GA Cup Atlanta Stage Race

I got in the car on Monday, and drove from Oregon to Atlanta by Wednesday afternoon. I sped a lot, and my car averaged 34 mpg with everything I own in the back. I slept some that night, trying to adjust to east coast time, and began the stage race with a 7 mile TT on Thursday afternoon.

I placed 4th, only a few seconds out of 2nd place (John Murphy from HealthNet crushed us all by 30 seconds. The stage race continued without me for the next couple of days. I wasn't in town to race, and hanging out with family took priority over trying to keep my 4th overall in a local race. I trained both days, riding almost 100 miles on Saturday.

Sunday was a crit in Gainesville, GA. I was active in breaks, but nothing got too far. With 10 laps to go, a large move I was in came back, and I countered it alone. I built up a decent gap, but I went a little too early, and was caught with 4-5 laps to go.

Monday was the finale for a stage race: a 1 hr crit in Buford. Toshiba was trying desperately to get Frank Travieso off the front, hoping to pick up the 16 seconds he needed to beat John Murphy for the stage race overall. Their tactic was to get another one of their high-placed riders into a break, force Murphy to bring it back, and then have Frank counter. I bridged the early move, which contained Bobby Sweeting (Toshiba), Tim Henry (Jittery Joes), and 5 other strong riders. Tim was working for John Murphy, so he didn't help much. The plan backfired on Toshiba, as Bobby got the intermediate time bonuses that his teammate needed, but the break failed to gain the time needed to win the stage race.



With 10 laps to go, I attacked the break with Tim Henry. It was a great tactic, since Bobby was forced to do the chasing alone, and Tim and I stuck it to the line. I botched the last couple of laps: assuming that Tim was too fresh for an attack to work, I took monster pulls to keep us clear of the chase, and lost the two-up sprint. In retrospect, a few attacks would have been a good idea, since I should know I'll never win a two-up sprint. Next time...

Mt. Hood Stage Race

There are only 75 minutes left in the stage race, so this is as good a time as any to post the blog. The Mt. Hood Cycling Classic was my first race this year with a full team, as the teammates were finally thawed out from the New England winter. Long term, this was not one of my major targets for the year, so I planned to use it as an endurance block to train for some important upcoming races, doing a couple extra hours before the shorter stages.

Stage 1: 1.7 mile prologue TT. I rode fast, put out decent power, and finished in the front third or so of the field. My teammate, Matt White, took 12th. Not bad for his first NRC of the year. He claims it's meaningless, and his years of cross racing have made it so that he could do the same effort right off the couch after not riding for a month.

Stage 2: 90 minute crit. It was a cool course in a park in Portland, with a steep uphill and a sweeping descent. I rode well at the front and followed one attack, hoping to fry off the front and get my name out there a little. Of course, the big guys decided to race their bikes right then. Ben Jacques-Maynes, the race leader at the time, attacked. As I attacked up the hill, I found myself joined by him, Rory Southerland, Chris Baldwin, Ivan Stevic, and a couple other major contenders. Of course, none of them wanted to be in a break, so we came right back to field and that was it for my day.

Stage 3: 86 mile road race. This was my best day of the season so far. The course was 4.5 laps on a half uphill, half downhill course. The first time up the climb, a break of 6 had formed, and some of the major climbers in the race decided to join it. I was waiting for that sort of move, so I bridged up, and found myself with Neil Shirley (Jittery Joes), Chris Wherry and Jonny Clarke (Toyota-United), Andy Bajadali (Kelly Benefits), Matt Crane and Matt Cooke (Healthnet), Burke Swindlehurst (Bissel), Bradley White (Successful Living), Doug Ollerenshaw (Rock Racing), Ryan Trebon, and a few amateurs.

Healthnet didn't like the composition and instructed their riders to sit on. That forced most of the other pros to do the same or take short pulls, since they weren't going to just give the stage away. Our gap was up to two minutes by the time this was all established, and I only have one move like that in my legs per day, so I needed the break to stick. With the help of some of the pros on the smaller teams and the amateurs that had any legs left, we held the gap for a few laps. I set the pace up most of the climb with 2 laps to go, and we had three minutes by the finish line.

With 1.5 laps to go, the gap had gone down some. Bajadali, Ollerenshaw, Shirley, and Swindlehurst started attacking each other up the climb, and I held on and put in a few digs of my own. We traded punches while the rest of the break lost contact, and I think they were impressed to see me there.

At the top of the climb, the break was down to 8 or so, as Wherry and Ollerenshaw went back to the field with the amateurs. With nothing better to do, I stuck with it to the bitter end. Going up the final climb to the finish, we could see the field coming up behind us, but the attacks continued. I got ten seconds or so with about 10k to go, but Swindlehurst bridged and the rest followed, and then we were caught. The field accelerated, and I ended up losing some time on the steep parts of the climb.

