homebrewk

Place in the top 5 in a crit.

carpediemracing 

So after a bunch of friends talked and emailed me over the last few days, I'm readjusting my goals.
1. Convince myself to downgrade.
2. Have fun racing with a highly experienced, highly motivated, extremely unselfish team of Cat 3s.

I'm working on #1.

I realized that as a 2 I'm not going to be having fun hanging on crosseyed in the P12 races. I'd miss the Cat 2 Somerville, okay, but that's it. The other races - M45+, P123s, I can do those as a 3.

And all my close friend teammates are 3s and have no aspirations, at this point, on upgrading. I can't race with them as a 2 (they're generally too young to race as M40+).

I'm no pro, I race to have fun, and fun means tactical machinations with like minded tactically minded racers. I'd spend a lot of time working for others, but that's a huge part of what makes it fun. It's a team show, not a solo one. I'll have to think out loud more in a post.

substructure

Win a Masters crit.

ancker

For racing:
Upgrade to a 4.
Finish (most) races in the pack.

Racer Ex 

Downgrading from 2 to 3 at your age, if those are your goals, is a bit of a no brainer in a lot of ways. Not a lot of impact on your racing schedule or goals for Master's stuff. It's actually a lot easier if you haven't been killing the yutes in the 1/2 races... there's a few geezers (I'm probably in that group) that would elicit a bunch of "sandbagger" groans by downgrading.

It would be tough for my ego to take the uno off my license. 2 to 3 would be a lot easier...WR did it and has no regrets.

carpediemracing 

I'm not a strong rider by any means; if I was I'd have been a 2 a long time ago. There are other factors too, but basically I want to have fun in the next few years.

I'm still convincing myself on the downgrade part - it's just a matter of accepting the fact. One of my new teammates was the guy that asked me why I upgraded. I told him I was never a 2 and wanted to have a license with "2" on it. He understood - he took care of that when he was young. He's one of the main reasons I want to downgrade - we've been trying to race together for probably a decade, maybe more, and when the political gears worked out just right, with life situations just right, he joins as a 3 and I'm a (very unsuccessful) 2. If I downgrade we'll have at least 5 guys who will probably show up at every similar race, family/spouses in tow, and all of them would be good "if I only had one teammate" type of teammates.

Throw in two uber strong cross guys (3s on the road who can ride) as wild cards, the less consistent 2-3-4 Cat 3 guys, a few wild card guys (mainly road racers), and it'd be a lot of fun racing.

I basically got my butt handed to me in the races this year. I was off, okay, but it was crazy bad. Although I'm working on it, I don't want to depend on another radical winter of dieting/training to get into shape.

mollusk

My goal for 2012 is to want to purchase a 2013 racing license.

agoodale

Small goal...

Just 1 cat 2 upgrade point.

shovelhd

I think you know the answer. It makes a whole lot of sense.

ridethecliche

Why don't you do an almost radical one so you can have even more fun in the 3's.
If your goal is to be able to contribute better to everyone else as well, then you'll have more fun doing that if you're in similar form to last year.

Or you can burn yourself over the winter and race the P/1/2 races and hang on for dear life.

Up for you to decide which scenario sounds more fun. Last I checked, you were never the guy with the ego

rkwaki

No that's me

waterrockets 

+1

Doggus

New team strategy?

carpediemracing 

I have an ego, it just got shelled a long time ago

Seriously though, although I figure I'm an okay guy, fighting for position and doing a field sprint isn't something done without some level of competitive fire, some level of "I want to smash legs today". It also requires significant self belief to line up at the start of a race with 4 or 5 or 6 guys wholly dedicated to bringing you to the line first. I think that self belief defines ego.

I know what you're saying though. And yes, racing is more than just winning, it's part of my life. I don't want to grovel through life.

I'm still thinking semi-radical winter regarding diet. I'm still eating more than 10-15g fat per meal, 30g fat per day, which was my self-imposed limits in winter 2009-2010. At the time I regularly dipped below 1800 cal/day, once eating 500-600 cal at night so I'd be close to 1600-1700 for the day (and I didn't subtract calories for riding). It was crazy, a descent into quasi-anorexia I think. I stopped at 155 lbs because I was too weak to train much, and by the time I came back from SoCal I was 158 and getting stronger weekly.

My SoCal trip is out for 2012 so I have to figure out how to get my goal 30-35 hour week in while in CT. I suppose I could just ride 5 hours a day, but it's easier to do that when it's warm out. Whatever, it means my training will be much less intense compared to past years.

So my semi-radical goal is to go below 160 lbs, try and get some reasonable training in (a 21 hour week sounds pretty tough in CT in Feb), and go to Bethel with pretty much no sprints in my legs.

My best-wish plan is to have a Rock N Road type conversion done to my trainer and go to Bethel with some sprinting legs.

Enthalpic

That sounds like a miserable way to lose weight. I pretty much do the opposite: eat fat, protein, fiber and avoid junk carbs except for high volume or intense days.

carpediemracing 

Actually it probably is. I'm talking with someone about probably something like what you describe.

I did eat a lot of fiber and protein, but I focused on extremely low fat. Fruits, tons of veggies, turkey/chicken, some carbs. Yogurt. Coffee.

Hm actually that doesn't sound all that bad. Heh.

Debusama

1. Win the Wenatchee Omnium (Cat-4)
2. Make Cat-3
3. Global domination.

It's got to be in that order because I'll never win Wenatchee as a Cat-3 (probably not a as a Cat-4 either, but I gotta set the bar somewhere), and once I'm the supreme ruler of the earth, I'll have no time for silly bike races.

rkwaki

Why not? Don't sell yourself short...

Debusama

Actually, I do think I've got a pretty good chance to win Wenatchee. The course is well tailored to my strengths. I just didn't want to jinx myself by sounding overconfident. I definitely have my cross-hairs on that race for 2012 though.

mattm

Probably because some 15 year-old cat 3 from Canada will come down and lap the field in the crit? At least, that's what happened in the 3's there last year..

Seriously though, you are right - when I upgraded to the 3's I figured it would be a few years before I won anything; instead it was only a few months. If you get there by points it means you're strong enough to win something, at least that's how I look at it.

Creatre

- NOT wreck
- Find a local Team and some fun guys
- Upgrade to Cat 3
- Get a Win in a RR
- Get a Podium in a Crit
- Increase FTP to 300w+ (4.8w/kg+)
- Increase 5s Max > 1000w
- Hold steady with < 140lbs and not get sick
- Top 10 in Assault on Mt Mitchell, NC
- Have some fun and win some Fred Rides/Races in the Fall

Mainly just continue to enjoy cycling, race when I can, and be back for 2013.

JAX_11

After just getting into cycling in april and doing my first race in august which included a podium in my first road race and upgrading to cat 4 for the state road race championship. My goals for my first full year is;

1) get better with cornering at higher speeds
2) get my upgrade points to cat 3 as soon as I can (if its possible). Then finish out season in cat 4 before upgrading.
3) if I get my upgrade points I will then try some 30+ masters races with my teammates I train with.
4) do good at superweek. It will be my first out of Florida racing.
5) have fun and be safe.
6) see if I can learn something from "BOTTO" seriously.

Crash716

Help teammate to CAT 2, Top 5 one race…then go from there.

hammy56

fixed.

carpediemracing 

Ultimate Cat once again.