climber7

only one princeton rider in the men's A this weekend. i didn't get a chance to talk to him about how it went, so i don't really know anything beyond the results.

i was racing in the Bs for the first time (with echappist). TT was ok, not great - i was about 20 watts off my best 5-minute power, and it was a 5-minute race - but i managed to get a point anyway. sort of front-of-the-middle of the pack (or back-of-the-front, i guess). i thought i had a decent warm up but my legs felt pretty cold at the start.

road race - tough. the first lap was way too slow, as echappist said. everyone was all bunched up. i just barely missed the crash; dodged one guy and a couple of water bottles as i hit the brakes to avoid another going down in front of me. bumped into someone as i came to a stop but unclipped and got a foot down to stay up, then got going again and chased back on. second lap was pretty uneventful. legs started hurting the third time up the climb (almost tied my best 5-minute power on that climb - more than the morning's TT), but i hung on the back of the pack (which was getting pretty small by this point) and got back in there after the top. got dropped the fourth time up, then spent half a lap chasing back on with a teammate and two other guys. made it back, got dropped again, chased back again. stayed with the pack basically until the final sprint, at which point i lost 9 seconds because my legs were dead and i sprint like a turtle anyway, but sticking with the pack was my goal so i'm pretty satisfied. there were about 50 starters and only about 20 left in that pack by the end.

this morning's crit: 0.87-mile loop with a pretty solid hill. most of the lower categories shattered pretty early in their races. sat in the pack for a few laps and actually felt pretty good, so moved up toward the front. at the start of the 8th lap, they rang the bell for the second prime of the day. an army guy attacked up the hill and i decided to have some fun, so i went after him. a couple of other guys came with me. army stayed in front but i managed third for the prime (they go 4 deep). i don't know if anyone else really cared about it, but i usually get destroyed in sprints, so that was cool. went for the next one, too - there were a couple of guys off the front by then but i still managed to get another point. after that, i promptly got shelled and realized i had used up all of my sprint power for the day. struggled in off the back by myself and finished probably close to half a lap back. but i finished, placed, didn't get lapped or pulled, and got some sprint points, so i'm not too disappointed. if i had ignored the primes, i could definitely have finished with the pack, but i wanted to test out my legs and have some fun in the first crit of the season.

good weekend. looking forward to next saturday.

echappist

goddamn, that crit doesn't look fun. Definitely not my type of race, though it'd be great for training anaerobic stuff. Instead, i get to learn all there is to learn about silicon chemistry...

Chapeau on chasing back yesterday. The back side was not an easy place to latch back.

And i surely hope that MIT sandbagger upgrades. Racked up at least 15 points in two days... That, and the fact that the MIT girl chopped my wheel when there's no good reason just makes that team the evil empire of collegiate cycling. Their only redeeming value is that one of their alumnus went on to invent Quarq.

mike868y

Had really good legs today. Went on multiple breaks but nothing stuck. Attacked with 2 to go. Got decent separation, but the long (the crit had long laps) headwind back stretch ate me up and I got caught right as we got the bell lap. I was fried and just sat in for the sprint. My teammate ended up winning the sprint so it's all good in the end!

wanders

Was this Winston?

3kmi

Crashed out of the men's C1 in the ECCC yesterday. Right after the first lap, two guys bumped shoulders right in front of me and I couldn't avoid it. My whole left side hurts like a mother and my right shifter is trashed

mike868y

Yup. Did you race either day?

In other news, Adam meyerson beat the ACCC crit monster by sitting on his attack and then out sprinting him. What a classy fellow.

echappist

sorry to hear that dude.

When the pack is going slow, be extra vigilant. When there's little team organization and no one is attacking, things like this are bound to happen unless there's some hills or stretches of crosswind to thin down the field. But then again, if everyone goes up the first hill at a snail's pace, nothing can be done...

gsteinb

lol

wanders

I was there today in the 4/5 race. Even with the tailwind, at 205, that hill got to me after about 6 laps.

valygrl

thanks badhat. looking forward to reading your report.

patentcad

I thought that was the whole idea in mass start bicycle racing.

3kmi

The pack was moving, I looked over my file today and hit the deck going almost 30. It was right after the finish line, but just before the staging area.

gsteinb

Here's from Adam's mouth:

Tell that kid that not winning when you have 8 guys in a local races would have been more embarrassing than sitting on and attacking wasn't classy. No one would have said "oh, he lost with so much class!" We won the field sprint, so I had no reason to work. Only to win.

mike868y

I only watched the race and don't know the collegiate kid at all, all I know is that he rode away as the 8 mt. khaki guys chased and then attacked again right after they caught him. Kid is a beast.

crazyarm07

I rode the Tucson Bicycle Classic This weekend (CAT 5B).....

