group rolled in to the finish together and one of my teammates sprinted to 2nd place. My other teammate was 9th and I was 19th.

Day 3 - Downtown Crit and River Road Time Trial (down to 66 starters)

The crit was a 6 corner, L shaped course. Pavement was good and corners were fairly wide so I had felt good about being able to maintain my "s.t." placing. Alas, it was not to be. I was dropped and pulled halfway through, I was in a group with 5 others and we were maybe 1/3 of a lap back? They assigned me a 3 minute time gap, which I am unsure if it was fair or not, but I get that it has to be done. The yellow jersey crashed bad enough on the same lap that I was pulled and the officials neutralized the race, stopping the field on the start line until he was taken off the course. This meant my teammate was the virtual yellow jersey. He ended up sprinting to 2nd at the end of the race and the time bonuses were enough to keep him in yellow. I dropped to 33rd on GC.

The time trial had to be changed due to flooding on the usual course, so it ended up being an out and back design. It was windy by the time we started but otherwise pretty uneventful. I kept my power steady and averaged the same for the out section as I did for the back section. I only had my road bike with clip-ons and a different seatpost to bring my saddle a bit more forward. I rolled the 8.5 mile course in 22 minutes flat, just fast enough to preserve my 33rd place.

Considering the last time that I did a stage race I was the lantern rouge, I was happy with how I did.

hack

Snelling 35+ 123. 10th of 75-80.

Racing solo and all the big teams were well represented. Legs not great, so I just hoped to get in a decent workout and sneak into the winning move if it happened. Neutral rollout was cold. Very cold. Commiserated briefly with @Ygduf about how cold the cold was.

A couple laps in I snuck up to the front to be ahead of the field when we hit the bump that dislodged bottles and caused chaos. A little kicker follows that bump and the winning rider made his move over the top of it. Myself and a few other guys looked at each other with our best "you chase it" faces and let the move ride away. Who'd a thunk he'd hold it for 25 ish miles?

After that, just kept near the front. Another rider I was watching, based on his performance last week, jumped hard with 7k to go and I was on the wrong side of the field to respond. Shoot.

3k to go and the pace was inconsistent allowing the swarm to mob around the front. Riding solo I had no one to kick the pace up and just waited for the teams to react. Around the 1k marker the pace kicked back up and we were back to 2 wide instead of 10. Came through the last turn too far back and came up into the leadout guys bailing. Sprint, brake, sprint, blah. Too late. Content, but shoulda done better.

aaronmcd

Snelling P12, 65 starters

Who knew a flat road race with minimal wind could be so hard?

7x12 mile laps with a few rollers totaling only a couple hundred feet per lap. They start to hurt towards miles 70 and 80 though!

Rally showed up with 6 guys and the first 2 laps averaged 27.5 mph. Then a 6 man break with 3 Rally guys got away. One team had 11 guys and missed the break, so they chased for a few laps as the gap went up to over 2 minutes. Finally they stopped chasing and everyone started racing for 7th.

3 laps to go 8 of us end up off the front as the pack got a bit lazy on the rollers. Drove it for 10 minutes and caught. Last lap Rally guy attacks so fast that absolutely no one even attempted to follow. Shortly, 4 guys go off to chase and I bridge up. Waaay too fast for me, I had to sit on and wasn't recovering. Then we get caught and I'm hurting trying to keep contact. Finally we hit 1 mile to go and the steady high pace with good draft let's me recover a bit. Manage to move up a bit as guys get tired, but when a gap opened 700 to go, I didn't have the legs to go through. Teammate had the legs and led out another teammate for 3rd in the field sprint (11th overall)

I struggled in for 24th.
Rally swept the East Coast version of the podium.

3:15 and only 240 TSS. Still need more road race fitness apparently! (It may be the short efforts getting to me as I haven't added them in to training yet this year).

Ttoc6

First weekend of collegiate racing in the cat a field. Boy is it a different animal. Big variance of talent between the hitters and the rest of us.

