waterrockets 

Nice work on the high placings ford and Leo. You too botto -- nothing like a good job loss finish.

botto 

thought of you today, with your blurry last 1km tactics.

my result was thanks to a teammate, who came out of nowhere.

there was a break up the road (with another teammate in it). i was hanging around 5-6th wheel, and we were a little over 1km to go.

i hear my name being called. teammate flies past, i jump on. he buried himself. hell i buried myself just to catch his wheel, then hang on.

he dropped off at +/- 550 meters to go. i had to dig, and dig deep (into headwind, and up a bridge). somehow i managed to do his work justice, and hold it for the next 500 meters.

it hurt, but i did make the big bucks. €5.

waterrockets 

Awesome. There's a point, starting about 150m from the finish, where the suffering is so great and pure. That point is what it's all about. I hear people tell me that their "legs gave out" 30 seconds into a WRI. That's not where your legs give out, that's where you stand up and go harder. I like Enthalpic's recent tirade on the topic (something along the lines of "what, the muscle tissue in your legs bio-degraded?")

Nice push for the pure solo suffering there b. Nobody else was trying that hard to get fired.

Grumpy McTrumpy

that was fast.

M35/45+ crit at Syracuse 27.1 mph

back of pack finish. lots of bumping and shouting.

chado445510

Great job! Lots of my friends from the local group ride raced there. Seemed like it went pretty well for you. Congratulations!

Racer Ex 

Or 30 laps out on the points race when you have had enough, and when it gets ugly, you just keep going.

Love the description BTW.

BTB awaits. We're getting the band back together.

kensuf

made money in the morning TT. didn't do too well in the first crit, dnf'd the second crit. Legs are cooked, but I've got a 60 mile hilly RR tomorrow.

bostongarden

Lots of good stuff going on:
Racer Ex -- my read is that there are some Ws on the near horizon
gbot - very cool
fordfasterr -- not bad at all!!
Leo - wow! That is very impressive.
botto - the pain locker.
grumpy - that was fast

tallmantim

Raced SKCC HotDog Crit yesterday, C grade (equivalent of cat 4 generally I think, but this was higher as there was decent cash up for grabs).

86 starters in a 2.2km course.

Pace was vicious after the neutral pace car, and the turn points were on a two lane road - so you litterally stopped and trackstanded for a moment when you got to the corner and then had to quickly sprint back up to 45+km/h (top speeds for a friend who was spat out the back after 5 laps were 48.2, 47.4, 47.8 ,48.5 ,47.5 kph - completely flat and no wind). I led out the first lap from the pace car, to see if the field could be broken up a little because 86 people trying to turn at a 2 lane hairpin was ridiculous - but could not stay too near the front for long.

After about 8-10 laps, I could no longer hold onto the wheel of the last guy in the lead group which was now down to 25 guys (by the end) or so - sprinting up to speed at my weight takes a lot of energy! ;-)

My friend was waved off when he was getting overtaken about 30-35 minutes in and averaged just over 40kmh - pretty high considering, a) he was being lapped and b) you had to slow to nothing twice a lap!

For myself, I was in no mans land for about 5-6 laps and was then caught by the chase group. I tried to get guys there organised to get back in touch with the lead group (and we did make progress, keeping them in sight and getting to the corners just after the group had left them), but after a lap it came back to me pulling with an occassional respite then an occassional turn by a group of guys.

In the end, finished half a lap down on the lead group and the guys I was pulling sprinted for the line. I was pretty well done, so didn't contest the sprint but rolled into the finish with the rest of the group (about 15 guys all up in the chase group).

All in all, I was happy with the race (my first open race - I have done 5 x masters races before over the last few months). There was nothing I could have to better my position (other than contesting the sprint perhaps at the end - but it didn't worry me that much whether I finished 26th or 30th!) - I simply could not maintain sprinting from 0 to 45+kmh continuously; I raced, I led at one point (LOL), I got a chase group organised for a short period of time, I kept the pace going strong the whole time (a bunch of guys got popped from the front group then drifted back defeated) and I wasn't pulled from the race.

bostongarden

Good luck in rr.

