Wednesday, Day 1 Cascade Cycling Classic
Day 1 Cascade Cycling Classic: Bend, Oregon
Today was not good. Everything went really well in terms of registration and finding a hotel and getting to the race on time, but from there is was all downhill for me- well, no, actually there was a lot of uphill. Lets start out with the stiff intimidation factor. Will Sladek, a fellow collegiate racer from Cal Tech, my dedicated sponsor/fan/support crew/father all-in-one, and I, trembling legs and all, were greeted this morning at the start line by an impressive line up of national caliber pros in all their shining armor and glory, along with their 7 or 8 serfs waiting eagerly to do battle for their great Lords. A listing: Healthnet, Navigators, Target Training, Broadmark, Toyota United, Kodak-Sierra Nevada, Recycled Cycles, BMC, Cal Giant, South Australia.com, Jittery Joes, Webcor, Vitamin Cottage, SuccessfulLiving.com, Colavita-Sutter Home, and last but not least, the one man wonder Aaron Olson of Saunier Duval who just got done racing in the Giro d’Italia, no big deal.
Today’s stage was 92 miles with a five mile climb at about 4-5% grade at 55 miles and then a nasty steep 1 mile climb at the finish at about 10%. The real destruction came within the mileage of 60-85 miles because a tart crosswind kicked up and turned what had earlier been a nice cozy little protective mass of riders into a single file line stretched about a mile long. The field shattered into about 3 groups, and guess what, Sammy skinnybones got shot out the back like holding a wheel was going out of style. I can’t imagine a more devastating way to lose time in a bike race. You’re following a wheel in front of you and a gap starts to slowly open and you stand up and start to sprint just to hold on because you thought you were already going as hard as you could go, and instead of the gap closing it just slowly grows until it jumps exponentially because you’re no longer in what little slipstream you had enjoyed a few seconds before. So you’re going as hard as you can, and you just watch the pathetic little pack of dropped riders pull away from you like they’re still treading water while you thrash around, slowly sinking to the bottom, and you’re crying and thinking that you’ll never be good enough to actually participate in these races instead of hanging on for dear life and why the hell did I pay $160 to do this? Then the real fun begins as the last kilometer comes into view, and it’s a wall 1 mile long. I guess today was really disappointing because it wasn’t like I did poorly because I just don’t have the ability to do better. I know when my climbing legs feel good, and today my body just didn’t feel right. I’m hoping that my legs felt heavy today because of my cortisone shot on Monday (to fix my nagging knee ligament) and that tomorrow I will feel better. At least Will did well today. I think he managed to stay roughly within the second group, which is impressive. He was also climbing very well up the first climb of the day. Until tomorrow.
Today was not good. Everything went really well in terms of registration and finding a hotel and getting to the race on time, but from there is was all downhill for me- well, no, actually there was a lot of uphill. Lets start out with the stiff intimidation factor. Will Sladek, a fellow collegiate racer from Cal Tech, my dedicated sponsor/fan/support crew/father all-in-one, and I, trembling legs and all, were greeted this morning at the start line by an impressive line up of national caliber pros in all their shining armor and glory, along with their 7 or 8 serfs waiting eagerly to do battle for their great Lords. A listing: Healthnet, Navigators, Target Training, Broadmark, Toyota United, Kodak-Sierra Nevada, Recycled Cycles, BMC, Cal Giant, South Australia.com, Jittery Joes, Webcor, Vitamin Cottage, SuccessfulLiving.com, Colavita-Sutter Home, and last but not least, the one man wonder Aaron Olson of Saunier Duval who just got done racing in the Giro d’Italia, no big deal.
Today’s stage was 92 miles with a five mile climb at about 4-5% grade at 55 miles and then a nasty steep 1 mile climb at the finish at about 10%. The real destruction came within the mileage of 60-85 miles because a tart crosswind kicked up and turned what had earlier been a nice cozy little protective mass of riders into a single file line stretched about a mile long. The field shattered into about 3 groups, and guess what, Sammy skinnybones got shot out the back like holding a wheel was going out of style. I can’t imagine a more devastating way to lose time in a bike race. You’re following a wheel in front of you and a gap starts to slowly open and you stand up and start to sprint just to hold on because you thought you were already going as hard as you could go, and instead of the gap closing it just slowly grows until it jumps exponentially because you’re no longer in what little slipstream you had enjoyed a few seconds before. So you’re going as hard as you can, and you just watch the pathetic little pack of dropped riders pull away from you like they’re still treading water while you thrash around, slowly sinking to the bottom, and you’re crying and thinking that you’ll never be good enough to actually participate in these races instead of hanging on for dear life and why the hell did I pay $160 to do this? Then the real fun begins as the last kilometer comes into view, and it’s a wall 1 mile long. I guess today was really disappointing because it wasn’t like I did poorly because I just don’t have the ability to do better. I know when my climbing legs feel good, and today my body just didn’t feel right. I’m hoping that my legs felt heavy today because of my cortisone shot on Monday (to fix my nagging knee ligament) and that tomorrow I will feel better. At least Will did well today. I think he managed to stay roughly within the second group, which is impressive. He was also climbing very well up the first climb of the day. Until tomorrow.
posted by Unknown at 12:23 AM
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