Hey everyone,
I'm brand new to cycling, just started about 3 months ago. I'm looking to race in a circuit race for the Sea Otter Classic at Laguna Seca in April. Obviously this would be my first race and I would be a cat 5. What kind of pace should I expect? It's a 50 minute race. Figured that waiting to do a race, primarily for fun, until April would give me enough time to gain some experience and get my legs conditioned. So, what do you guys think about for the pace and what type of training do you guys do for a circuit race?

Try doing a search on this subject in the racing sub-forum. Theres tons of information regarding racing and training...and go here:

https://www.bikeforums.net/showthread...s-a-tip-or-two

...

"Pace" is irrelevant. It matters in running, not cycling.
In bike racing, you will go 20, and 25, and 30 and 18 and 22, and 17 and 27 and 19. .... in varying amounts, for varying durations. And then a sprint at the end.

17.2

...I mean 25.4

19.6?

still drunk?

Kmh right?


OP Homebrew is correct, it all varies. In Cat 5 there I have sometimes seen a tendency to go hell for leather from the off.

You're bigger concern with Cat 5 should be staying safe.

Just do it, it's never as bad as you think.

I'd love to ride the corkscrew on my bike!

Agreeing with everybody else. It isn't the average pace that kills you. Its the fact that cat 5s as a whole suck at cornering and slow down from 25 to like 12 for corners that could be taken by yourself at 20, then sprint up to 25 before slamming on the brakes, crossing wheels, and yelling "INSIDE" going 6 wide into a 90deg corner... Then repeat, over and over. Also some people will be seemingly going in reverse through the pack, and inevitably you will have some soon-to-cat-up but brand-new triathletes or whatever who will be off the front or pushing the pace the whole time.

The best strategy in a cat 5 race is to go off the front (as long as you can and as many times as you can). Half the field won't know how to work together to to bring you back... and the other half will get dropped off the back when the pace hits 30+. If you're not strong enough to go off the front repeatedly or stay away for good periods of time, your best bet would be to sit in no further back than 5th to 10th spot.

Do the Early Bird series in January for race experience.
Last years flyer (this year should be similar): https://www.velopromo.com/ebcr-ent.htm

About 40 km/h.

this

you get to ride in a controlled group for 45 minutes in a kind of race simulation. If you don't feel like racing, then you can go home. If you do, yea, another "race simulation" although the second one is more real and much, much more likely to break your bones

Another vote for the Early Birds.

This guy or gal nailed it. This is your answer OP.

Or at least once.
When I was in 4, I had only one of those in me per race so I'd try to do it in the last couple of kms.
Turned a lot of mid-pack finishes (I had a poor sprint) into respectable ones.
The best part was throwing off the better sprinters, of whom I was jealous.

also, OP, you mention that it's 50 minutes. If that's your first race-pack experience, there's a good chance it'll be more like 8 minutes (or less). Like it says everywhere on the forum, it's not the pace that kills you, it's the part where you go from 22 to 28-30mph. If you haven't "riveted" yourself before, learning the skill while trying to concentrate on not crashing in a pack probably won't go well. It's nothing to be ashamed of, but figuring out how hard to go in a crit (sometimes it's REALLY hard) is something that you generally don't learn the easy way.

I will resort to my standard reply about what's racing about/like.

If you want to know what your first race will be like - go have a buddy kick you as hard as he can in your junk. When you can see straight again - if you can contemplate having him do it again then you're ready to race.

The only thing that separates that experience form a real race is that it's only missing the sheer terror of riding within a few inches of sketchy riders as you head into a corner.

You will never push yourself hard enough to "prepare" for a race. Ride in a group first. Then ride in a fast group. It is simply impossible to simulate the intensity and spikes alone.

The difference between road racing/crits and something like running or a triathlon is something like this:

In a tri - they give everyone a medal and pat everyone on the back, "You FINISHED! How AWESOME! We're so proud of you!" - not unlike giving a trophy to the last place little league team because "they tried".

In a Crit - you get to deal with a registration person who is either in a foul mood or clueless. Pay an amount that when back-calculated as fun/minute is on par with illicit pursuits. Line up next to a bunch of 120# college kids and 400# master racers who are all stacked into a starting bunch like a herd of bulls who just smelled a cow. Accelerate like you were trying to launch a vehicle into orbit, go cross-eyed, see spots, go again, Faster??? really? ...and then pop. Come around and the official will give you what I like to call the "superweek salute" (a sweeping motion with the hand across the neck - the universal "you've been cut off" sign) and loudly call out yuor number as you go by - as though he's calling out the tag number of a bull that came off the herd and should be sent to slaughter.

....then you won't get placed and there will be no record of your poor performance, or that you even got out of bed that day.

...and allyou will be thinking is, "When's the next race?"

DFL>DNF>DNS

I agree ...ZXiman gave a good answer on what to do...

As far as adressing the pace... Cat5 is as inconsistent as racing gets. You'll have the guys who are naturally gifted - some might have been riding strong for 5+ years and just now decided to start racing ... then you'll have the true newbies that can't hold a "C" pace in a group ride. Cat5 races are rarely slow - there's just fewer really fast guys. Don't expect that because its a beginner level that the pace is that much slower.

One other point to add to the comments above. If you have the option, ride a junker bike, that's advised. I wouldn't go riding my prized sled in a Cat5 race - especially in a crit. Make sure you have health insurance too

depends on the pace but the years that i have done it , somewhere between 5 to 8 laps, the hill gets old after 3 laps. and if wind is blowing corkscrew is very nasty to come down in the cross wind as you hit 50mph at the bottom

search the racing sub-forum here and read the stickies, but i'll just put up my first cat5 experience. i was told to stay in the first 1/3 of the group (there were about 35 people...not too bad IMO). so i tried to do this since it was only a 12-lap, 15-mile race. not having anything more than 3 weeks of riding prior to this i blew up about 1/2 way into the race and fell off the back before getting lapped by the field in the last lap. the race-pace was exactly as it was stated above where it ranged from about 29 mph on the straights to 12mph in one of the up-hill corners of the race. my average pace for the first half was about 24.5 mph and my average for the second half (a clear decline after analyzing the data from my Edge) was just under 20 mph.

preceived exhertion throughout the race was high, consistently as i usually average about 175 to 180 bpm on a good 30-mile workout and my average for the race was right around 185 bpm.

i did witness a crash on a straight...he was by himself...how it happened...i have not a clue (and i even saw it).

my advice - continue riding and ride a lot. my usual ride is a 30-mile loop that usually lasts about 1h40 to 2h00 depending on if it's a hard day or a recovery day. sometimes the recovery day is a shorter distance. about one a week do a group ride so you get familiar with riding in a group. when you start a structured ride practice have intervals and pryamid practices in there so you can simulate the decel and accel that happens in a crit. i've been doing this (sans the intervals and pryamids so far) and i think i've greatly increased my ability in a past 3/4 months. i'm practicing for this coming season in 2010 as well.

It's better if you just pre-reg and don't think about it, just ride. You can't prepare for your first race outside of riding before hand and signing up.

I LOLed.

All good info/advice, but this sums up my race experience to date:

Also, in my limited experience, I haven't seen anything like a CAT 5 'pace' in any race I've done or witnessed. If there was a pace, it lasted for seconds before the insane yo-yo effects of the constant surges of speed and inevitable slow downs took hold.

Mine has been more of a kicked in the junk type experience.

Thanks everyone, that helped put somethings into perspective. ZXiMan, thanks that sounds like a plan.