Friday TT: 3.2 mile course, kinda windy, thought I tasted blood in my mouth at one point, so I think I may have gone hard enough. Didn't black out or throw up though, so maybe not. Finished 5th in the category though, best result of the weekend.

Saturday RR: 2x 20 mile laps course, some moderate climbing. A few guys decided to really up the pace, I spent most of the race towards the back of the group. I got on the front with about 4 miles to go, and tried to go off, but it ended up just being a really long pull on the front and then I just rode it in. Finished 17th or 18th.

Sunday Circuit: 28 miles (5x 5.6 mile laps), pretty hilly IMO. Again, sprint right from the start, I got gapped about 3 miles in.......so it became a 25 mile ITT for me. That really sucked. On a positive note, I set new highs for all of my power numbers from 5 seconds through 60 minutes. So I guess that's good. Finished something like 18th again.

Overall, really fun weekend, each race was more painful than the last, and I definitely have a lot of training to do. As horrible as my performance was, I really love this stuff. It's great.

gsteinb

Adam was addressing your comment. You're the kid.

echappist

Your speed at the time of accident doesn't matter. It's the average speed as that determine how many people are left in the race. Too slow a speed just means that no one gets shelled out and everyone bunches up.

my teammate won D1 with an average speed of 21.4mph. Your first lap was at 20mph. In other words, way too slow given that there are 40 some kids trying to ride in a very narrow lane.

First lap for the B's was at 19.8mph, which is also way too slow given the size of the field, and I had the feeling that the crash was a question of when and not if. FWIW, the crash in my field took place when we were at 26mph.

First lap for the A's was at 23.2mph, which is more normal.

mike868y

I'm aware.

hammy56

lol...good ****in grief.

man sometimes this place is just too much.

vanno.velo

Rutgers ECCC Race Weekend 1:


Road race:

Basically everything has been described above. Really sketchy riding and people braking for no reason (like going up a hill). I got caught behind 5 crashes, and went down twice, but still managed to stay with the front group until about 200m from the end when a rider in front of me touched wheels with another rider and caused a nasty crash (an ambulance had to be sent). I basically did a front flip, landed on my left side, and got hit by a few bikes/bodies. I got up, put my chain back on, and finished 12th or 13th behind the part of the group that did not go down. The crash broke my left cleat and took a chunk outta my pedal, but aside from a missing contact (weird, huh?), a few scrapes on my left side, my handlebar tape, and my saddle, everything was OK. Disappointing, because I was feeling extremely good to contend the sprint finish...


Crit:

No crashes from what I saw. A teammate went off the front after a couple laps, so me and another teammate sat on the chasing group until the hill on the last lap which basically blew apart our small group. Teammate won, I got 8th for 2 points in addition to 1 point in the first prime. I also set a new best 20min average wattage by about 10 watts, which I'm happy about.


Lessons learned:
1. stay at the front as much as possible to avoid crashes
2. see #1


Also, if anyone knows where to find pictures from the race, let me know. I'll love you long time.

jwible

Confused at the grammar. I guess he covered a break and sat on the guy and then went for the win? Understandable. Same thing happened to us yesterday in the P12.

The kid shadowing my teammate kept acting like he didn't speak English when asked to come around and help. His bio states he's from Slovakia but a student in Miami. Maybe he only speaks Slovak and Spanish. . Or maybe he was covering so that Frank T. could attempt to reel them back in and go for a field sprint, and if not then he could go for the win.

gsteinb

I'll be here all week...tip your waitress.

bostongarden

First race of season in 45+ at Bethel. No complaints. A lot more work to do.

bigmand

Albany Race Weekend (Cat 5):
TT: 17th
Crit: 29th

Like was mentioned earlier, gnarly TT course. The tornado sirens and standing water didn't help the nerves any. Decided not to do the Road Race since I woke up this morning with a touch of head cold (or something of that sort), and I didn't want to go race in 43 degree weather with 25mph winds. Mainly just using this weekend as a gauge to my fitness (not very good apparently). Did better than expected considering I didn't even plan on racing until a week ago. Luckily my next race isn't for about another month or so.

climber7

jeez. congrats just for finishing. and for the crit results, too.

i'll second that.

also, thought i should add to my race report that in yesterday's road race, a teammate of mine in the Cs had half of his crank fall off with 6 miles to go. he rode the rest of the race with one leg - holding up the other foot with the cleat/pedal/crank arm still attached - and still finished 9th.