Racer Ex 

Hopefully the omnium win at the track last night is foreshadowing some success over the next few weeks. I think I finally got my racing brain engaged.

badhat

hugo RR, hugo colorado, CO SM4 race.

first the course:


second, the weather report from yesterday for hugo: 85 degrees. winds SSW 25-35 w gusts to 40.

(it actually got closer to 90 degrees, and the winds were pretty consistently over 30.)

SM4 rolled out at 10:30. 65 riders. most of leaders from last weekend at Deer Trail were there this week too. the course is such that the first 40 miles is brick wall headwind a bit from the right or knock you over cross wind from the left. then mostly tailwind on the way home.

I spend wednesday of this week sitting in w the local P12 training ride in FC, and got the best crosswind echelon workout i've ever gotten and went into today feeling really good about my ability to ride smart in the wind, so i was really excited that the wind was so intense today cuz my experience is that it would demolish the field pretty quickly once a real move went off.

got to the line i was feelin pretty good and confident after last weekend, i promised myself i'd ride more conservatively this week, stay out of the wind some, and watch the main players for moves. we rolled out, absolutely crawling into the wind. one half ass break goes off be we can see them struggling, not working together at all. and cracking after a couple of minutes. i start taking conservative turns at the front, and even at a reasonable snails pace, the front of the pack is awkward and uncoordinated in the wind, i end up doing like every other pull for a while just to keep the tempo steady. i get tired of doing more than my shareof the work, so i figure i'll go hide in the pack for a while.

that sucked. wind knocking dudes into eachother, yoyoing and braking, dudes crossing the yellow to move up... and we're going like 12mph... and i start reminding myself: just stay out of trouble, someones gonna make a move or pick up the pace eventually, just relax till then.

but after a half hour, i got really sick of it so i though, ok i'm gonna come around the inside, get on the front, and pick up the pace really smoothly, and kinda get this race going. with this kinda wind we were looking at 4 hours on the road, most of that on the front half, i will absolutely kill myself if this is how the next 2 hours is gonna play.

so i just on the front and put a little pressure on. not an attack, not even a surge, just a real smooth tempo bump, and i look back after about a minute....

and i am all alone.

oh come on, guys. i'm not even redlining and i know theres guys in there that can handle this, but theyre conserving. fine. but i cant deal with it any more so now i start thinking: well, if i just watch my effort really closely, stay just inside threshhold, maybe i can stay out for a while, and then get caught after the seperation and the join the leaders and it'll be smoother and more fun.

the moto-ref was pretty awesome through all this, he kept rolling back and forth and giving me split times: 45 seconds, a minute, a minute and a half.... then after about an hour, he comes up and says "hey theres a CU kid trying to bridge up to you, and his boys are workin the front, you might wanna ease up a hair and let him on"

hell yeah! i sit up for a second, the kid comes up, i give him a tow for a little bit, then we start working together really smoothly, and really fast. he's a bit fresherthan i am, as i've been out in the wind along for an hour and hes fresh out of the pack, but we're still going smooth, tempo is good, his pulls are a little longer than mine but i'm doin' my part. we get down to the right turn into the hellish cross wind, and the split is up to 3 minutes. we know this is where the field is gonna start to crack, the wind is RAGING. we're stuggling to stay upright with just two guys, theres gonna be total carnage in a big field.

we are also both dying of thirst and praying for the feed zone. moto tells up we're up to about 4 minutes. this despite having 3 bottles on me. we're half way through the crosswind section when i get a monster cramp up and down my left leg, adductor, quad, calf, all just completey sieze, so i unclip and pedal one legged in CUs draft for a bit. we back off just a hair, but i'm not gonna give up yet. gradually it goes away, and we hit the feed zone. stock up on bottles, and get ready for the tail wind.

this is where i start struggling a little bit. we're on a long flat straightaway with 30mph tailwinds, and i'm on my compact and suddenly i'm outof gears and spinning over 100, and its not enough to keep up W CU. who gaps me.

