spdntrxi

Maybe Captain America would have been better ? I've only met Chris once... but hell I thought it would be the easiest way to know it was someone from the forums my bad.. I thought it would be funny.

Ygduf

Sorry. He sat in the catbird seat the whole day, was primed to win, flatted out about 3mi from the finish.

UmneyDurak

Berkeley Crit 4/5 First race of the season for me.

I forgot how much that race hurts. The hill isn't very steep but it's on long side, for a crit. Plus the course is so short that there is no real time to recover. Specially since down hill is in to the wind. Between T3 and T4 there were some really deep potholes. On Lap 3 at T4 guy in front of me crashes, I was near the front, and I couldn't avoid him. Got in got my free lap. Had to explain to the "break" that A) I was near the front when crash occurred and B) that is where official put me.

After two laps plowed straight to through the pothole. A lap or two later found out that my front wheel was loosing air. I did it by almost tucking my front on down hill turn when my front started to slide under neath. Thank God for tubulars. I think on clincher I would have went down for sure. Got in to the pits swapped front wheel and rejoined the "pack". At that point majority either got dropped or crashed out. Had to explain again that yes I did get a flat. Not my day... Was surfing the back when a rider in front of me let the gap open, my fault for being too far back, and I didn't react fast enough. So we slowly got dropped. Ended up 6/25. lulz. Everyone else got pulled and few remaining riders that weren't were lapped at least once.

One of the hardest crits on a calendar I think. Right behind Cats Hill. It's like a Coperoppolis (howerever you spell that) of crits.

mattm

Sucks man.

mattm

Budweiser Sequoia Class crit p/1/2 waaaaay down in Visalia. 200 mi each way, but $4k for the p/1/2 field alone.

14th, meh. $90 richer at least.

No team mates, everyone else was doing the hilly RR or the local crit. Or some stupid waffle ride.

Was in an early move, we got brought back.

Tried to bridge to The Break (that won), but couldn't close the 20-second gap alone. Made it a bit more than half way but just couldn't do it..

Boxed in when I felt fresh on the last lap - my fault, oh well.

Avoided last-lap sketch, on the last corner one guy slid out sending a few more into the barriers, sound like a bomb went off. Bike flew in the air, avoided it and sprinted for 10th in the field sprint.

jdms mvp

finished my first attempt at p123 stage racing. The tour of page county in luray VA. Done it as a cat4 and cat3 fields in the past with 'good' (fun) results. Very tough racing with fast teams represented. I was racing alone so it was very tough mentally and physically for me. Even ben kings little bro came out to race from Cal-giant, he lives close to the area. Learned a lot.... suffered a lot... crashed in the crit after two people in front of me hit pole, his bike flew into road, guy in front hit bike, i hit guy , and blew up my friend's enve 3.4 front wheel ugh..... But i got my 'FREE" lap, dried the blood and set off to finish this tough figure 8 course with tough finishing climb. I was looking mad haggard with 'holy' rapha bibs, borrowed from wheel, etc...ugh lol. Based on the field, my expectations, i am quite happy to leave with my results and had fun hanging with teammates and friends from other teams!

5th in the RR , 12th in TT , 12th in crit, 10th overall (was 8th before the crit, but i couldn't fend off close rivals in the sprint)

got some upgrade points, ate carbs^carbs all week, got some donuts and bbq sandwiches. all in all good weekend!

MDcatV

nice job @jdms mvp, particularly grabbing 12th in the TT against a really strong field. sorry you fell down. i did the 35/45 instead of P123 and only did the RR saturday, 9th.

jdms mvp

@MDcatV, u too great result. Hard racing and thankful that my field didn't get rained on! =)

Ygduf

did you have fun at least? enjoy the drive?

Ygduf

In the day-after retrospective, yesterday was one of the more-fun races I've ever done. Being outnumbered, totally defeating Mike's Bikes, including being a mean person and pushing their ultra-annoying "guy" for the day out of like about 25 times, having a guy with world-champion stripes tell me "come with me on the next counter", then being solo out in front of the race for the last 20 miles playing domestique for the team to take the win against the odds.

