da Tour

I'm easing out of my self-imposed embargo on race blogging, on account of all the thoughts swimming in my head. There's only so much you can explain to a patient wife; the rest has to go somewhere. Why not here?

It only took a few years longer than expected, but we finally got around to doing a proper stage race, the first Tour of Galena. My fitness is off this year on account of my off season injury and surgery, but I managed to get some miles in, so I was looking forward to it. I fancy myself more of an all rounder, so I thought it would be interesting to see how I stacked up in the omnium. Plus, Brian's white hot right now, so we had a real contender to look after.

Things that went right:
I headed out early, pre-rode the TT course, drove the RR course, and built up a tent for the bus dwellers, since I had a feeling they would surface well after dark. My aero wheels were undergeared for the climb, so I was happy to find that out ahead of time and rolled with a mixed pair.



First thing to go wrong:
I drilled the first half of the TT, but at the turnaround, I made a mistake (apparently the kind that triathletes rake each other for!) I came around the barrel nicely, and using every inch of the road, I bore down for a standing start at the edge. A little sandy gravel was hidden on the surface and my rear wheel went sideways under the power stroke. I hit the dirt, and recovered quickly, but it killed my time. I finished 24th of 42. Not too bad considering, but about 23 seconds out of the top ten (and the points that came with it). I have a surprisingly bleedy scalped knee.

An Iron Cycles guy noted the irony that that a couple weeks ago I did 65 miles flawlessly in the gravel (and won), and this weekend, I did a couple seconds and hit the deck. C'est la vie.

Brian killed it and Al Pearson, fresh off a year of grad school, finished with him in 4th and 5th. A genetically gifted Toftoy brother killed us all, but I take some solace in the fact that he beat all of the P/1/2s field as well.

I didn't have high hopes for the RR, but I hoped to hang on to the main field longer than I did. The kickers were ok but the steep climbs got me. To think I used to sprint up rollers all day on a 53x16 back in Atlanta. That was 25 pounds ago (on a good day) but hey, I probably couldn't crack 600 watts back then, right? I fell in with a strong dude from Bellum and before long, two teammates in Al and Josh. The four of us hit lap two with a few xxx'ers and independents chasing.

We had a solid rotation going with Bellum outclassing us a bit in the power department, but we all worked our asses off. We spent a little too much time re-carbing and got caught by 4-5 chasers. This killed the collegial vibe, as not one of the newcomers would take a quality pull.

For some reason, I had discovered that I could hold a solid pace in the 27 on the steep hills, then miraculously around the midpoint, just take off. Great, NOW I find climbing power? I did this once to see if we could shed the wheelsuckers, but no one came with me. I went with it and solo'ed for a few miles, but got caught. I did it again on another hill and got caught after a few miles. My teammate joked about me going for a solo breakaway and I replied "I have to do what the legs tell me to do." I'm not settling in for comfy ride to the line.

I decided to make the last attack count, and just past the vineyard, I found my magical climbing power halfway up the hill. My breakmates inadvertently fueled it, as they settled into 'this sucks, are we there yet' kind of chatter. That shit makes me crazy in races, when people get into a group ride 'just get home' mentality. Frankly it makes me want to attack, so I did, and it stuck for a good long time.

A few miles later I was caught by a xxx'er and a Rhythm guy. 2-3 miles from the finish, I just decided to take soft pulls and watch the distance. xxx was in front and as soon as he figured out that no one was pulling through, we came to a little hill. He motioned for someone to pull through and I attacked. A little digger and I look back to see Rhythm on my wheel and no one else.

We slow rolled it a bit, sizing up the match sprint plan, and passed inside the 1000m mark. He coasted a bit and started stretching his glutes and calves out of the saddle. It was a little earlier than I wanted to jump but I couldn't let the opportunity pass. I went full gas and caught him off guard. It wasn't a huge gap, but it was enough. Up, down, left, right, and held it to the line.

Man I miss road racing. Battling for 30th feels great, until you realize...that it was a battle for 30th.

Brian got a flat, found no Campy 10 speed in the neutral wheel truck, and ended up taking Andrew's shoes and bike. He held on for 25th, his shot at the W and the Omnium were gone. Mike held on for 13th and Max for 18th or so.

My legs were trashed for the crit but I kept telling myself 'so are everyone else's.' Apparently that was not too true as the pace was a solid 27-28 in both stretches for most of the race. My long slow training plan showed and I was out of jumps after a dozen laps. I managed to stay in the pack and dodged crashes to finish 21st. Meh. Brian got second and after being in the top ten all race, Josh went down and killed his frame in the process. Double Meh.