Moto pulls up and confirms that the crosswind DESTROYED the field, but there 8-10 guys coming up hard. i cant freakin believe i survived 3 hours alone in a headwind only to get caught on a tailwind cuz i dont have enough gears. i fly into the 90 degree right turn, which takes us from tail wind to another cross wind, and really i'm coming intothe corner hot, and push hard on my outside pedal, and another cramp shoots through my calf and i have to sit up to shake it out. the leader group catches me right after the corner, but i jump on with them, and hide out as much as i can. they've caught me and CU is in sight, so they easy off a little bit and i get a recovery.

tricky wind is going from hard cross wind to a bit of a tail wind, and we're stuggling to work together. but i am totally comfortable in the group. itsa pretty similar grop to last weeks leader group, and i'm confident i can finish with thm.

we reel in CU and he jumps on with us, we shed a couple of guys, i try to get a bit of an echelon going, but its not really coming together, so we sort of flail in the cross wind for a while, but no one seems to care, since the rest of the pack is shelled, theres no chase coming, and no incentive to work together really, we're coming up on the home stretch: 20 miles of tailwind into a downhil finish. we're 3.5 hours into a day, and i've been OTF for 2.5 of them, and still, despite a couple of cramps, i'm feeling ok. but then, we turn into the tail wind, and between a minor acceration, and my tank hitting E, i'm finished. i'm dehyrated, dizzy, and more than my legs, my lower back is killing me from 2 hours in a tight tuck in the drops.

CU cracks not long after i do, and the remaining leaders splinter into a 2 man lead group and the remainders in a chase. one mechanical falls off and swears loudly cuz support is nowhere to be found. I sit up and spread my arms to catch some tailwind and give my back a break. i feel defeated and broken and have to keep reminding myself i'm still gonna finish 12th, unless i screw up in the next half hour.

i roll past the 1k sign and see the finish, and see a couple of guys have closed in on me, barreling down, and i refuse to give up two spots after the effort i put in today, so i drop in and hammer hard to the line, holding them off for 12th.

i collapse on the ground and grab a coke out of a cooler and suck it down in 30 seconds. i'm a mess. everyone is a mess.

i congratulate CU on an awesome effort, and i cant tell if hes pissed that i cracked, or if hes just completely obliterated from the effort and doesnt have the strength to talk.

so, lessons:

yeah. theres probably easier ways to get 12th in an 80 mile road race, but theyre not as fun.

i only lost time on tailwinds, headwinds and cross winds i was very comfortable, and honestly believe if the whole race had been into a headwind i would have stayed away.

def need to get a full sized crank and maybe get my cadence up a little bike (i was around 80 for most of the day).

i really do need to try something different next time though. 2 suicide breaks in 2 weeks, suggests i'm not learning my lessons. otoh, i have a feeling i'm gonna be a breakaway rider, i just gotta time them better, and i need to coordinate with some other guys before i go. be nice to have some teammates.

riding with the guys who are winning these things i'm noticing that they have a lot of high end punch but are very surgy, and like to punch it hard for a minute, and then inexplicably ease off for a while and recover. i'm confident that if i could find a couple of other good engines we could really drive a steady tempo that would hurt these guys and change the finishes.

i was hoping for top ten and probably could have played this smarter and ended up there. CU told me he's a sprinter, so it was a big risk for him to go out alone with me and i feel bad that we didnt make it. he was 3rd last week and probably could have been in the hunt this week if we hadnt worked so hard early. he ended up 8 or 9.


but as far as i am concerned, i'm after 3 things by racing: good results are nice, but learning and fun are just as important, and i definitely learned and i definitely had fun.

ZeCanon

bostongarden

Badhat -- I love the effort and the performance. Sure, one could break this down to race smarts and such. But, what I think is great and will endure is the effort. You stayed away for a long time and battled through some tough cramps (and running out of gears). I'm thinking down the road and it all looks really good for you. Sure, debate how much higher you could have placed. I think the bigger story/lesson is the way you are setting your body and mind up for future races!! And, 12th place is still pretty sweet!

badhat

damnit ze

badhat

CU dude was Brett Peters, btw know him?

ZeCanon

Doesn't ring a bell.

You can win these races, and I think you'll win one soon. If you stop attacking in the first 1/4 of the race that is.

badhat

i know i know

i wasnt gonna race the superior morgul next weekend but after yesterday i think am gonna shift the plan a little bit to allow me to do it. i need attack when the big strong guys are gonna follow cuz i know i can wear them out on a longer effort.

