#road-race

[ridepostmodern-blog]

wente road race

After a leisurely morning (which will not be repeated tomorrow) wherein I woke up wonderfully late (7:45), and enjoyed had my oatmeal and coffee, I got in the truck with Zach.  Picked up Joe, and we're off to this delightfully nearby race.

Driving through Oakland and Dublin, it becomes apparent that yesterday's wunderground-forecasted 19kph NNW wind was vastly under-reported.  This was going to be a windy day - great news for those of us working for Joe.  Wind makes it a lot easier to protect somebody / hurt his competitors who may not have the same level of protection.

Do a quick bit of wrenching on a teammate's recently borrowed bike, flipping cassettes around (a 23 would be pain; the borrowed 26 - much more reasonable), sweeten up the shifting a bit, and get my race prep under way.  20 min on the rollers, with a couple leg-opening sitting 15 second efforts.  Set a new PR for cadence!  206rpm.

And we're rolling.  The start was that anticlimactic - just a wave.  No whistle.  Once we get out of the neutral section, it becomes even clearer than last weekend at Copperopolis that these guys are here to race.  Somebody jumps of the front on a solo flyer.  Hit the base of the climb, and the pace is much higher than I would have expected on the first lap.  The first time up hurt - not a good sign for the next three…

Second climb, after the bridge, same pretty nasty pace.  We're already shedding a guy here and there.  I'm too far back in the peleton to be where I want to for the descent - and I resign myself to the fact that that's how it's going to be for the rest of the race.  There simply isn't enough flat after the climb to maneuver my way to the front before the descent.  I get down it carefully, and note the pretty sharp right hand turn with the hay bales, and then the sweeping U.  Nothing more technical than we do regularly going down Tam, but this is racing.  People get weird.

Every time I look at my Garmin, it's apparent that my heart rate is way above where it should be.  The pace is high - but not that high.  I've got a good aero tuck - there's no reason why I should have to be working this hard to stick with the pack on a descent.  And then it hits me like a two ton anchor:

My rear brake is rubbing.

That's why I've spent the first two thirds of the first lap at >185bpm.  There goes well over half of my book of matches...

Reach back, flip open the toggle that gets the calipers out of the way for easy wheel removal.  When we get to the flats through suburbia, I sit near the back of the pack and reach down to adjust cable tension a bit - so I've got a hair more stopping power.  Less than ideal, but it'll do.  

Move up.  Lap 2.  I want to be top 5 wheels going into the climb, if only so I can fade back through the pack.  I do exactly that, and eventually get dropped.  Oscar looks to be suffering immensely;  Zach shouts over "Spin dude, spin!"  Pace is fucking fast.  Spend most of the rest of the lap chasing to get back on, using a guy here and there.  I join up with 3 guys, and try to get them to work together.  We have a go at it without much success.  4 more join us; total 8.  They have a cheerleader - who is nothing more than that.  Sits at the back and yells "come on guys!  pull through!  what the fuck HOLD YOUR LINES. PULL THROUGh."  Not JimG at all.  Very much angry, bitter Type-A.  I bite my tongue, ignore his horrific attitude, and keep riding.  We catch the main group on the flats.

Lap 3.  I start much nearer the back of the field than I'd like.  C'est la vie.  Pace is mellower, and I hang on much better - still, get gapped off, but only by 500m or so.  Definitely something I can grab back on the descent, on my own, not worrying about Juniors not knowing how to take a corner…And then, full stop.  Somebody's overcooked the hay-bale corner, and is getting helicoptered out.  10 minutes.  I'm unsure if this is good for Joe or bad - we added a good 6 guys to the field (myself among them).  All of whom would have caught back on, but this maybe left them in the pack a bit fresher.  So I chatted them up.  How're they feeling, whatnot.  Nobody's feeling good, and everybody's afraid of the lactic acid that's just piling up in our quads.  Good news for Joe.  Chatting turns to the crashes we've been in, and how we're very glad to not be on the stretcher up the road.