I figure I finished around 31/42 in the Omnium but if I pretend I didn't crash in the TT I could have finished 26th if I'd gotten a single omnium point. Not too bad considering my fitness, but man, exhausting and taxing to say the least.

The ladies pretty much rocked it. Daph got 2nd in the TT, did the road race on a frickin' 23 toother in the back, and then she and Marie pushed the pace relentlessly in the crit to hurt the field. Daph got 3rd in the crit and 3rd in the omnium. I almost forgot that they were doing their 2nd and 3rd road races, but they have a lot of track experience. Jannette wasn't feeling it, but she's still sort of recovering from last year's crash, having just gotten a dental implant last week. She felt like her body was trying to generate bone, not race bikes.

The crew was in prime heckling mode, we didn't get ticketed for open containers, Jeff killed it in a Karaoke duet with Newt (then raced the crit the next day), and in general, a good time was had by all. Can't wait to do it again, just not any time soon.

vive le 2008 road season

No more alleycats.

It started as a crazy idea to race a crit on a single speed. But roadies are such dorks. LT, HRMs, watts, weight weenies, base miles, the kinds of things that can take the fun out of riding a bike...finish midpack, ok, I can do this. Maybe a time trial? I shaved my legs. I totally better back this shit up.

I need a road bike. Raid my 401(k), troll ebay, drive solo to Iowa for two races, come home with two medals. Sweet, I'm gonna tear it up.

Sadly, that turns out to be my best showing for most of the season. Join a kickass team. A little rough around the edges, brings it strong sometimes, and long on style. I'm not a bandwagon-jumping, rah-team type of guy, but they were the first team I've seen that made me think...yeah, THAT'S where I belong.

Little lessons, tiny mistakes, shine hard here and there, but when one small thing goes wrong...nothing. Excuses abound. No hill training, I neglect my bike, everybody gets stronger and my winter conditioning doesn't take me the distance anymore.

Whatever. It's fun. Lots of things go right. I took the penultimate turn at Downer's harder and faster than everyone in my heat. I absolutely threw my bike around the descent at Snake Alley. I stayed out of the red zone at Whitewater and saved it for the sprint. I took a few hard pulls out front that earned me the right to point at a spot at 5th wheel and say "coming in." I slipped off from the family just enough times to get my upgrade to cat 4.

So it is with some relief that I made it back to the podium this past weekend. ok, it was a beginners' heat. In ABR. In a time trial. (Technically, I've had less than 15 mass starts, so I can, in good conscience, race that division in ABR.)

But...it wasn't a gimme. There were some strong riders out there...some guys 15 years my junior, some with all the high end gear that can shave a minute or two off in the course of 9.8 miles. I dusted off the single speed and killed it in 22:56, for second place, averaging 25.6 mph. (It would have been good enough for 10th in cat 4, but I think I would have gotten over my laziness and set up and tested a proper TT config for cat 4.)

Our team aspirations of putting someone on the overall podium in the Fall Fling weren't panning out. Rather than show up for the final stage running low on money, time, and energy, I decided to go out on a high note.

and so. Adieu.

things you can learn from an 8-year-old

If you raced, and you didn't win, you'd better have learned something. Yesterday I learned what my daughter does at every swim meet: when you're doing multiple heats, write your start time and race number on your arm with a sharpie. It'll save you from getting to the line three minutes late.

With that said, it was a time trial, and an ABR one at that, so they were pretty relaxed about bumping me down a few spots and sorting it all out at the finish line.

A race report on a time trial is about as exciting as a paint-drying report. So I'll try not to put you to sleep. I've never been to one of these before, but it's a different crowd. The mean age is about 50 (even the guys my age looked like dentists, or roadies who have the money to line up in a crit, but not the cajones). Damn near everyone has a five thousand dollar bike and many have a $200 helmet. All the more reason to show up on a single speed, in a skull-covered tri suit. Seriously, other than my bling CF saddle, I felt a little ghetto. My bullhorns are little bent (from the accident that bought that saddle :), and my unorthodox brake lever mounts (one in the drops, one on the flats) meant the officials had to give my bike an extra look-over.