Racer Ex 

Badhat, very good job. Take the lessons learned, apply them for the future, and know you're just going to get stronger for the effort; much beeter than sitting in and getting 12th or getting caught in one of the chase groups in the cross wind.

msh1283

Oklahoma State Championship Crit today, Cat 5.

Tough, technical course with a nasty hill. Not playing to my strengths at all. Was just hoping to hold on.

Got a bad start, but the field strung out almost instantaneously. Course went start -> really tight turn (almost a switchback) -> climb, so really strung out, really quickly.

Picked my way up the field, seemed like I got probably halfway through the field, but nobody was getting pulled and I quickly lost track of who was where. Settled into a rhythm with two other guys for the rest of the race. Dropped both of them pretty easily in the sprint, but still no idea where in the field I was.

Seeing the scoring sheet didn't really help either. I got marked twelfth, which seemed reasonable, but one of the guys I was working with got 28th. 12 seems a lot more reasonable, but whatever. Doesn't really matter. Lots of protesting, so we'll see where I end up after it gets sorted out.

Either way, hey, hardest race I've done and didn't DNF. And I got invited to check out some team rides with the team I'm interested in joining, so I'm calling this one a win.

El Diablo Rojo

badhat nice effort and nice report!

cmyke

My experience at Bunny Hop helped me prepare for two things: being ready to start hard, and being in a good position before the last corner.

At the whistle, I was ready to launch. Unfortunately, I started from the second row and got stuck behind another rider who had some trouble clipping in. I quickly maneuvered around him without incident, but it could have been prevented.

It took me about a lap to realize I was in a race, as my legs were saying “I don’t want to push this hard yet!” and I began drifting backwards. Whoops! Luckily, after a few seconds, I snapped out of it and pushed back towards the front end of the field.

Bunny Hop also taught me that it’s tougher to defend a position in a crit, so I was ready for big masses of guys coming up on the sides. I tried to be diligent about keeping contact with the front folks, which paid off with much smoother accelerations.

3/4 of the way through each lap was a neat chicane that really made the race fun. It also was fairly dicey. On the last lap, I got butterflies in my stomach and my brain started saying, “don’t screw this up!” I calmed down and told myself as long as I stayed in the top 10 through the last turn, I’d be okay.

I entered the turn sitting fourth wheel, ready to jump, when the guy leading the pack apparently decided he was coming in too hot and slammed on the brakes. The accordion effect caused a crash, which was thankfully behind me. The survivors started to ramp up the effort, and I was ready.

The first sprint launched with me sitting third wheel. I launched shortly after and drifted past some riders. I crossed the finish line and looked back — the next guy was at least 3 bike lengths behind me.

First place!

My one big problem was picking too tall a gear for the sprint. When I jumped, I could already tell my cadence was too low, and it made the last 50 meters harder than it needed to be. Luckily, it didn’t prevent me from winning, but it’s something to remember for next time.

Lessons:
- When getting ready for the sprint, pick a lower gear that allows for a sharper jump. I can always upshift during the sprint if needed.
- Start the race at the very front so I don’t get stuck behind someone who can’t clip in.

Grumpy McTrumpy

second day at Syracuse

TT felt good. Engine firing well. Placed 8th in 35+ on TT

Road Race had some big guns in it. Very large field for M35/45+ (mostly 45+). Kinda crazy on the fast flat down tailwind section before the first hill with everyone jostling for position. First hill dropped half the field and I hung tough. Race of attrition and I made the cut all day. I didn't have the strong finish necessary to do much on the last climb to the line though, finished tail end of principal group.


I am happy because last year I would have gotten dropped in this race, especially with the horsepower in this field.

Omnium placings Crit 12, TT 8, RR 12. (m35 field is tiny though so these numbers are near the back, except for the TT)

bostongarden

msh1283 - well done on sticking!
cmyke - sweet, congrats
grumpy - all sounds pretty good to me!!

MDcatV

congratulations. i did the P12. 35 miles of criterium racing with a field of 125. it was heavier on the Ps than most of the races i've done. my effin' gawd that was hard. i finished with the pack, which i view as a win of sorts.