Bike Chess…

I haven’t had much of a chance to do a whole lot of road racing, nor in the past did I desire to do a lot of it. A few years back I decided to try a few road races and managed to get an upgrade to cat 4 in the process. My back has been healing well and road riding with intensity seems to hurt a lot less than mtb right now. With a new very generous Christmas for the rest of my life, hand me down ride from my father whose ailing bones can no longer handle 6/4 titanium bike, I decided to try my luck at the Springer omnium. Since I used to do a little triathlon back in the old days I figured I’d go ahead and enter everything and see how it went.

Time Trial-
The time trial went very well thanks to a borrow of some clip on Aero Bars from Tim Tidwell. I was able to somehow pull a win out of my bag despite missing my pedals at the start and hitting a road kill skunk on the course. The course was hilly and hurt like hell. I passed a guy in full Aero gear about halfway through my ride, which I think greatly helped increase, my moral. It’s funny how all that pain and suffering over 30 minutes can boil down to a spread of a couple seconds, which is how much I happened to win by. Definitely a good start to the weekend but it left my tanks empty.

Bart was there taking some photos and I was yelling at him when he snapped this one. I look about as aero as a brick compared to some of the slick outfits some of these guys were sporting. The crisp and cool morning air made this ride not quite the suffer fest it could have otherwise been.
Bart's photo site.

Criterium-
This is was I was most horrified by for the weekend events. The last crit I did a few years back (cat 5) we went into the first corner near 42 mph and several people hit the deck in front of me. I would rather fall off my mtb and hit several trees than hit pavement. Pavement is guaranteed always hard, At least in the woods I have a chance of landing on softer brush or furry animals. The course ended up being a whole lot of fun, clean of debris, and pretty safe overall. This year our team has an excellent roster and for our Cat 4 group we had several people in both the crit and the road race. Having teammates was something I was unaccustomed to and a pleasant surprise. Knowing I’m not the best sprinter I decided my role for the day was to be a Crit “domestique”. Basically I work and pull in front for the team members in back and chase down breaks that don’t include my team members. I figured I would be working for Cameron, Tim, or Philippe, who are our strongest Crit riders. Cameron got into a mid race break and the rest of us played “blockers”. Dave and I especially enjoyed the 180 corner on the course, using our mtb cornering abilities to shoot low in the corner at low speed and then slingshot to the outside to intercept “roadies” who were carrying more speed through the outside of the turn. The result was a joyous sound of disgruntlement of the riders behind us we were trying to slow. As we came out of the one corner on time in particular we had Dave, Philippe, Larry, Tim, and myself on the front almost taking up the whole road, giving Cameron and his break mate up the road about 10 seconds instantly on us. As the race progressed the break was not gaining or loosing and I thought Cameron might have it. Then the Krystal guys, who also have a very strong team began to work with 2 laps to go and somehow brought them to back to the field. Philippe was able to best the resulting field sprint and I feel our efforts protecting some of our teammates including him included really seemed to work. I ended up mid bunch and really at this juncture had no visions of competition in the weekend omnium points.

My dumb ass was in the front the pack much of the race, messing with riders up there and trying to make it a veritable hell to break away. My "domestique" tendencies I found were borderline aggressive, hardly something I was planning on, but it worked. Next time I'm going to try to save a little for the end.
(Me,Larry, and Cameron before his break up front)

Boogs found the only cool spot on the crit course which was frackin (no longer just a battlestar galatica term)hot by our race at 2:30.

Road Race-

Lots of mtns...something I used to like a lot.

The talk of the weekend. Everyone knew what was coming. A few miles to warm up followed by the infamous “Mt. Larry” and another climb a few miles later over Brushy Mtn. Pre race strategies were buzzing and the nervous tick of what would happen was rushing through the peloton like electricity from the very start. My day started off terribly with a dehydrated body and some mean GI problems from the previous night’s dinner. After a cliff bar and 3 Imodium tabs, it was off to race. It was all I could do just to get on the bike from the start, which made me assume that I would be functioning once again in a domestique capacity. I hadn’t really done any climbing training, so I was not in the frame of mind that I thought I would need to get over with the lead group.