I really regret eating my way to 7-8lbs surplus after getting to cat 1, or I was regretting it when I was out solo for sure, but the weight will come off again and now I'm re-motivated to get back in good shape.

It's a fun reminder that I'm not really built for crits at all and that I much more enjoy road races and the tactics and strengths you can wield when you have more than 60 minutes to work guys over.

sijray21

Great job this weekend. That was a VERY full field and racing solo against a lot of those guys and getting 10th in the GC is still great work. I watched the carnage from the side lines as I proceeded to get a horrible start in my 3/4 crit (ended up hitting the first corner near the back and proceeded to get shelled). I heard at one point in the Masters race guys tried to go 6/7-wide in the second to last turn on the 2nd or 3rd lap...

Those 2 pot-holes in turn 1 cause a lot of flats and my teammate cracked his rear zipp tubular on it (managed to finish the race on it though...)

mattm

It's always fun.

Just disappointing to not do better! At least finished in the $$ and with the main contenders, but I wanna finish in front of them..

jdms mvp

yea turn 2 ate up a few tubes and wheels on the day =( . I watched the 3/4 race unfold. Good racing! and glad it was sunny for the crit!

drider85

Had my first Cat 3 race as I upgraded end of last year. I did a 8 corner Crit here in Michigan. I was hanging well and was in a little 3 man break for a few laps. However the harsh wind and a weak link for was to much for us. I rejoined the group. With 2 to go I moved up. An experience got the better of me. I got caught flat footed on the last lap. From most of my other CX and XC racing I am trained like pavlovs dog to hear "last lap" and a bell. This race was announced as "1 to go" as the last lap and there was no bell. Being dense as I am it didn't trigger until it was too late, a long straight 2 corner and a short sprint to the finish. I picked up 4 spots before the corners and two on the short sprint. I ended up 12th of 53. Its tough to know I had a lot in the tank. Oh well next race up.

Make me feel better or more like a dense new roadie. How do they call last lap on most races. 3-2-1-last lap or 3-2-"1 to go". Does 1 to go = last lap always?

shovelhd

Yes. The bell should take precedence over the lap cards but it is your responsibility to watch the cards and know which lap you are on. When I am ringing the bell I also hold up one (nice) finger but it's not required, I just do it because it's another indicator.

jsk

Fayetteville Stage Race M35+ 4/5


Stage 1 - Saturday Road Race - 34mi single loop course
Start got pushed back multiple times due to thunderstorms that kept popping up. 8:00am start turned to 10:15. Sun came out so course was damp at start but dried pretty quickly. I expected an agressive pace given the shorter distance. There were some surges coming out of turns and at the hotspot, but no serious breakaway attempts. Yellow line rule was in effect for finish and I wasn't in position to contend for top-3 finish (for bonus time), so I played it safe and finished with the pack.


Stage 2 - Saturday Time Trial - 8.9 miles, rolling hills
I had a pretty decent idea what my target power should be from fairly recent 20-minute FTP test. At first I was frustrated that I didn't seem to closing on my 30-sec man, but as the TT went on I realized we were both gaining on other riders. I ended up passing 3 riders, while finishing about 5 meters behind my 30-sec man. My avg power faded a bit on the last section with the larger hills, but I was able to finish strong and ended up winning the TT.


Stage 3 - Sunday Road Race - 49 miles, 3-loops
I had a big enough lead in the GC that I didn't have to worry about the KOM or race-finish bonus times. As long as there wasn't a successful break, all I had to do was finish with the pack. Unfortunately, covering breaks as an unattached rider with no allies was a tall order. First time over the KOM hill two riders broke away and opened up a gap on the field. A third rider bridged across. I decided to give chase and ended up bridging to make it four, but they were already fading and the pack brought us back in. Second time over the KOM, another 2-man break only these two had put in strong TT performances and had the potential to stay away. I was a little too far back in the pack to respond right away. By the time I worked my way up and tried to bridge, the gap was too far. Back in the pack I was frustrated that nobody was willing/able to work, they seemed content to let the break ride away out of sight. I ended up going to the front and pulling for almost 10 miles, but was unable to get the break back in sight on my own. Ended up finishing with the pack, almost 3:00 back from the break. My GC lead had turned into 3rd place. Still on the podium, but it was bittersweet.

