HMF

No, I don't remember anyone screaming at me. I was the one with the camera on his head.

johnybutts

Ah, the Commanche Racing dude? I was following you around for quite a while - strong and good handling. Can't wait to watch the video =)

shovelhd

I've been in this position often. There is no set rule or plan. I have been in the break and had the whole field pulled with 6 laps to go so that we could sprint it out. I have been in a negotiation to sit 250m behind the field with an agreement not to attack and then sprint it out. Most of the time though, you should take note of your break mates and plan on riding through the field. If you have a teammate get them to the front and have them blow the field up for as long as they can. Don't let any of your break mates get away, but get away if you can. That's the best scenario.

Monkeyclaw

Thanks Shovel. I made my way to the front again with some of the break mates (it was tough to tell who was who due to the bigger teams) and stayed there until the final lap. I think I mentally gave in, just happy to have been in the break. Definitely my bad. Next time I'll just keep racing to the end. Live and learn

mattm

Early Bird Crit yesterday, 8th place.

After losing horribly on Saturday, this was a nice turnaround. Decent field even with the game on tv, and a headwind on the homestretch. Great recipe for racing. Guys kept attacking into the headwind and blowing up quickly, so I figured any and all efforts like that were doomed. Dumb. Of course four guys go away and stayed away, so it goes. With my two hours of hilly riding earlier in the day I didn't have the legs to do much more than I did.

I did try to get in a few moves/bridges but nothing panned out. On the last lap I was in the top 5 or so, on the home stretch was 2nd wheel. Jumped and led a few guys out for 4th in the field sprint, 8th overall. Man my ego needed that!!

Jandro 

Nice! The wind was brutal earlier in the morning. I knew I didn't have legs after Knights Ferry so I was on helper duty for some friends. Took 2 full pulls down the home stretch and that was pretty much all she wrote for me. Stayed in the bunch for the rest of race, sat in on the sprint.

chidonchea

The Knights Ferry Road Race Cat 4 45+b A.M. wave. 13.5 mile out and back course for a total of 59 mile. Plus a side trip to check out the longest covered bridge west of the Mississippi.

I had visions of $$ signs during the race. This was my first race that involved prize money for the top five finishers. I sat at the back of our group of 16 for most of the first 45 miles. Three riders began to pull away about a mile before the last turn around. I and another rider made a jump from the back to make it a group of five into the turnaround. A few minutes later another rider joined us to make it a group of six for the last 11 miles to the finish.

I made a suggestion to our group to start a rotating pace line to make our break away stick. After about 8 miles of the high speed rotating pace line my legs were starting to give out. A cramp started on my right calf. I had to sit on the back and started to get yelled at for skipping my pulls. Next, my left thigh began to cramp. Finally, my right thigh began to cramp and I had to drop back. Thoughts of the $$ signs went away as I saw the group of five prize winners climb up the last hill towards the finish. I finished 6th (the first rider without a prize).

mattm

Nice vid - but no video of the break action?

Sounds like you were close to the $$, maybe next time!!

Btw it seems like you're riding otb a lot, is that on purpose? I would think that would use up energy being out in the wind like that..

grolby

I agree with this assessment, I noticed it in the last vid you posted. There's no need to be coy about it, I figure Matt is trying to be polite, but straight up: you're burning valuable energy hanging off the back that far, you really need to close up and ride IN the group. You're also out of position to follow moves or make your own. When you're riding in a small field like that, position is less of a problem, but it'll really hurt you in bigger fields. All things considered, you got a great result in spite of that! Correct the hanging back issue and you could well be hitting the podium very soon.

chidonchea

I didn't have enough memory on the card so I missed the stuff at the end. I like to turn the camera off and on, so for safety I tend to be off the back when filming. Riding a little otb gives some more time to react if somebody up front crashes. I was a little too close to the guy in front of me at EBRR and couldn't avoid going down when everyone hit the icy patch. That was the only time I went down (hopefully the last) in the 30 or so races I've done. Too bad I didn't have the camera on for it.

chidonchea

In the EBRR video I posted there was a LOT of ice on the road. I made it a point to ride otb. i just wanted to finish it safe and not get a dnf. Here is how close I normally ride in a rotating pace-line. The camera sound didn't work that day. Sorry about the silly YouTube music.

Tyrell

New Braunfels Ronde von River Road 4/5B on Sunday. I won!

The pace going out seemed very different than grwoolf's experience in the "A" race. Things were pretty tame from the start with only slight surges up the initial rises. About 8 miles in, a group of 3 got away. No one seemed too worried and I half expected them to fizzle out. But they stayed away for about a mile. Pretty soon, another guy and I made a bridge attempt and I think the pack lost track of us among the carnage falling off the back of the 4/5A race that started minutes earlier. It was hard to even keep track of our breakaway group with all the dropped riders filtering back. Of course looking for the lead car helped.

We were successful in bridging and our 5-man break worked well to stay away. We lost the guy I bridged with near River Rd but our group of 4 continued to truck along. 2 guys on a team (Soler Sports) and 2 individuals. I was an individual. We traded pulls, with the Soler guys pulling longer than us individuals. That was just fine by me. At one point, I glanced back and I swore I saw the pack coming up. Not wanting to be caught, I popped around the other guys saying, "the pack is right there" as I surged ahead. They probably looked back and saw nothing but chased me anyway. I think I was seeing things because a very short time later, we were alone again (and eventually finished with a 2' gap on the field).