Rolling again.  Can't make up any space on the descent; just not wide enough.  Back on the flats, and I finally can zip up the right side.  Zach and Joe are top 5 - maybe even top 3?  Hard to tell.  One guy is 20m up the road.  Perfect.  I jump up to him on a slight incline and say "lets go!"  I know we'll get caught, but this provides impetus to the pack to get their chase on.  We take a couple rotations, and then he yells from behind me "dude we're caught."  I shrug, and bury the head.  43, 44, 45 kph.  Nasty, nasty head/crosswind.  Pain cave.  Drop off a bit, two or three guys come around, I slot in.  Recover a hair.  Shit!  We're going too slow!  I jump around them, and kick the pace back up to that 43-45kph spot.  180bpm…185…190.  Get off.  Rise repeat.  Gutter everybody, I know Zach is doing his part to protect Joe.  Take a less than perfect line where the lane narrows down and there are cones, and the pack follows me perfectly…a cone goes flying when somebody behind me rides through it.  Everybody reacts with aplomb, shouts it out, and nobody goes down.  Chapeau, gents.

Fall back, one more dig - attack from 4 or 5 wheels back.  Just to try and get somebody to follow me and burn a match - unfortunately, nobody does.  My work is, in a word, done.  Back of the pack.  Zach takes over the controll/attacking/pacemaking.  We deliver Joe, and cruise up the hill together, we both make sure we're looking presentable, in case there's a camera at the line, and cross in high style.  28th, 29th.  

Takeaways:

 1) This race fucking hurt.  I felt like if the bike was moving forward, and not downhill, I was redlined - regardless of effort.  Definitely like the entire race was done anaerobic, which, while very likely not true, is definitely a bad thing.  I'm not sure exactly what it was, but I was feeling very much off my form today.  The rubbing brake pad for most of the first lap certainly didn't help, but I'm not sure exactly what else it was.  The past week has been stupidly stressful at work, but I've been sleeping quite well.  Hopefully form returns for next weekend.  Tomorrow's gonna hurt no matter what.

2)  I should have saved my last sprint/dig for a bit nearer the base of the climb.  Then it might have been seen as a bit more of a threat, and maybe somebody would have burned a match to reel me in, instead of just slowly (well, not so slowly…) being reeled in by the peleton's inertia.  In retrospect, it was an excellent eye-opener for how far my acceleration has come in the past month or so.  I just proved to myself that I have a real, nasty jump now.  Tomorrow will tell if it's good enough to be called a proper sprint.  

3)  I feel bad for not thinking about the fact the peleton was probably 4-5 guys wide when the lane narrowed.  I should have been thinking more clearly in picking my line into it - but I'm glad it worked out as well as it did.

3)  Fix your fucking brake pads!

4)  Last weekend, I had similar goals and results.  Last weekend, I felt veryaccomplished.  Copperopolis is hard, but rewarding, and definitely fun.  Today I just hurt.  Wasn't nearly as enjoyable a race.

5)  It's just bike racing, and I'm incredibly thankful that I wasn't going home in a helicopter today.

Numbers:

Time:  2h33 (2h22 moving)

Distance:  76.7 km

Speed (avg/max):  32.5 / 71 km/h

HR (avg/max):  175 / 203 bpm

Cadence (avg/max): 93 / 140 rpm

Power (per strava): 189W

http://app.strava.com/rides/495457

[ridepostmodern-blog]

Copperopolis: "The pavement's not *that* bad"

On the eve of Wente, I've got a feeling that I should finally get around to uploading this....

Copperopolis - E4 - "The Pavement's Really Not So Bad"

I set my alarm the night before; 3:50 and 3:55 (just in case!).  In bed at 9:30, asleep by 10.  I sleep through the "night" - a not mean feat given my usually noisy neighborhood.  (Oh, the Tenderloin…)

3:45 - I wake up to my phone ringing.  It's some Middle Eastern guy yelling about how he's the milkman and I owe him money for his fucking milk!  I groggily explain to him that a) I don't have a milkman and b) I live in san francisco, despite my NYC telephone number.  So c)  please chill the fuck down.  I would have been a lot angrier, but he just gave me another few minutes to my morning.

