TheKillerPenguin

My 10th race as a cat5 is done! Time to upgrade

Race was only 24 miles long, 15 laps of a 1.6 mile loop with a 50 climb thrown in. Uphill sprint finish.

I raced in the 3/4/5 field, thinking it'd be a fun challenge. While the pace wasn't anything special, I got an introduction into affective team tactics. One of the teams had a guy way up the road in a solo break for the first 5-6 laps, so for any break that managed to get away from the pack a bit, they'd send a guy or two out to it to slow them down and organize the peloton to swallow it back up. I wound up being in a couple of weak early breaks, and its how they kept playing out. So I sat around at the front for a while, every once and a while I'd take a pull to try and bring back guys that managed to get away. I'd keep trying to get into breaks, but the peloton would latch onto my wheel as I bridged, and gobble us up. Either I was marked from earlier, or I wasn't putting enough distance between myself and the peloton quick enough.

Last two laps I was stupid and let myself fall back into the pack a bit. I had been pulling the pack downhill and my legs got a little tired, I didn't pull off to let someone else pull because I figured I had to hold my line going downhill, so the pack just went around us. Everyone was psyched up for the final sprint, so it was hard to get forward at all before it. During the sprint I had a ton of energy left, but got boxed in behind two slow guys, so I had to wait for them to move to be able to do anything. I'm pretty sure I took top 15 though (I think 12th, but results aren't up yet), I'd wager top 5 out of the cat5's in the race.

The guy that won it went out for a solo break with 2 laps to go. It was his first race, and he was able to hold on just long enough to win it!

Cromulent

Good job. Way to get in there and mix it up. Off to the 4s for you, then 3s, then fame and glory. And later start times.

DrWJODonnell

Nice job! and congratulations on the upgrade. One comment though, and you are allowed to refute me if I am wrong in this assessment. A lot of lower cat riders assume they are going with the break when they are really just accelerating at the front of the group and "injecting a little bit of pace" as Antony McCrossan would say. When you wish to "break" you need to do exactly that...usually a hard acceleration (short sprint) where you can put a few seconds distance between you and the rider behind. An attack must be powerful. It sounds as though you are accelerating, but perhaps not with the snap necessary to splinter things. As a cat 4 work on that splintering in some training races, and you will find yourself in some great breaks. Good luck and congrats.

TheKillerPenguin

Yeah you're probably right about that. When I was following others into breaks early in the race, I had to accelerate as hard as I could to make it to them, and the peloton wasn't coming with me. Later in the race though, I think it was just a decent acceleration, not a snap, and they were all able to hang on to my wheel without a problem.

bigskymacadam

time to upgrade? nice. keep us posted.

Hipcycler

Keep writing them up Penguin.....You realize that the only way I can experience what it must be like to think about anything other than hanging onto a wheel in a race is to read about guys like you that can actually 'deal' at times!

Great job!

sarah_k

I did this race. The women's category though (obviously). My boyfriend did the 4/5 race and the 3/4/5 race. Are you on a team?

Sarah

TheKillerPenguin

Yeah, my team is "Windham Mountain Outfitters". I was in Blue and Orange, with a white helmet.

sarah_k

Yeah, I know your team. Binghamton was a great race. With the best weather we've had for a race all year. Different from the rain, hail, and freezing cold at least.

TheKillerPenguin

Yeah, the weather was tons better than it was last year!

BTW, I was watching your race go on while I did some warmup laps. How'd you do?

sarah_k

I did the open women's category and I came in 4th. I then did the cat 4 race and came in 2nd. That second race was tough. Not because it was fast it was slower than the first, but because the hour in between my races fooled my legs into thinking they were done for the day.

How did you do? My bf raced w/ you. He's on the Dick sonne's team.

TheKillerPenguin

Congrats to you!

I still don't know what place I came in yet. They only had up to 8th place marked down after the race, but I'm hoping they have pictures to see what went on. When we were rolling after crossing the finish line, IIRC, I remember counting 11 guys in front of me, so I'm pretty sure I made top 15 even if I didn't see a couple.

DrWJODonnell

I will probably be up later on this year for the Chris thater...there may be a few other races that I go up there to do...I will keep an eye out for ya!

celticfrost

Ah, mid spring in upstate NY -- I'm sure it was a nice course. I tried to explain bike racing tactics to my gf a few nights ago. I can now use this thread as a reference.

Top 5 in cat5 sounds like upgrading in style.

pinky

Chris Thater is a vicious one, money going 20 deep makes people do some nasty things (and I sucked that late in the season last year)

pinky

BTW was the circuit course around a park or elsewhere?

TheKillerPenguin

yeah, it was around an industrial park

TheKillerPenguin

and I might just drag my butt down to the city sometime to see what the racing scene is like down there. Just gotta wait for school to end...