At about 1.5k to go, there was a slight rise after a little bridge (not an official river crossing) and I made a move. I knew it was uphill all the way to the finish and gawd that was a long ways... It didn't help that a dropped rider hopped into our group and was challenging me almost all the way to the finish. I didn't realize he wasn't in our race until after we were done. Not appreciated.

I feel great about the win. Looking back, I think the 3-man break would have likely sputtered out if we didn't bridge up when we did. That move combined with the early attack which caught the others off guard were the keys to the day.

waterrockets 

Congrats! Very well played. Kudos for the aggression. Keep it up.

(disclaimer: tyrell and I train together some, and talk about it a lot)

johnybutts

Awesome job Tyrell! You earned it for sure!

mike868y

Sounds like someone's ready for an upgrade

Racer Ex 

Slightly delayed report on the first weekend of racing:

PCCRR: 45+. Guest staying with me from out of town hit the deck on the first lap. Pulled out when the moto said they were sending medical. Banged up and destroyed frame but no ambulance ride. Rode some bonus miles after we got him into the van. It's training race season.

Oak Hill TT the next day. Entered the 45+. 50+ was on offer but no SoCal Cup points for the team so I raced the "kids". Was still waiting on parts for the TT bike; I rode it Merckx on my crit bike. One of those 15 MPH uphill into a headwind/45 MPH back down with a tailwind courses where the TT bike would have been a help. Legs sticky from the day prior and the cold. Ended up 2nd. Would have won the 50+, but the guy who beat me in the 45+ was also racing down for points so there you go.

waterrockets 

Nice work, and lol on the racing down for point situation.

mattm

I suggest you try racing without filming a few times, so you can focus on the race.

Yes crashes will happen but being in the very back can also mean you get stuck behind a huge pileup and split from the field. Crashes are a part of racing.

grolby

+ a zillion. Or buy a better memory card. Make sure you are focused on racing, not on racing and filming at the same time.

echappist

oh you must be so disappointed

mattm

Bicycles Plus Winter Crit p/1/2, Folsom, CA.

7th!! Finally a decent result in a USAC race down here, and in the money (well, Cytomax).

Nice turnout, 68 total for my race. Things started off slow and wound up here and there, but it never got overly fast. No threatening breaks, and I mostly sat in and tried to stay out of the wind.

With about 15 minutes to go I decided to make sure I was up front for the final surges, so I jumped around the side of the field on the backstretch and nestled in to 10th wheel or so. With three laps to go I was still up front, able to follow moves and make sure I didn't get too swamped.

On the last lap I felt great, and was in the thick of the action up front - guys were doing pulls for their team and then blowing up and shooting backwards, which is always a pain to get around safely.. with 1/2 lap to go I thought about going for a jump but didn't have room to get out, so had to wait for the final corner.

In the final sprint I was accelerating past guys but eventually had nowhere to go, had to coast and sit up for 7th. I'll take it!!

Dan333SP

My first weekend of collegiate racing! NC State RR, 2 days, 2 courses (1st day was on a 12 mile, mostly flat course, 2nd on an 8.5 mile slightly hilly loop). I'm a grad student, and my only prior race experience was 3 training crits towards the end of last summer. I was advised by everyone on my team to skip the D field and race in C right off the bat, which was a good choice. That said, yesterday was a 3 lap race on the 12 mile course, and I made the mistake of lining up too late and being towards the bottom of the pack. We had a double yellow line rule in effect for a field of 50, so it was really hard to move up. I felt pretty good and worked my way up into the top 20 by the last part of the first lap, but a couple guys bumped and for whatever reason one of them went down hard at about 28mph towards the front of the field. About 15 of us went down by the time it was all over, one guy broke a collar bone and a couple guys broke their frames. I saw no clear path around the carnage so I went off to the right and hit some soft mud, no damage done to my body. Sadly, someone's shoe ended up in my rear wheel and broke a spoke, so I was done for the day.

After borrowing a rear wheel, today went much better. 4 laps on the 8.5 mile course, I started up front and stayed in the top 5 for the first 2 laps, getting a nice rotation going with some guys I know from other schools. The field of 45 was down to about 25 after 3 laps, but I started sliding back a bit as I just wasn't aggressive enough in holding position. I just wanted to finish the race, and I ended up doing so in the lead bunch of about 20. I was probably 15th or so, but I'm just happy to have finished safely and realized that I have a lot more in reserve than I think (my max HR was only 176, average 140). I'll be racing again this weekend with a focus on improving my cornering and improving my positioning.


https://app.strava.com/activities/40438915

JAX_11

I can't believe that with 6 races already completed in the FRS Florida Race Series there isn't a single race report from the Dirty south yet.

caloso

Cherry Pie E3. Not much to say other than I finished midpack. Nothing to write home about other than the flyer I took in the first lap so I could wave to my wife. Haven't really done any high intensity work yet this season, so I just don't have the top end yet, but I'm a crafty old guy now and I think I've learned how to get around even without the top gear. 314w NP for 40minutes so it seemed awfully hard for February.

Yep

+1 to the OTB comments. It was painful to watch. There wasn't any point at which I saw you drafting. The good news there is that you road a 59 mile race in a solo break.