Fall River Crit 2.0

Well I went back. The nice thing about this race is it serves a good yardstick to compare where i was fitness wise last year with this year.

Not much comparison.

The last two weeks the only riding I've done has been on the Tandem with the 40cm bars and the 170 cranks. Not only is it different in that the back wheel is way behind me and the handling is weird, but it is very biomechanically different. Reduces my leverage in all possible ways. #1 can't stand up, all power generating has to be done in a seated position. #2 lever points for the hands are closer together (less leverage even seated). #3 cranks are 10mm shorter, making for a 20mm smaller circle I'm pedaling through, and that's a lot. But still I managed to survive riding it. Esp fun when we added the trail-a-bike for the trip to pick up the youngest. Riding with my three girls was a blast.

But Friday was the last day on the tandem, at least planned. riding to school with the tandem will not work, weekends are going to be full of activities and my oldest has had enough of riding right behind me, she would much rather be on her own bike now.

The two weeks were up and it was Saturday, a gorgeous day. Wonderful morning and from there after everyone got up they headed to LL Bean for some school stuff and I set to work getting the old Klein ready to race. Seeing as my only rear wheel choice was the aero one I had just replaced 3 spokes and had less than full confidence to race on, or my trusty 32 GeWilli lacing special. So, I went with my trusty old rear wheel. And put the disc covers on it. They add weight but I have to say, the bike is easier to push at speeds over 25mph with the disc cover on. Just rolls faster and easier, even in a pack.

Once it was all put together it was time to start getting re-adapted to a more proper bike fit. Off the bat the bars felt wide, which is really weird, the Klein's bars are 2cm narrower than the CX bikes and usually feel narrow. And i was pedaling giant circles.

Headed down the bike path. Yes it was a gorgeous day and the path was busy, but i wasn't going fast, but i was spinning like a top. And it felt great. Light spinning down to Sowams road and I turned left and shifted up to the big ring and started some tempo. And it still felt pretty good. I had planned to do some sprints along Teddy Toeclips favorite sprint spot, the place where he taught Bill Yarbroudy how to sprint as a junior, Kent Road between New Meadow road and Sowams.

But before that a car passed and I decided that jumping up to their speed would be a good warm up. So I jumped up to how ever fast they were going, closed the distance and held it till I thought I would explode, then backed off. Once more before the left turn from NMR onto Kent and then I was gassed so I revised the plan and just sprinted up to speed every time a car passed.

Went left on Sowams again and for some reason the cars were going slower so the jump was easier and I was able to hold the 30+ pretty easily up till just before the Barneyville road turn when the car bailed to the right.

Three more sprints down NMR cooked me pretty well. My lungs were on fire. I hadn't had any super short all out efforts. The max efforts on the tandem were testing legs more than lungs.

On the way back up I had this mental image comparing my legs and lungs with as a gamer.

In away, after those sprints I had felt that my legs had leveled up but my lungs weren't quite ready to go to the next level. Not enough points yet.

After getting home, eating, chilling and whatever else happened that night (pool birthday party for my daughter's friend), and a lost tooth (it had been ready to come out for a while) we all crashed.

Then it started. The youngest was having bad dreams. All night. I got up a couple times around midnight. Once back to back. She was just sleeping, and the last time I woke her up, and she said she was fine and wanted a lullaby so i complied and then hopped back in bed. Next thing you know not 5 minutes later she's back at it.
Turns out she was dreaming about a monster coming into the house and taking the money the Tooth Fairy left for her. Awesome. Not the best night sleep pre-race.

But I managed to get enough.

Got up and made a Ted King pancake thing. Doused it in maple syrup and ate it. Pretty eggy (as my comment reflects over there). But hey, it was different. This morning was more normal, sauteed mushrooms, spicy pepper, 3 eggs scrambled, cheese, baby arugula, divided into two tortillas. That Ted King pancake thing did stick with me through the day. Very well actually.

Finished up, even put sunscreen on (i'm getting smaht as i get old) - Met up with Nathan T and we rode down to the race.

I guess that's another reason why I like this race. It is so close. about 15 miles from my house on the bike. Perfect warm up.

And The Coffee Depot is right on the way there. Stopped in for an Iced Coffee (had them put it in a 22oz in a waterbottle - don't want to incite the bloodlust of ryantkelly).

The ride down was interesting. It was a deserted morning in Barrington and there is a light where the path crosses the big road and it was deserted, and so instead of standing there and hitting the button and waiting for the light we just rolled through. Some dude in an scoobie mini-wagon with a kayak on top yelled at us "PUSH THE BUTTON AND WAIT FOR THE GREEN LIGHT!" He was pretty pissed. We both found it kind of odd. We had just barely come out in the road, he was in the other lane, we were waiting for him to clear (not another car in sight), and he yells at us.

