Breaking Away
This Sunday was the last day of Nelson's Landing Stage Race, and Sam and I had circled it as a climber's paradise. In just 50 miles of road racing, there were 7000 ft of climbing. We had been doing a lot of long hill repeats, so we felt like this was the day to attack.
I woke up exactly one minute before the alarm clock went off, and our friend Will from Caltech was still missing from his bed. I called him on the cell and he was on his way back to the hotel in a cab after a night out on the town. With this kind of a day ahead, that's way hardcore. That's the way Caltech does it.
The conditions were perfect: sunny, barely any wind, cold but warming up throughout the day. There was a huge line for the portapotties, but free bagels while we waited in line. The time before the race is always a bit exciting. It's fun talking with some of your competitors before going to battle, maybe trading war stories from the day before. "Oh, crap... YOU were the guy that crashed?! How's the bike? Not too bad? Cool. Well, good luck today." I also talked to the guy who beat me at SDSR last year, and he had a few words of warning. "Hey Chris, you gonna show everybody who's King of the Mountain? There's a couple good climbers in your race, so don't write them off right away." I enjoy trying to feel out who's confident, getting rumors about which guy is gonna be a dark horse, who's got the guts to attack early, who's got the legs and lungs to win. It's the build-up: sometimes it puts a few butterflies in your stomach, and sometimes it may give you motivation to really dig deep during the race.
The start of the race was smooth: two guys from the same team went off the front for the first few minutes and a few of their larger teammates tried to block for them; it was quickly evident that these teammates would not be able to handle any gradient larger than 1%. These are the riders you don't want to sit behind for more than a few seconds in case someone makes a big move.
We made the leader, #123, do all the chasing. He was just keeping the break at a constant distance, but then Sam flew up the left side. The leader quickly accelerated, but still needed at least 20 seconds to catch Sam; once caught, I flew up the right side and #123 didn't do anything about it. To break free from the stuffiness of the peloton is pretty invigorating.
I bridged up to the break but didn't do any work at the front because I knew it would be worthless. We were all together on the first descent, and there were some SUPER SKETCHY riders who looked super nervous and ready to crash at any moment. So, I tried to give them as much space as they needed to stay upright.
The first time up the hill things heated up. You can hear and see the desperation in their breathing and peddling. After a few accelerations I was off the front, not really expecting it to last long. Again, he let me go and I kept a very manageable rhythm and gained a bunch of time. On the downhill, I expected to get caught, but avoiding this, I knew I had to hammer my way up the hill. I tried to concentrate on going as fast as possible, saying to myself, "Climb like an angel." It's hard to stay motivated when you're all alone on a climb, with your opponents out of sight. I would have liked what I would have seen: Sam sticking right on #123's wheel, sucking all the inspiration out of the guy, attacking him when he was tired. Great teamwork.
At the top of the hill, I hammered and started the 9 mile individual time trial to the finish. This part sucked, but when I finally saw the finish line, and I looked back and saw nobody in sight, I wiped off all the spit and ClifBar crumbs from my face and got ready to win. It was an awesome feeling, to raise my arms just like the guys do in the Tour. There was lots of adrenaline (and fist pumping) since this was my first road race victory ever . I waited eagerly to find out how much time I had gained, but it wasn't quite enough. I finished 2 minutes ahead of the rest of the field, but still needed 20 seconds to win the overall.
Next time.
Waiting 4 hours to sort out all the problems with the results was pretty anticlimactic, and driving back to the hotel and packing and driving home felt like an ordeal to say the least. But it was a great weekend, Sam and I hammering at the competition and coming home with some hardware: - a few champagne bottles as trophies.
I woke up exactly one minute before the alarm clock went off, and our friend Will from Caltech was still missing from his bed. I called him on the cell and he was on his way back to the hotel in a cab after a night out on the town. With this kind of a day ahead, that's way hardcore. That's the way Caltech does it.
The conditions were perfect: sunny, barely any wind, cold but warming up throughout the day. There was a huge line for the portapotties, but free bagels while we waited in line. The time before the race is always a bit exciting. It's fun talking with some of your competitors before going to battle, maybe trading war stories from the day before. "Oh, crap... YOU were the guy that crashed?! How's the bike? Not too bad? Cool. Well, good luck today." I also talked to the guy who beat me at SDSR last year, and he had a few words of warning. "Hey Chris, you gonna show everybody who's King of the Mountain? There's a couple good climbers in your race, so don't write them off right away." I enjoy trying to feel out who's confident, getting rumors about which guy is gonna be a dark horse, who's got the guts to attack early, who's got the legs and lungs to win. It's the build-up: sometimes it puts a few butterflies in your stomach, and sometimes it may give you motivation to really dig deep during the race.
The start of the race was smooth: two guys from the same team went off the front for the first few minutes and a few of their larger teammates tried to block for them; it was quickly evident that these teammates would not be able to handle any gradient larger than 1%. These are the riders you don't want to sit behind for more than a few seconds in case someone makes a big move.
We made the leader, #123, do all the chasing. He was just keeping the break at a constant distance, but then Sam flew up the left side. The leader quickly accelerated, but still needed at least 20 seconds to catch Sam; once caught, I flew up the right side and #123 didn't do anything about it. To break free from the stuffiness of the peloton is pretty invigorating.
I bridged up to the break but didn't do any work at the front because I knew it would be worthless. We were all together on the first descent, and there were some SUPER SKETCHY riders who looked super nervous and ready to crash at any moment. So, I tried to give them as much space as they needed to stay upright.
The first time up the hill things heated up. You can hear and see the desperation in their breathing and peddling. After a few accelerations I was off the front, not really expecting it to last long. Again, he let me go and I kept a very manageable rhythm and gained a bunch of time. On the downhill, I expected to get caught, but avoiding this, I knew I had to hammer my way up the hill. I tried to concentrate on going as fast as possible, saying to myself, "Climb like an angel." It's hard to stay motivated when you're all alone on a climb, with your opponents out of sight. I would have liked what I would have seen: Sam sticking right on #123's wheel, sucking all the inspiration out of the guy, attacking him when he was tired. Great teamwork.
At the top of the hill, I hammered and started the 9 mile individual time trial to the finish. This part sucked, but when I finally saw the finish line, and I looked back and saw nobody in sight, I wiped off all the spit and ClifBar crumbs from my face and got ready to win. It was an awesome feeling, to raise my arms just like the guys do in the Tour. There was lots of adrenaline (and fist pumping) since this was my first road race victory ever . I waited eagerly to find out how much time I had gained, but it wasn't quite enough. I finished 2 minutes ahead of the rest of the field, but still needed 20 seconds to win the overall.
Next time.
Waiting 4 hours to sort out all the problems with the results was pretty anticlimactic, and driving back to the hotel and packing and driving home felt like an ordeal to say the least. But it was a great weekend, Sam and I hammering at the competition and coming home with some hardware: - a few champagne bottles as trophies.
posted by Unknown at 12:42 AM
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