Stage 4: 18 mile TT. The previous day's effort put me at a major disadvantage for the TT, as everyone else had enjoyed a fairly relaxing day behind the BMC train. As a result, my legs were worthless, and for the 3rd time in my life I was caught in a TT, finishing dead in the middle of the field.

Stage 5: 100 mile road race. This course started on the desert side of the mountain range here, in 90 degree eat, and gradually climbed from about sea level to a ski resort at 5500 feet. A break went early, and I focused on staying out of the wind and keeping hydrated. I think I drank 10 bottles in under 4.5 hours. With Healthnet's lead in jeopardy, they drove it hard up the final steep climb, shattering the group. I ended up in a selection of 40 climbers. I couldn't follow the attacks, and with the steep slopes making drafting pointless, I dropped myself and rode my own pace up the climb, catching and dragging a train of stragglers who came off the lead group after me. I stayed in the sight of the leaders, but could never quite bring them back. I saw one U23 rider with 1 k to go, and burned myself to catch him on the offchance that the other young riders ahead of my in the GC were all dropped. I caught him at the line, as the riders enjoying my tempo all jumped me, and I finished a solid 15th on the stage.

As it turns out, the other young riders were all dropped, and they awarded me the U24 jersey after the stage. Of course, the officials screwed up. It's true that I was the first U24 to finish the stage, but I didn't put nearly enough time on the others to take the jersey. Someone on Bissel is probably pissed off right now, so I'll wear my team stuff and return the jersey at the crit today. It was fun while it lasted.

The crit starts in two hours. It's 75 minutes, and looks like it shouldn't affect the GC much. If I have legs, I'll try to get off the front, but I expect to be in survival mode and try to finish with the front group.

Gila Week

The Tour of the Gila was the shortest stage race of my career. Early in the race, a rider crashed in front of me, forcing me into a ditch with a broken spoke. I got a neutral wheel that was spaced exactly one half-step from my previous wheel, leading it to skip in every gear but the 13. Using that speed exclusively, I chased back on. 30 miles later, I got caught behind another crash, and had no legs to put in another chase effort.

Ninety miles into stage 1, I arrived at a literal crossroads. To the right was the finishing climb, and to the left, my car. Had I gone right, I might have made the time cut, allowing me to continue the stage race about 40+ minutes back. However, that path was 6 miles uphill and windy, and I had already been in the wind for 60 miles by this point. The road to left, on the other hand, was about 30 feet, and led to recovery drinks, energy bars, and AC. I went left.

That very same car took me all the way to San Diego by 3 PM the next day. I’m back staying with my friend JC, who isn’t in town at the moment, so I have his sweet pad all to myself for a few days.

Further good news was that there were two $2000 local races in and near San Diego over the weekend, which would provide good opportunities for training and redemption after the poor showing in New Mexico.

Saturday was the Barrio Logan Crit. It was indeed in the Barrio, complete with taquerias and tamale stands. A number of pros (as usual for Cali) showed up to fight with the locals on the tight, figure eight course, including David Clinger (Rock Racing), Ben Brooks (Team Type 1), Tony Cruz (BMC), and Neil Shirley (Jittery Joes). I attacked alone a little past halfway through the 75-minute race, bombing the turns to quickly get out of sight. My legs and power were good, so I kept it up, hoping to stay out of sight and maybe take a lap. I got up to halfway across, but the field was too motivated to let me ride away. I came back with 15 laps to go, with only a few primes to show for it. I stayed near the front, and fought for wheels for the sprint, just to prove to myself that I do in fact know how to bump elbows and ride a bike without falling, a point that I had begun to doubt lately.

That night, I sat on JC’s porch, read a novel (The Savage Detectives, by Roberto Bolaño), and drank one of my primes, a six-pack of Tecate (there are two left).

Sunday was an 81-mile road race an hour north of San Diego, with the same field as the previous day. The course had one steep, long finishing hill, with false flat and a sketchy descent rounding us back to the base of the climb. At the end of the first lap, Ben Brooks jumped hard up the hill, and David Clinger went with him. On a course that favors a breakaway, anyone who had legs and a brain knew that this was the move. I clawed my way up, and drove it up the rest of the climb to help establish the break before the long descent. There were about 10 of us, and we all worked smoothly, gaining time on each lap.

I pulled through, being careful to eat and drink with 70-something miles remaining. The climb was really the only place to attack on the course, so I made sure to be on a good wheel when we got there. Sure enough, with two to go, Brooks jumped near the top. I held on, and countered when he sat up. Clinger brought me back and had a dig of his own over the top, but we all stuck together.

With one to go, the usual suspects jumped again. Clinger and Brooks got a gap with one local rider, and I didn’t have the legs to follow their accelerations. I rotated through with the second group until the end of the race. With 1k to go, the Kahala-LaGrange rider jumped. We all stuck to him, and I jumped when he pulled off. There was too much ground to cover, and I blew up with 200 meters to go, ending up 6^th.