Imperceptible wind, 60 degrees...it doesn't get much better, especially when the wind can ruin a singlespeeder's day. I was killing it, holding it at 24+ mph for most of the first half, hitting 29ish on the downhills and keeping pretty steady on the mild climbs. I caught my "minute man," pretty fast, then before the turnaround, I caught my 7 and 10 minute men too. Halfway into the 30k, I hammered up the hill, pulled a nose wheelie stop at the cone, a u-turn, and hammered back down. I had 4-5 minute men laid out in front of me. I caught 3 of them immediately. There must have been a mild tailwind, because I was having no trouble holding it at 25-26 mph, and I had so many rabbits to chase. My 50 minute target time was totally in the bag, and my "daydream" time of 45 minutes looked possible after all.

That was the high point of the day.

I got a flat. I rode on it for over three miles. Sitting way back on the saddle, fingertips on the flats of my bar, I was still able to do 18-20 mph. A couple of race marshals blasting Nirvana at one of the corners helped me out (I'm pretty sure it was Sammy Hagar and his roadie wife, who, I found out later, flashed one of the competitors as he was sailing through the corner!) I was signed up for two heats, so I was hoping to get back and swap the tube. I tried to pump it up but I'd trashed it and it wouldn't hold, so Hagar let me borrow his wheel.

I tried to relax a bit on the ride in, since I'd put my all into the first heat...now I was having to save some for the second try. However, I started to watch the numbers of the riders starting out, and I realized it was coming up on my start time...so I put myself into the red zone just to get back for heat two!

I made it with three minutes to spare. Rip off one number, juice up, drain a gu, and line up...only to discover I should've gone three minutes ago! The judges were pretty cool about it, and let me start anyway.

So I did heat two on a heavy, not-so-aero wheel, and no speedometer. I fought as hard as I could, but I was clearly off from my first heat. I grabbed a few minute men, but unlike my first heat, got caught by a couple who started behind me.

There was one in particular who was in the distance for about half the race. I'd gain a couple hundred yards on him, then lose them back. Virtually everyone had "proper" trial bars and gears, many had those "Alien vs. Predator" helmets. Usually I can trail a bike for a few seconds and guess about whether I can catch, pass, or hang on to their speed, but it's hard to tell when everyone's in their submarine position with a smooth cadence.

So I finally start to soak up the gap on this one guy, and I think, "This sucks, I've spent $30 on gas, $45 on racing, I was on fire, and now I'm toast. This is my race. I.am.going.to.beat.that.guy." (I knew that he started minutes ahead of me, and technically, I had already made up my ground, but I wanted to cross the line ahead of him.)

So I kept at it, and this Winston Churchill quote popped into my head: "Never, never, never give up." I used to see that quote on a billboard, going to see my mother in Detroit, when she was in her final months of treatment. I remembered that one year ago this weekend, I surprised her by showing up on her birthday, a birthday that we all knew would likely be her last. That REALLY got me going. And, like I thought so many times in my marathon training last summer, "this ain't SHIT compared to cancer treatment."

So I damn-near-redlined and recovered, over and over, and reeled him in. When I passed him, I saw that he had no idea I was there, and I could also see that he was probably cooked. I thought he might be able to shift and bear down and get me, so I just laid it all out hard. I knew the finish was nearby, and I thought I saw it in the distance.

I was busy trying to figure out if I could hammer all the way to those orange cones a half mile away, when to my surprise, I passed the finish line! I pulled over to discover he was 3-5 seconds behind me and as he rolled by, he yelled "DAMN!" ...and not in a nice way, in a "if I had a wall to punch through, I would" kind of way. He continued his outburst coasting back to the lot...I cut back to the finish table to make sure they had my proper start time and the clock man said "I think you made that guy a little mad. He has a $5,000 bike and he couldn't catch you."

"Then my work here is done." (Grin)

After all was said and done, I finished in 53:24 on heat one, and 53:09 on heat two. Had I stayed on form, I coulda woulda shoulda medaled in my division in 4/5th place, with a time in the 46s. What did I learn? That with a $5-10,000 bike, I could rack up wins and medals well into my golden years. That riding 700x20s is a bit of a gamble, when even a little stone can give you a pinch flat. Though, I may have to take that risk again and do another TT soon. Maybe I can piss off someone else at the line.

UPDATE: I'm not sure why I thought someone did it in 27 minutes, maybe there was a sheet posted with overall records or something. The fastest time of the day was 42:24, so I wasn't too far off, given what happened. I ended up 18th in Cat 4...out of 21; lame. But I cracked the top ten in Masters' 30+ (ok there were only 11 in the field). Also lame.