furiousferret

Great read @tetonrider! Things sounds elite af out there.

PepeM

Sounds like a great experience. In the west of France no less. They are bike crazy out there.

shovelhd

I bet CDR and TKP can relate. Looks like a lot of fun. Reminded me of books I'd read.

TheKillerPenguin

The narrow roads and road furniture definitely, as well as the huge baked goods. There was a bakery I'd stop at in a town called Berchem that sold chocolate croissants the size of my head for 85 euro cents. My stomping grounds were the flemish ardennes and it was really neat to bump into like, Katusha, Astana, Saxo, etc when they were out training. Team Sky stays at a hotel that is only a couple of blocks from my sister's house in Kortrijk, so you'd even see them out and about from time to time. Unfortunately I did not get to race while I was there but every group I rode with was absolute class. I am stoked for and jealous of teton, I would love to get back to the promised land at some point.

aaronmcd

Drove 3 hours to the last road race yesterday. Small fields and 5 guys on one team (AMain), so a couple in our field decided not to show up. We had 8:
5 AMain guys, me, one new cat 2 who has been crushing cat 3, and another 2 Timmy. They started us with the 10 cat 3s so we'd have a bigger field.

Course is 4x18 mile loops, 10+ mph crosswinds, a small rise at the feed zone and a smaller finishing hill off the main course.

Timmy takes off, AMain goes to the front and keeps him out there for a while, me and the other 2 sit behind AMain, and the cat 3s follow us. They eventually reel in Timmy.

Lap 2 one of their guys takes off and the 3 of us sit there hoping he will eventually burn out and the cat 3s will start racing. But AMain decided they didn't want their guy out there anymore so they chased hard through the feedzone and crosswinds, dropping all the 3s except for one skinny climber type guy and a huge diesel that can do 400 watts at threshold.

I wanted a bit of rest before the attacks, so I told the 3s that we were all 1s and 2s and they would get first and second if we stay away. One AMain guy got a flat and the rest of them wanted to keep it slow so he could get a wheel and get back in. But huge guy goes to the front and drills it for half a lap. Still, halfway through the 3rd lap my cat 3 teammate makes it up with Deisels teammate. Both eventually disappear again though (my teammate flatted).

Timmy tries to get away at various times to no avail. Deisel showed his hand so my plan of sneaking away with him wasn't gonna work. But maybe he is done hammering so I attack a couple miles before lap 4. I got 45" up (and a bee sting), but then the motor comes up and tells me "30 seconds, they must have decided to chase". They would catch me in the crosswinds. So I ease to tempo and they catch me at the feedzone.

10 minutes to go AMain's designated late break guy snaps the elastic and a lackluster chase from new cat 2 and Timmy wasn't gonna keep him close. We were beat. We sit around waiting to sprint.

Deisel led it out, but slowed about 35 seconds from the line. I was at the back of our 8 guys and though hey, tailwind, momentum, I should go now! It might have worked if I got the sling past the group, but the group widened just as I was coming to pass, I had to scrub speed, but for some stupid reason I went ahead with the attack. Dammit, why did I do that? The bunch flew past me 20 seconds later.

6th of 8. But still a really fun race!

mike868y

is it just a perception thing or are a lot of the fields out there tiny? how are promoters putting on races with 8 person fields?

aaronmcd

There are a good many 10-20 racer fields. Maybe cuz there are so many races and a lot of guys don't race every weekend. Over 50 is really good. I hardly ever race in a field that big though there are a few big races like that.

This race is way out in the middle of nowhere, no road closures, no police, small payout. But still, the P12 payout was 200 and 6 T shirts, for like 400 in entry fees.

mike868y

even 10-20 is really small compared to out here though. i don't think any of the races I did this year had <30 people in the 3s and usually were closer to 50. longsjo was three days of 100 person 3/4 fields.