Higher Class

A little overdue, but I've got a cold, I'm bored, I haven't race since, and I didn't see a writeup on this race, so...


Florida State Criterium Championship - Brooksville, Fl - Cat4

This was one of the first courses I ever raced and I knew it was going to be tough. Our field was around 50 deep. I had two teammates who both recently upgraded from the 5's.

I was late rolling off the trainer to the start line as usual, so I was starting toward the back of the pack. There's a nasty cobbled climb that I knew would split up the field, so I started scratching my way to the front. I was thankful I had chosen to get a healthy 15 minute warmup in. By the second lap I was sitting top 10. Dope.

Unfortunately both of my teammates got shelled pretty quick. I sandbagged for the most part, watching attacks go up the hill and get caught. A 2-man attack went up the road and pretty quickly gained 15 seconds. It was only halfway through the race, but something had to happen. I pulled around from 8th-ish wheel during the fast section. To be honest my plan was to do a hard TT-effort pull on the front, but I instantly had a gap and I decided to keep the pedal down. I stayed away for a few laps and was closing in on the breakaway. I was feeling fairly cooked but really confident. Then on the climb I looked back and saw the group approaching fast. Since the gap was so small to the breakaway, I decided to sit up and let the group catch me. But as soon as they caught me, the pace slowed and the gap opened back up to the break. The 2-man ended up sticking, I was in a crap position coming up to the sprint, and I finished 9th.

I'm not going to rattle off excuses, but the major thing that confused me about this race is that nobody went with me on my move. Even with one other person we could have caught the break with ease. Oh well. This was my last race as a cat4. I'm hoping that people will be more antsy to jump on moves in the 3's.

carpediemracing 

In the Tour du Pont or Tour de Trump there's a gleeful discussion by the director of Coors Light, Len Pettyjohn (I think it was him, at least I remembered his name). He's discussing the work one team was doing to cover moves (Lemond's Z team so it was du Pont). He says pretty matter of factly that the PDM guys were attacking the Z guys to break them. "It can take days" is part of his analysis on breaking the team. I love that quote.

Or Roy Knickman in the Tour de L'Avenir. He goes on the attack in a long crosswind stretch of road. After 20 km pounding huge gears he turns around to see who's left on his wheel. One guy who's shaking his head, he isn't gonna pull. Knickman stays in the gutter for the next 20 km, turns around. "If you don't pull through I'm gonna keep you in the gutter." The other guy started pulling through. They won by 5 or 8 minutes or something like that. Heh. Unfortunately Knickman got sick and Indurain won the overall.

Wylde06

I wanted to do this race, but the ~3.5 hour drive made that decision for me. Maybe one of these years.

canuckbelle

Woooo! I won the Women's 3/4 race. There were only four of us, but no weak points and there was an attack from the whistle. Lots of attacks with lots of tactical riding in between. I did ZERO work (except to chase down attacks--I only significantly chased down one, we had gapped the other two, but I didn't care to work). My race plan was always to wait for the final sprint. I knew I could out-sprint the others, so there was no reason for me to work for a breakaway. The two other stronger girls didn't like that very much, but whatever. They'd attack, I'd pull them back, then they'd want me to do a pull while they recover. Uhh...no. You attack, you suffer. I made sure to put all three of them in front of me going into turn 3. I followed one wheel while the wind up started, then got around her into the final corner: I was head to head with the other strong girl. But as soon as we came around the corner, I gapped her almost immediately. I sat up well before the line (maybe a little too soon). SUPER happy with my race. I wouldn't have changed anything!

revchuck 

Way to go, CB!

mattm

congrats!!

valygrl

Niiiiice.

Wylde06

First race last night on the TT bike (which is also the first time ive ridden this bike hard like this), first official club race of the season. Took 2:20 off my road bike pr on this course. And now I want to buy all the rest of the aero things, and do all of the TTs

furiousferret

Solid job @Wylde06