The pace early had some small surges and it seemed like everyone was saving their tanks for the inevitable fireworks to come…and they were. Larry and Bob Davies along with a couple other team members did some driving early to ramp up that pace and when we hit the early part of the climb Davies surged like Jan Ulrich in his prime, crushing it. This was part of our plan and it worked beautifully. I have never seen such a plan implemented in person in a race only to watch the devastation take place first hand. Bob hit the climb at an unsustainable pace which several of our men we marked as possible good climbers for the stage followed unaware they were falling into a beautifully crafted, yet deadly trap. Bob managed to push halfway up the climb at this pace nearly shedding Cameron, Tim, Dave, and myself. Cameron and I stuck together well with some guys from Krystal that were riding tempo on and off trying to shed people. Before long we were down to a group of about 8-10 from 40.

After the first switchback mid climb I decided it was time to try my hand at some attacking and the legs were feeling decent. Everyone took the second switchback which was steeper at a wide berth so I took a shot to the inside and up not looking back and putting in a good hard minute. I looked back and was pleasantly surprised to find Cameron and myself were now alone about 50 yards up the road. We managed to almost double that over the top and down the first of two sketchy descents. This is when I knew if we didn't collect a few people our break would be short lived as the peloton would be hungry to pull us back. We eventually collected Tim Tidwell in addition to the 3 strong Krystal drivers and Tanner Hurst, a very strong Jr. that whipped me up a bit in CX season. I was bummed my team mate Dave didn't get over with the group but the flurry of Krystal attacks after he had a hard pull on the front left him alone to bridge a large gap, so I think he waited to collect a few more people to organize an early chase. Everyone that had collected in my group, was doing there own thing at first and that's when I decided to act. I sat up and voiced my concerns and said I was starting a pace line and if we wanted to survive they should join in. It worked, our speed went from around 20 to 24-26ish for the whole flat section before the second climb.

The second climb was a more gradual grade and though there were few attacks here and there for the most part we stayed together mostly out of fear of what was behind us. Those fears turned out to be unfounded as our team along with some of the Krystal team members were reluctant to mount any type of chase in the fractured peloton and worked against any people that tried to attack out of the group, reeling them in. Big thanks again to Dave, Bob, Larry, and Philippe...you guys rock. The last descent was hairy and everyone at the front was taking a little more speed and risk but since there were few of us the road was a bit more open. At the bottom Tim started to cramp and I held back a bit to make sure he stayed on, knowing our odds would be better if we could make it to the finish with all 3 of us. The Krystal boys were having no work once we got to the back of the last climb and finally after about 3 miles reluctantly joined back into pace line fashion. At the top of the second climb our boys in back had limited the regrouping peloton to almost 4 minutes behind us...amazing!

The selection of 7 came after the first mtn climb and we maintained till the end.

As we approached the small town of Coalfield the working together stopped and everyone began to play mind games. One guy from Krystal in either an intimidation or luring move made a strong attack and his boys up front let him go. Cameron and I reeled him back in and once again the 7 of us were at a stalemate. I had asked Tim earlier at the base of the second descent where the finish was because I was sure they wouldn't have us cross the highway intersection into Oliver springs for a finish. As we approached what I thought and turned out the be the last right hand corner Cameron had be laying it on thick up front. I was tucked in and followed closely by two Krystals, one of which who was their strong man sprinter, so I thought.

As we rounded the bend Cameron was winding up but I could hear the guy behind me already dropping his cassette. No, not after all this time of people on our TEAM racing together over two painful climbs while some were controlling the field was I going to let anyone thwart our efforts. I decided I would sprint around Cameron to his left and the two of us would at least create an obstacle for the guys behind us to come all the way around on the outside. Nothing but the sound of wind and a blur of color followed my decision to go and it seemed as I floated across the line all these seconds had transpired in about 1 hour. I felt like Max Payne in bullet time. (great game, terrible movie) Anyways, I won my first road race in a field sprint, which surprised the hell out of me. Maybe I'll try a couple more of these road things before the year is out. With teammates all around you this stuff is addicting and fun as anything. I can only hope I remember my dirty fat tire roots when the season comes to an end.