3:55 - Coffee water boiled.  Call Zach to make sure he's moving in this direction.  Breakfast:  A couple slices of Acme raisin cranberry walnut bread w/ homemade pistachio butter.  Didn't want go through the effort/time for my usual oatmeal.

4:15 - Zach arrives; we go pick up Joe, and we're on the road exactly as planned.  Bridge at 4:45.  Fuck me, early.  Almost as early as when we left for Merco…

6:30 - drive up the climb.  Revel in the perfectly paved section.  Recognize that it's gonna hurt.  Laugh at the Porsche that has a bike rack helping set up the feed tent.

6:50 - Pull into the lot.  Directed to park on a bunch of beaten down grass.  Going to make the rollers a pain…  Reg, warm up, etc.

8:10 - Line up, get told off by one of the officials for having folded the border of my number.  Why the hell can't everybody have small numbers like the did at Chico?  Seriously.  A normal Velopromo sized number is impossible to fit on a size-small jersey and maintain full pocket-access…  More or less direct quote:  "that's a DQ'able offense you've got there, I'd tell you to fix it now, but you've got too damn many pins in it.  I'll let you off, but next time don't do it.  If anybody else says anything to you, tell them Bobby P let you off the hook."

*race*

8:15 - Whistle blows, and we're off.  Pace is reasonable right off the line - it appears that these guys are here to race!  (Quite different from my experience off the line at Chico last weekend, which was positively leisurely for the first 15km).  Feedzone; hear Taleo talking about attacking through it on the second lap.  Relay information to Joe and Zach.

And we're climbing.  Roaring Mouse sets the pace up the hill on the first lap; it's not too bad - but it's very clear that the next lap will be worse, and oh god I don't want to think about the third time up…it may be 3.4% average from the bottom to the top, but it has some easily > 10% sections towards the top, which were brutal.

Crest with the group; settle into a spot near the front.  Zach, John Becker (Mike's Bikes, apparently riding for Daniel Velasco) and I are trading pulls, keeping things reasonable.  Then Becker's gone - punctured his tubie.  (turns out Velasco hurt his knee recently; wasn't on top form, and gave Becker his wheel to continue).  Becker eventually catches back on, only to mechanical as he tries to shift into his newly acquired 28 while still in the 58 and the drivetrain locks up.  Note:  be careful when riding somebody else's wheel!  Also, cross chaining…still not a great practice on a perfectly tuned drivetrain!

I fall off the pace at the front to go back and fetch Joe up to the front, so the three of us can be together on the descent.  I felt very pro being a good domestique - but it wasn't really needed given the pace.  Nobody really wanted to work.

The (not-so-) little kicker before the descent came up; and we three were riding up it together.  A couple Mouse guys in front of me look like they want to have some fun on the descent.  They blow down the first bit, and I carry a bit more speed through the first little roller; slingshotting around them and let my inner Jon Stevens roar.   Brakes?  Hah.  Weight way back, light on the pedals; hardly holding the bars, letting my front wheel do it's thing (within a guided limit) over the spectacularly bad pavement.  Pedal pedal pedal.  Heart still pounding from the climb - this is no time to rest!  There are hills to zoom down!  Per Strava, guy who went down it 15 seconds faster than me was pushing 300watts the whole way…measured with a power meter.

I (finally) get caught on the rise to the finish (wouldn't be a Velopromo race without an uphill sprint).  As a float back through the pack, several guys say "holy shit dude, that was spectacular" and similar.  I feel good.  I know I've burned a match…or three, but if I can push the pace and scare people (w/o endangering them) at any point in the race, I might as well do it where I'm capable.  A quick conference with Joe and Zach shows their agreement.  Zach makes an interesting point:  if the pack is still together (and if I make it over the last climb…) I could win this thing.   Previously stated plan updates:  if the pack is together on the plateau on the third lap, I go ballistic on the descent.  It's been shown that nobody can hold my wheel, and maybe, just maybe, I can get enough of a gap to hold through the slight bumps and to the finish.

Lap 2:  Dropped on the climb, though not too far from the top.  Maybe 6 minutes on my own before I'm back with the pack - dropping several guys who are clearly completely locked up on the way.  Take it easy; scarf a clif bar, some shot blox, drink up.  Rest.  Take this descent easy.  Though it's easier on the legs, it's a lot more stressful having to worry about the competency of guys around me trying to make up a place or two.

