Cool vid.

+1 good stuff.

Another narrated race. Road Warrior 50, cat 4.

Colin still needs to work on following wheels, his sphere, and cornering.
Colin is doing a better job shooting the holes in the field.
Colin needs to anticipate moving to the left side well before the sprint opens up.
Colin's speedometer needs work.

For what it's worth, in the afternoon races they said they would be strictly enforcing the yellow line rules all the way up to the 200M to go sign. Looks like in the video people are in the oncoming lane at 500+m, which makes sense, but isn't what the officials instructed us.

The left side of the field, not the left side of the road (over the yellow).

Yeah, I see what you mean.

I've been burned by that scenario before. People starting the sprint 500m out, across the line, everyone follows but me and a few others stay on the right and end up out of the money while nobody gets dq'd relegated. Burns me up.

Davis Cat 4 110F temps....

I tried to work on staying closer to the wheel in front and didn't quite succeed. It's not that I am afraid or uncomfortable, it's just I have hard time judging effort to keep shorter distance, and I tend to over brake (I think) going in to the corner as to not hit the wheel in front. Went for couple of prims (not in vid), ended up third each time. I had issue with crankset. :( On final few laps started to drift down the line, purely tactical. Same old story. :( In final lap jumped on a wheel of a guy who got two prims, but it didn't look like he was going to advance and was loosing place. Tried to go around him on other side of the field, and a guy in front of me crashed, another to my right crashed, 10:20 in the video. Managed to go between two sliding bikes, but at that point big gap formed to the front of the field. I had nothing left in the tank. Tried to finish as best as I could, but didn't push too hard. The rest of the field was nowhere to be found behind me. I heard there was another crash with two to go which took out bunch of people.
Disappointing race. When I got off the bike I could barely stand. I went through two 24oz water bottles and was still dehydrated and slightly dizzy.

Video is first few laps moving up through the field, and few final laps.

[QUOTE=UmneyDurak;15837884]Davis Cat 4 110F temps....

I tried to work on staying closer to the wheel in front and didn't quite succeed. It's not that I am afraid or uncomfortable, it's just I have hard time judging effort to keep shorter distance, and I tend to over brake (I think) going in to the corner as to not hit the wheel in front. Went for couple of prims (not in vid), ended up third each time. I had issue with crankset. :( On final few laps started to drift down the line, purely tactical. Same old story. :( In final lap jumped on a wheel of a guy who got two prims, but it didn't look like he was going to advance and was loosing place. Tried to go around him on other side of the field, and a guy in front of me crashed, another to my right crashed, 10:20 in the video. Managed to go between two sliding bikes, but at that point big gap formed to the front of the field. I had nothing left in the tank. Tried to finish as best as I could, but didn't push too hard. The rest of the field was nowhere to be found behind me. I heard there was another crash with two to go which took out bunch of people.
Disappointing race. When I got off the bike I could barely stand. I went through two 24oz water bottles and was still dehydrated and slightly dizzy.

Video is first few laps moving up through the field, and few final laps.

Couple quick notes:

-Nice work in the heat, and way to push it through to the finish.
-Generally, this looks a LOT better than your last video. I'm seeing you jumping around gappers and not being as much of a victim, in general.
-In corners, try to follow the line of the guy you're drafting. If you are 8 inches to the left of his wheels going into the corner stay 8 inches to the left of the line he takes through the corner. If you move off that line, make sure it's intentional, to gain or defend position. If you're in a happy place in the field, then just following the same line works great.
-If you touch your brakes going into a corner, downshift at the same time. Every time you brake (other than feathering), you will slow enough that you need a lower gear for the upcoming acceleration.
-That said, you should not have to brake for corners in a flat crit unless you are well back in the accordion or it's a turnaround. Work toward the goal of not braking for corners through comfort in cornering, and maintaining position such that nobody in front of you is slowing (top 10-15).

OK, I worked on some of the things mentioned. I think there is an improvement. Although I might be biased. lol. Did two crits one on Saturday, and one on Sunday. For some reason I had easier time staying on a wheel on a down hill turns in first crit, then on flat corners in second one. Both times started at the back and got my azz to top 10-15, and both times got swamped at the end. Any recommendations, suggestions? Thanks.
First lap, and last few.
last lap

This is an improvement. Good work. Much better following wheels through corners and staying in the draft (mostly). Your sphere is considerably smaller now, which is important.

Notes: at san rafael :35, you came out to move up. If you'd have gone left instead, you could have done 85% of that same gain inside the pack with MUCH less power lost. You ended up spending 28 seconds in the wind, going faster than the pack, but you weren't doing it to get away. Just to improve position. Work on picking through the pack. You should set aside a race for this practice sometime (soon). Start at the very back of the pack. Work through the pack to the front, and don't allow yourself to move up if you're outside the pack. Once you get to the front, pull out and go to the back, and move back up again through the pack.

still getting gapped a bit coming out of the corners, even when you're in the top 10. Don't brake unless you really have to. Make sure you're in a good gear to come out of the corner, and put in the effort to hold that wheel in front of you.

In the sprint, you should have been on the white jersey going up the left. Don't go on your own if you can avoid it. You should probably have anticipated the swarm going into that last corner to latch onto them better. In the corner, you can't accelerate as responsively (which is why you should consider attacking just before a corner in crits).

menlo park last lap: when it's that slow (wide pack) in the last lap, a swarm is coming -- don't be in the middle. You lost a metric assload of position in the last 40 seconds, then went through the last two corners unprotected, taking wind on your own. You've got to take advantage of the work being done by others whenever possible.