The road race was roughly 60 miles with a few little rollers and a pretty gnarly cross wind section. I didnt get a warmup in due to some issues with my tubulars before the race started that meant my alloted warm up time was spent switching wheels. I attacked from the end of extra because I wanted to be warm when the race started. Ride hard ish for like 10 minutes, sat up and came back.

No struggles on the first 1.5 laps then I got gapped a tiny bit going up the first roller. I caught back on to the back through a tailwind section and watched all the big boys in the pack attacked. All 3 of my team ended up on the wrong side of the split. We took to chasing in the small group that was left. Myself and one teammate worked real hard and eventually popped. The break never came back and I just rode the last 40 miles steady state for some training. Teammate that held onto the chase ended up taking 5th after one up the road fell off the pace and got caught on the uphill finish.

Ttt
Our team is pretty much the only group in the a field with 3 this weekend and probably 4 next. So we won this pretty handily over second place despite a terrible start and some bad cornering.

Crit
Started out dry and developed into some garbage conditions about half way. Went in a bit nervous about racing an hour crit but overall my fitness is there, just need to work on the mental state. Got into what I thought was going to be the breakaway about 15 minutes in (this race is known for its long breakaways that work). It got pulled back about 5 minutes later when we hit a headwind straight.
Another rider attacked and got about a 30 second gap. I was still recovering and let a gap open through one of the small corners. Unfortunately this was compounded by the guy two wheels ahead of me opening a big gap, and my teammate in front of me giving a full sprint effort to close it. Chased really hard, got close to getting back on but couldn't make it. Rode it in for 9th and a few prime points.

Big takeaways. We, as a team, need to make the splits they are going to decide the races in the a field. I can't forsee many of our races resulting in big group finishes.

hack

Race bikes today ... well, sort of raced bikes. Land Park Crit

35+ 123. Dead legs. Did what I could in the closing laps to help set teammates up. Took a dig on the last lap and sat up. Team did ok, but sprinter lost leadouts wheel. Leadout came in 6th.

P12. Deader legs, but race felt smoother than the 35+ race. Survived until 1.5 to go at which point a crash took out a dozen riders or so. Was able to slide around it and stay upright, but by the time I corrected course, the race was gone. Bummer.

caloso

Land Park 45+

No expectations. Training has been inconsistent due to work and a cold that won't go away. All I wanted to do was test my fitness and not get dropped. Was able to take a couple hard digs and covered a couple moves, but not the one that counted, unfortunately. Still, I'm satisfied.

mattm

Land Park Pro 1/2 - got 8th, team mates got 5th & 6th.. decent but if we had worked together better we shoulda/woulda/coulda been on the (east coast-sized) podium.

I felt great during the race, never under that pressure where you're like "damn I might get dropped.". Bridged to an early move, but it wasn't to be. Eventually could feel it was coming down to a field sprint, and it did. Sketchy af of course, but #thatsracing. Wouldn't have it any other way.

Heard the big crash with 2 to go, but was luckily ahead of it. Some guy almost took me out on the last lap, but didn't - just made me lose some spots..

Felt good the whole time, mostly happy not to crash! Plus the weather was just about perfect. Got $15 for my troubles. Video uploading now.

globecanvas

Grant's Tomb 40+, conditions so bad you have to laugh and/or puke, temp in the low 20s, wind 25 mph off the river but higher down the canyons on the back stretch. Our field had the windiest time of day. I mean, it was completely absurd. Wind chills in the low single digits. I didn't even try warming up, just sat in my car until about 3 minutes before the start.

The usually awesome feature of the course is the fast turn and drop down 120th and swoop back up 122nd street but the wind was literally pushing guys feet off their line turning onto 120th and turning up 122nd was like riding into a brick wall.

It was set up for a break from the start, and the 3 guys I knew would go, went, and I watched them go feeling like death. The rest of the race was a strange mix of feeling like a schlub because the race was up the road, and miserable suffering in the wind.

With 1 to go I miraculously felt fine as usual, got 3rd in the field sprint but could have won it if I'd been on my game. So, a mixed bag mostly full of "why do I bother doing this to myself" with a little bit of didn't suck at the end.