Lap 3:  Dropped like crazy on the climb.  Started to feel cramps coming on the outside tendon of my right knee, and up through the hamstring.  Chapeau to Zach for falling back and giving me hell for not giving it 110%.  We crest, and try to haul ass back to the field, but it becomes more and more apparent that that's just not going to happen.  It's become a brutal training ride - mental and physical.  Half way through the flats, the cramp that was developing turns real - it feels like my leg shortened by a full 5cm.  We try and get the guys we pass to work with us, but they're just as gassed as we are.  Well, a bit more gassed; we're passing them.

Crest the hill, and I repeat my performance on the descent - better on the true descent, actually, but not quite as good on the couple rollers after it to the finish.  Might as well enjoy myself, and get some more skills-training in!

Cross the line, don't bother to check place.  Probably 40th or something.  (Actually - 17th.  Shows exactly how blown up the field gets in this race.)

Get home, upload to Strava, and find out that I got KOM on the descent on the first time, by 1second, over a Marc-Pro-Strava rider, earlier today.  Ecstatic.  Write this report, and then Phipps tweets at me that he's just uploaded, and he stole it from me - by 7 very significant seconds.  (Average speed of 54.2km/h, to my 53.3…).  Check back on Strava a bit later, and Justin Rossi has both Phipps and myself beaten by 9 and 16 seconds, respectively.

TAKEAWAYS:

1)  This is not a pure-climber's race.

2)  Racing with a team is fun.  Having a plan, executing it, and modifying it on the fly as circumstances change (realize I can drop the field on the descent, and having Velasco and Becker, our two main marks, fall out of the race).

3)  Negative racing still sucks - talking to Joe afterwards, he attacked on the climb on lap 3, and nobody bridged up.  I know there were climbers who could have bridge up to him, and then worked together in a break, but I'll let him tell that story.  Generally people just sitting up on the plateau and not wanting to work.

4)  Being recognized for something you're good feels awesome.  I can't wait for the next race where I can drill it on a descent.  Oh wait!  Next weekend, and the weekend afterwards!  

5) The pavement really wasn't nearly as bad as everybody made it out to be.  Though Jacob tells me the top section was resurfaced somewhat recently, so there was more shitty pavement in previous years.  Still though, the pavement here is bad and uncomfortable,  but it's not dangerous.  Yes, run reasonably new tires - old ones are far  more likely to puncture.  Drop a bit of pressure for comfort, but nothing extreme.  The bad section at Madera was far worse in terms of base-level quality, and on top of it, it had many more sizable, wheel-taco-ing potholes).  This was just uncomfortable.  But this is bike racing.  Who expected it to be comfortable?!

NUMBERS:

Distance:  101km

Elevation:  1414m

Time:  3h14

Speed:  31.4 / 72.6 km/h  (max speed was on the descent on the third lap).  

Speed on the descent the first time (avg):  53.3km/h, in 6min40

Power (whole race, per strava, usual warnings):  193W

Heartrate:  172/205bpm avg/max

Cadence:  93 / 135rpm 

http://app.strava.com/rides/464601

[ridepostmodern-blog]

chico stage race - paskenta road race

One 45 mile loop.  Flat/rolling until 4.5 miles of gravel, then 2.85 (as we were told at the start) miles of pavement to the finish.   Not much happens - Rio Strada sits on the front, setting a totally luxurious pace.  Eventually a couple Webcor and Davis move up, and the pace picks up - good.  I'm watching the Rio guys carefully (Oliver won Tulock last weekend; I know they have a good train, and race seemed like it was staying together).  As it picks up, I pick out Nate Dunn as Rio's protected rider.  

I sit on his wheel.  I sit on his wheel.  Some team mates come up - they jump to some breaks, seemingly trying to get me to follow.  I sit on Nate's wheel.  Right turn, a couple rollers, a few more attacks from various teams.  Chico guy goes OTF; Chico blocks.  I shout from mid pack "Don't let Chico block like that!"  Response:  "Get to the front and do something!".  Why the hell would I?  I'm solo.  I respond "You've got guys!  You can chase him down!".  Various people do.  A few more guys go OTF, a couple guys bridge up, everything is sucked back in.