Keep working on it -- this was much better.

Try as some might, can't make another inside line on the last lap. Most of us ended up okay.

Yeah, first guy crossed wheels, the some couldn't avoid, but there was another guy on the inside who just overreacted. He grabbed too much brake (probably including rear) and crashed himself out (there was nothing in the way of his line). That guy brought a lot of the pack to the outside with him since their options started to dwindle.

Note that in this case, too much brake is the same as any brake, because I think his line was fine. The guy in front of him slowed a bit, so that may have been an issue, but I think he was out of the line.

Does anyone else think it might have been safer to leave out the cones and let people deal with the manhole covers? Narrowing the course like that is always tough on the lower categories.

To umney,

The main issue i see with you is that you're too complacent in the field. You are fine just sitting still and letting people fly by you. Also your comfort zone is really really small, almost every corner you overreact and let a monster sized gap go. While this can work in the lower cats, as you move up you'll realize that being efficient is important. If you have to make a 1200+ watt jump every corner you're going to fade, but if you can get within inches of the rider in front of you, and stay close you might only need 500-600 watts and you can even stay seated and just spin up your gear.


edit: Also, you seem to be too interest in sitting close to the front early on. top 10 5 laps in doesn't matter as much as top 5 with one lap left (also in the first video you get majorly swarmed, then don't react at all. You should hear a group that sized coming, and instantly start sprinting and take your place near the front, as opposed to 15 guys back. You'll learn as you race more.

Guy in white wasn't cornering, what the heck was he doing? He was only sort of leaned over, he was slowing... I think he was scared of cornering.

Those manhole covers don't look great. I wonder if the race had a crash there because of them so the promoter then decided to cordon them off? The first one looks pretty bad, the second one is super slick looking.

The better alternative would have been to start the cones further out in the road, even putting cones with yellow tape 2 lanes from the curb for 50-70 meters. This way everyone funnels into the corner and it's not a pimple on the inside of the corner.

http://suffervision.appspot.com/v/687001 - with telemetry



5 min from my race at CCCX. My teammate filmed it. The group had been under stress pretty steadily from the whistle. The genesis of the winning break is at 2:10 ish in the video when he just eases off and lets us roll away.

That's Tom Dillon, the guy behind suffervision. Super nice guy and smart racer. This is twice now in a month he's created the gap for my break, then coasted along and won the field sprint to boot.

Agreed, good idea. Take them off the curb way early, and keep the cone line straight for a while.

Does anybody else find it funny that the guy in the white and black, who locks it up with a clear line( who WR is talking about I'm assuming), is the one that appears to get up yelling.

Thank you for the feedback. I'll try to incorporate it in to Sunday Crit. Unfortunately with two races left in the season, I won't get much practice moving through middle of the pack as waterrockets suggested. Well there is always next season. :)

So how do I counter being swapped, or metegate the damage? I am hesitant to move out with people coming by, because that might cause a crash.

You know this is not my first, or even second season racing, would think I learn this by now. lol. Although truthfully due to various factors I didn't really have the fitness to play near the front until last season. Reason for staying near the front is simple, there are too many crashes in the middle. That Davis crit, good chunk of the pack got taken out a lap or two before final lap. Even then I got caught behind another one on last lap. The last video there was a crash behind me somewhere right behind me at some point.

The first races I did as a 3 this year I was shot to the back of the pack. I'd move up and then quickly get cycled to the back. Super frustrating and inefficient. I felt like "why are these losers moving up right now when we will just drop them on the climbs/at the end?"

I never got the answer to my question. I don't know why people show up to races with fitness that is not competitive, but they do, and if you let them take your wheel over and over, it'll wreck your day too.

To prevent them from taking your wheel you have to keep the gap between you and the rider ahead small-to-nonexistent. That means pedaling through corners, or pedaling into corners so that as the rider ahead slows you can trim a tinytiny sliver of speed to match them. It's possible to exit corners with more pace than the guy ahead and not be forced into sprinting out of every turn.

Also, it's really a case of htfu/battle of wills. Keep your bars ahead of theirs. If they are moving up in the wind, move up half a wheel on the guy you're following to the side the people are moving up on. Prevent any gap at all. Move out so there is no line to move up inside the yellow or on the curb. Be a dick about it. That's racing.

At Mt. Hamilton there was a kid who kept moving up on the yellow/just over the yellow. Once, whatever, but on a 70-minute climb I saw him do this 3-4x and it was grating on me. One time I saw him coming so I moved out onto the yellow. On the yellow. He just went a foot wide and tried to ride up. NOPERs. I was irritated so I rode ON the yellow and squeezed him out. He went up so I went up. He was in the wind and after 5 minutes of me filling every gap he wanted (legally, I might add) the moto finally buzzed up and yanked him all the way to the back. He wasn't DQ'd, but he got the warning he deserved and I didn't see him again that race.

"I don't know why people show up to races with fitness that is not competitive, but they do, and if you let them take your wheel over and over, it'll wreck your day too. "

Pretentious much? Maybe because people enjoy racing bikes and life doesn't always align perfectly so that you can have "competitive" fitness.

you've never been annoyed by someone who clearly can't hang but shoots up the sides at low stress moments? Maybe it's me. I dunno.

Highway to Heaven individual hill climb time trial
.be

they're probably just doing their best to stay in the race as long as possible. I move up ahead of guys in p123 races that are way stronger than me just to survive. if i didn't i would be otb on lap 2. If it weren't for the pack fodder all your wins wouldn't mean much.