Shawn arrived to pick me up around 9:30 Saturday morning to head up to Bellingham to start the road race portion of the weekend at 12:45. The road race was 6 laps of 8.7 miles for a total of 52 miles and each lap had 500 ft of climbing. Now this doesn't sound like alot and I even didn't blink an eye at that number. There was a good turn out for the road race with close to 70 racers in our 4/5 category. We began the race and straight away we began a climb. It didn't get much easier as Rolly and myself seemed to find ourselves at the back of the pack again. There was no shoulder and the road was very narrow so it was very hard to move up. We got the yo-yo affect big time in the back. Basically this happens when the front speeds up and slows down alot and doesn't maintain a steady speed, which gets really annoying and tiresome. I began moving up through the pack to try and get towards the front a bit more. Then we came around for lap 2 and began one of the climbs and several people started popping off the front. It was hard to manuever around them so it was bob and weavin on the climb. I lost contact with the front group but had Greg from the team there and we were able to chase back on. I got next to Mark from Starbucks team and mentioned that I almost got dropped and then it seemed we were right on the next hill and that was it. I was done. There were 3 of us that latched on and formed our own little chase group. Greg from the team was there and we all took turns at chasing and picked up several riders along the way. We did this for 2 laps but we weren't gaining any ground on the lead group just limiting our losses. Another lap passed by and I blew big time. I literally had nothing left in my legs. The pain I felt and the mental pain was nothing I have ever had to go through. It hurt just to turn my legs over and several times I almost came to a complete stop. I also couldn't drink enough water as I was out of water on lap 5. You could walk faster than I could go on my bike. It was pure pain. I soldiered on and finished 31st out of 39 finishers. I decided on the bike while I was suffering trying to figure out what had happened to me, that doing the ride Thursday night is what did me in. My training all year has had me resting on Thursday's. Lesson learned and now I know what it feels like to pop, explode, blow up, and suffer. The ride home in the car was brutal too as my legs ached the whole way home.
I woke up Sunday morning and left to go meet Rolly to head back up to Bellingham for the time trial and criterium. The time trial started early with me starting at 8:44.00 and Rolly starting at 8:44.30. The course was down and back with a hill we had to hit twice for a total of 8 miles. I did the race on my road bike and felt fairly refreshed before starting. The legs were a bit of a question mark but once on the bike they felt ok. The tingling and ache from yesterday were gone. I finished 15th out of 19 racers with a time of 20:39. They say that a TT bike will cut your time by almost 30%. Rolly passed me 2 miles into it on his plush Specialized Transition. He would finish 3rd with a time in the 18 minute range I think. Either way he got 3rd which was great. Now the goal was to go find some food and check out the criterium course.
The crit started at 1:00pm and would be 30 minutes. The course was nice with your basic 4 corners. There was a nice false flat (slight incline) that had a big corner you could take fairly fast.
The race began and this time Rolly and myself were at the very front. The pace was fairly fast the first lap as most crits are. A few minutes later I could hear the sound of air coming out of someone's tire. I rode past start finish and looked down and realized that it was coming from my front tire. Just as we came up on the fast corner, which was turn 1 the tire went completely flat. I was very close to hitting the deck as the front doesn't like to turn when its flat and I almost fell over. I nursed it around to a area I could get accross in the middle and get back to the pit where I could get a new front wheel. I got all set up and was pushed off to get back in the pack as they flew by. I was happy with the new wheel and tire but I had alot of movement out of the front end when I got on the brakes which made me nervous going into the corners. I decided I should just use the back brake instead and it seemed to be fine. With 2 laps to go I was hanging around the back of the pack planning my next move. I decided on the last lap after turn 2 I would just hammer it. I got next to Rolly and said "come on, follow me". As I went by though there was a guy on my left that was moving over a bit towards me that I almost clipped. I heard a noise of bikes hitting the ground or each other but didn't think anything of it. I hammered it all the way around turns 3 and 4 with nobody passing me. I got about 350 meters from the finish line when I pulled off to give Rolly the sprint to the line but there was no Rolly. It took a second for the 2 guys that sprinted for the win to get around me after I pulled off, which means I probably should have kept going but I really don't think I had anything left. Plus, that wasn't my goal when I started the sprint after turn 2. The goal was to lead Rolly out to the line. Rolly rolled by in the pack and come to find out the loud bang was him and the other guy coming together. Thankfully nobody went down. Rolly had some frame paint all over his front rim from the other guys bike who moved over on us and said that was the hardest he has been hit with out crashing. This weekend I probably learned more about my body and racing than I have so far this season.
Thanks to the Cycle U team that was there on Saturday at the road race, Chris, Shawn, Greg, and Rolly.
Till next time.
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