Further down after we get into Warren a guy with his dog, yells at us again; "SLOW DOWN OR GO RIDE ON THE ROAD!!!" I can totally see this guys point. A team mate of ours likes to train on the path and terrorist the tourists and locals, but we were seriously riding very slowly. Maybe a mph faster than the older couple in street clothes riding just 20 yards in front of us on old hybrids. He was maybe even more pissed than the dude in the scoobie.

Totally weird. The rest of the ride in was pretty uneventful. Even Fall Reeev wasn't bad. But holy crap, Wilson is a bitch of a hill. But we got a decent warm up in because of it.

Signed up, grabbed some of the free powerbar samples, got pinned up, saw Steven Lehmann, talked about cross, met up with team mates, we probably had the second biggest number of riders in the field with 5 of us, Bikeworks (home team) had maybe 9? Paul was running his mouth on the mic and I didn't realize till it was over that I didn't hear him mention me once for a change, anonymity is kind of nice sometimes.

Last year I got spit out the back at the first Prime and rode the rest of the race alone. This year? There were more fit guys, fewer big dudes like me, and of course we had the McCormack brothers (the next generation of course).

My plan this year was to hang on to the group as long as possible. Sitting at the line when they announced the 1/2 way prime was for a set of Bontrager Wheels, well I got sort of excited, I could use some wheels. But that prime fell on the heals of another prime and I didn't fell confident enough to hit the last corner in the top 5 to make a run for it. Maybe I should have, I didn't. BUT. At the half way mark I was still in the pack. I never was gapped. Never had a problem with the accelerations up the hill. And was feeling good.

Chris Phenix from Bikeworks was hanging out in the back. He's had a good run at the Time Trial this year and I know he's good for a strong finish. And with about 5 to go I decided that I was going to mark him. His team has to have a plan. Either Chris was going for the win or he was going to work to set his brother up for a shot.

I marked him. We came around and on the finishing stretch before the line he started moving up, and I locked on. We hit the start finish line with the bell not quite up front but with a clear path infront of us. And Chris took off. Full on hard core jump. And I hesitated hoping maybe to make it harder for someone else to benefit from the draft (not brake checking just waiting to accelerate) and then went across and we flew down the hill, no brake turned at the bottom and he motored for a bit and then he started to fade and what did I do? I attacked him pretty hard and pulled the rest of the field out, full gas, max effort, up to the next turn, slightly overcooked the line and started to power up the hill before I detonated.

But then only one or two came around, then another couple, and a few more. Everyone seemed to be strung right out! Awesome. People were still passing me as I made it to the top of the hill. Eventually Chris came up along side me and we rode into the finish together I pushed him to make sure he finished ahead of me on the results and from looking back and not seeing anyone I assumed we were the last two to cross the line. Results show it differently but still. Mission accomplished.

I guess the eventual winner and prime beneficiary of our last lap shenanigans brake checked big Joe Phenix just before the line, someone ran into the back of Joe when he had to slow to avoid piling into the guy and he couldn't make up the difference. Dirty racing in my book. Not cool. Total douchebag move. If you can't win on your legs alone, find another tactic other than slamming on the brakes before the line in the middle of winding up for the sprint. My teammates managed a 7th and a 10th and the 7th place was to a guy in his very first cat 4 race. Paul is pretty strong. Nice to seem him do well. The winner also duped Paul out of a $20 prime with some good acting.

It wasn't an easy race, but I felt awesome being able to finish with the group and the ride back with Nathan was fun, did some tempo on 103 back to the EBBP, felt pretty good.

Hit the U Heights Wholefoods with the youngest for the weekly run and actually ran into Paul himself and even Brent and his whole family. Bike Racers stocking up on good food. Carts full of basic ingredients, very few packaged or processed foods.

Good stuff.

It was great seeing Chad there too, he did well for his first Crit. And I may be jinxing it all but Cat 4 crit racing is WAY safer than Cat 4 road racing. The pace is high enough and fast enough that people aren't talking or being distracted and going past the finish line a couple times seems to help everyone figure it out. Although we went past the S/F at TP a few times and that didn't matter.

Digging through the old posts for last years report had me clicking over here. Now i'm not really the most positive person in the world. And overly excessively happy people sometimes tend to make me want to punch them in the face but there's some good stuff that dude has compiled. Everything needs to be in balance... and often i could use a push more to the positive side, as pretty much all yall can attest to.

But it was a great and positive weekend.

This morning even was good too! It just started to rain at 5:45 when the dog and I got up. And kept raining until i was ready to leave.

And it stopped. No rain for the ride, just a light mist by the time I got to the city. And it was a great ride in.

Not too cold but not too hot. Wet from the atmosphere, not from sweating. A nice change. We'll see what the weather brings for the ride home.

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