Ygduf

it's frequency of races. it's not difficult to get 70 races/year here and more if you continue into cross. The race Aaron did was also 3 hours away, and basically everyone knows that no one goes there so it's always tiny. Probably put it on because the permit is likely incredibly cheap... because it's 3 hours away.

hack

Most of the races out here are generally well attended. The crit series races and the more established road races all get fields of 50+. One of the older promoters in the area has a handful of races that are in the sticks and at odd times during the season or are stacked up against more popular races, so the turnout is low. If you weren't the team that stacked the P12 field in Aaron's race, you were driving 3 hours minimum.

mattm

Yes 10-20 is small. < 10 is crazy small, which I why I was't as crazy/hardcore as Aaaron to drive 3 hours to a race at 8 AM with 8 other people. (although I really thought about it, since I wanted to be 3rd overall in the p1/2 BAR - 5th will do)

But like Fudgy said, the racing is more spread out (over time & geographically). The big races get normal-to-big field sizes, little races get tiny fields.

It's a good problem to have I think.

topflightpro

I'm just impressed that your promoters can afford to offer races with so few racers. Around here, even in the middle of nowhere, it's incredibly expensive to put on a RR.

gerundium

Cool report to read! Hard race from the sound of it.

EDIT: to add some more content here i raced my last race of the season yesterday.

National student championships in amateur category. A 54 km race on a 9,5 km lap with some gentle rollers on the backside and a 3 minute not so steep climb with the finish at the top. Due to the road being throughgoing we sadly could only use one half of the road. 6 laps in total. Because of the very nice weather and the headwind on the rolling part it was quite quickly clear that it would be impossible to get away from the 110 person field. Because we only had half the road on the finishing climb it was very nervous going uphill the first few laps.
It was 3,5 riders wide on the climb and because of that if the front didn't want to ride it would bunch up really bad and be impossible to get through. This made people antsy. Only on the third and fifth lap the field went hard from bottom to top stringing out the field a bit more. Third lap i suffered the most with gaps opening up which i had to close twice and got lucky with two other gaps being closed by the guy in front of me. This was in the top 20 or 30 riders. From teammates reports it was chaos in the back. Out of 110 riders 40+ got pulled before the end. The other laps it would be super sketchy with people trying to move up and getting squeezed due to the lower pace. To mark the half road they had fences set up once every 20 meters. People would get pushed off the course in between the fences and steer back in.

I had decent legs and tried to be up there for the inevitable sprint up the final climb, i was consistently in the top 20 or 30 riders so doing quite good but of course in the final lap it was hectic because of the narrrow finishing climb. With three narrow corners in the lead up to the final climb the pack was like a maelstrom with people trying to divebomb in the turns etc. In this shuffling i turned onto the road of the final climb in maybe 30 or 40th spot. Because of the turn onto the climb it got lined out and i hitched a ride behind another guy who went through the wind past the line and managed to move to a spot around 20th or 25th. Then when the climb started the pace dropped a bit and the pack bunched up.

I could see the front and had good legs and wanted to move up but it was impossible on the narrow road and lowish pace. As the climb started kicking up a bit more the paced started skyrocketing in the leadup to the sprint. This meant it started lining out a bit more but still i was too far and it was hard to move up. I could see my teammate around 10th spot get squeezed bad in the final where he even momentarily dropped his chain. He managed to get it back on nearly instantly to stay in contention up there and was on the wheel of the later winner but his legs were gassed and he didnt have a sprint in him. In the last 600 meters also at around the 20th spot where i was it started breaking up the field and i managed to move up a lot of spots without ever having the space to really sprint all out, just holding the high pace to the line. Even passing my teammate before the final to finish in 11th spot.

so a race on a very nice lap but was made boring due to the conditions and the way the final climb was setup had a large influence in the result and caused a super sketchy final. See the video for indication.

EDIT 2: video of final climb:

mattm

awesome race report!

with those barriers it looks sketchy AF - why were they there??

TheKillerPenguin

Yeah dude, watching that had me cringing anticipating a crash. Good riding!

Andy STi

You look OLD next to all those young guys in the pics!!