I try to pass a guy on the left - centerline rule is strictly enforced, per the moto ref.  Rider pulls left, and blocks me from passing him.  Moto comes up, and sends him to the back for pinching me off.  Hats off to the ref (I thanked him for it after the TT).

A couple more attacks, two guys go off the front.  A Davis guy, and a Bicycles Plus guy.

I start worrying about where we are in the race.  I want to get a bit more food in me before the gravel, and I want to figure out if I should burn the match to bridge to the break so I can hit the gravel ahead of the main pack.  I start doing the math - race promoters need to be more euro and give distances in KM - to convert the total mileage into kilometers, and then subtracting off the gravel + finishing distances, and then diffing that against my current elapsed distance and oh shit I'm on the gravel. 

The Rio train seems to be falling back, so I say "fuck it.  This gravel is the race."  I pass a couple guys.  I start hammering - average hear tart for the gravel is 188 - to force a selection.  I'm having a fucking blast.  Dust is everywhere.  Gravel kicks up; the ping of a rock hitting carbon is incessant.  A little kicker (300ft of climbing over the 4.5 miles of gravel).  Guy in front of me stands up…whoops.  I shift up, keep the weight back, and push around him.  Weight back.  Light on the bars; let the front wheel go where the front wheel goes.  Don't let the back slip - but if it does, don't worry.  This is fucking fun.  I fall back after forcing the selection, and can't quite latch onto the 4 guys who followed me.  It doesn't help that the last guy in the train seems to be slipping around a lot - much as I'd like his draft (little as it might have been at those speeds), I'd rather stay up and go around him if he can't quite keep it up.

Descent.  This is sketchy - I'm OTB of the chase group now, and I hammer hard.  Slight turn, and I curse:  I'm tracking right into a loose patch.  Too bad.  Brake a bit, and then step down on the pedals:  best way to get through is to get through fast.  I stay up.

Turn onto pavement is ahead.  I catch back onto the group, but can't hold it - legs are really hurting.  One of the two guys in the front break is on the side of the road, fixing a flat.  He'll get a good GC time, but now I'm guaranteed sixth if I can hold this….I'm on my own.  I fall back, and let my heart drop 5BPM (down to a measly 180…).  Climb a bit over the first roller.  Moto comes up and tells me I'm a minute off the lead guy (Davis), and 45 off the chase group.  Look over my shoulder, and see a group behind me chasing.  They're a way back, but i'm not gonna get caught.  Descent.  Get aero, decide that's not good enough, and start pedaling again.  Second roller.  Look to the left and look for the water tower a local told me to look for.  It's there!  The finish is close!  Dig deep.  Sprint over the crest of the second little roller, and sprint through to the finish.  6th.  Not half bad.

[ridepostmodern-blog]

turlock race report

Delayed start - crash in the first wave which stopped the whole race.

The usual slow roll out followed by a couple attacks, juniors being sketchy, etc.  Whole field felt a bit off; I think everybody was worried about the few potholes we'd been warned about (and apparently had caused the earlier crash).

Several attacks go off; I bridge up to a couple; they fall apart.  Usual E4 racing.  But hey - on the offchance that they can stick, you want to be there.

Comes down to a bunch sprint; I hop on the Davis train, watch the lead out guy give a HUGE push to his sprinter (on the butt - a real push, not euphemistically talking about a good leadout), and I don't quite have the legs after my repeated bridging / attacking, and I butchered my gear choice for the sprint.

9th.  Hats off to John Becker for pulling out a second after riding the incredibly aggressive and fun race that he did.  A podium well deserved.

I should add that the Turlock course was fantastic - everything great about Snelling and Merco (rollers, rollers, rollers, and a bit of wind), but none of the lousy pavement.  Full road closures.  Awesomely run by the promoters.  I can't wait to come back next year, and see this race blossom into the best of our NorCal Spring Classics.

Off to Chico now.  Very excited - can't wait to see how my form has improved since my last stage race (Madera).