Ygduf

barriers and cones give me untenable anxiety. can't even watch.

Hermes

Fiesta Island TT Series Masters 60+ 6/11. 20K course that features 3 laps of Fiesta Island that is pancake flat. First race in SoCal as a resident. It was interesting to ride past the start in a time trial and it felt different from an out an back course or the rectangular course. I got to the last lap and felt like I could up the pace and optimize the effort for the conditions.

Kudos to the organizers SDBC for putting on a excellent race and series. Weather was light winds, low humidity with temps in the upper 60s at 7:30AM.

I was happy with my result and look forward to the next one in November.

gerundium

Barriers and cones were there because of the traffic that had to come down the climb on the right side. Using only half of a road is really atypical here for racing (no yellow line rule type things exist here). This means the course has to be fenced off from traffic.

grolby

Midnight Ride of Cyclocross! Love this race. I finally felt good in a race, cool temps helped as did relaxing and not anxiously trying to train through the weekend. Had top-10 legs, even after crashing my dumb self in the holeshot, but I couldn't get out of my own way and fell down again, twisted my bars around and switched to my pit bike. That cost me a lot of time. Ended up 27th, definitely would've liked to have done better as I had the legs, but I still had a great time. Night races rule, and this course just really floats my boat. No more racing now until the end of October, probably. Glad to finish up my September on a fun note and feel good in a race again.

tetonrider

yeah. i'd been lucky to travel to europe to ride before; racing was altogether different...and better (IMO). recommended.

yes--right up my alley!

it was a road race -- actually a circuit race in avranches (town) in normandy.

thanks. not sure how brave i'd say it was as, well, doing a hobby for fun isn't something i normally associate with 'brave', but i was a bit nervous for it. mostly i did not want to mess up the flow of the race by unknowingly violating some rule or screw up the race for someone that has something real riding on it.

i also didn't want to take a ride in an ambulance and r- up the rest of my trip.

tetonrider

based on my perception and from talking to friends who now live and race in europe they take the attitude that you can have fun, but this is serious business. when you're young and show any promise, you will get FULL support from your local club/town. however, if you reach your mid-20s it's time to find a career and move on with life. it seems comparatively more rare for folks to still just do it as a hobby.

i mean, you CAN do it, but you're going to be racing against the kids who have some promise. they don't chop it up into 5-year age groups with an A and a B group. apparently there was a prize for the top cat 2 rider in the field, though!


was really cool to still see all the hype from when the TdF passed through.

apparently the TdF riders showed up to the area 5 days early; the start was @ mont st michel (google it -- amazing!). my buddy's teammate had the specialized nibali-edition tarmac. he somehow came upon the astana bus, asked for a picture and autograph, then was invited on a training ride with them the next day. they let his mom ride in the team car, and she basically recorded the whole thing. pretty crazy to see him riding right inside their tight formation.

it's so worth it!

thanks -- hard enough for me for sure.

great to read & see your report.

road furniture is real!!

i appreciate all the comments. glad you enjoyed the read.

tetonrider

(a) i AM old.
(b) i was definitely the oldest in the race, by far.

a rider from the local club was honored before the race; it was officially his last race -- he'd been racing for 22 or 24 years. i think he was now 36. had champagne at his house post-race. he's a cop!

everyone else was basically 18-23, 24.

tetonrider

also -- fortunately -- french patisseries do not have any age restrictions.

https://www.instagram.com/p/BKk_jGwg...ken-by=eb_velo

https://www.instagram.com/p/BKoQWtYA...ken-by=eb_velo

https://www.instagram.com/p/BK56E5cj...ken-by=eb_velo

PepeM

Been to Mont St. Michel. Beautiful place. My GF is from Rennes in Brittany, so I know a little bit about the region. Funny to always see Breton flags in cycling races, even far away (saw some in GP Montreal this year)! I'll probably be moving there in a few years, your story makes me look forward to riding over there even more.


The Breton flag, as seen in pretty much any cycling race: