So the weekend before last was the
North Carolina State Criterium Championships.
I guess if there was one race I could say was my “A” race for this
season, this was it. The one I wanted to do well in and had planned to peak
for.
Unfortunately, the whole training
thing was less than structured so coming to a tapered peak wasn’t realistic.
The race was sold out with a full 50 man field. Of course the goal was a
podium, but realistically I wanted a top 10 taking into account my lackluster
training. I got to the venue in downtown highpoint only about 45 mins before
the race start and immediately set out to find registration. After searching
forever I found it in a building off to the side and by the time I got back to
the truck I had less than 30 mins before the race start. I got in less than a
15 min warm up before I had to get the jersey on and dump water all over myself
to try and keep cool. (I found that if you go ahead and wet everything down it
helps to stay cooler). I got rode over
to the start finish and got there only 2 mins before our race was to start,
however the U23 race was running late so I had an extra 10 min or so before
doing my up lap.
This was by far the best venue Iv
ever raced at. It will serve as the venue for the 2013 and 2014 National crit
championships and it is up to the task. The start finish was under a huge
awning coming off the side of a convention center in downtown, which made for a
nice shady spot to watch the race. The court was 1.4 miles in a figure eight
with rolling terrain, but mostly slight grades except for one brief steeper
climb. The finish came about ¾ of the way through a quarter mile gradual
incline. The place was packed with racers and spectators who had come out for
the festival type feel of the event.
I lined up on the second row and
when the whistle blew I took off and settled in about 20 spots deep. The pace was really high from the gun and the
field was stretched out single file. It seems there several folks that come out
for just 1-2 crits a year and are really a lot stronger than Cat 5 but never
upgrade. I settled in on the first lap
but by the time we got to the start finish I saw the guy in front of me was
letting a gap go so I pulled out to go around and got the devastating news.
About 3 guys up there was about a 20 sec gap to the rear end of the front 15 or
so guys. I smashed it as hard and began chasing knowing that if I let them go
the chances of that top 10 were out the window. The front was still putting a lot of pressure
on and it took all I had to get around the guys in front of me and close the
gap about half way over the course of the next half lap. I glanced back and saw
Cameron (who’ve I v raced with before) on my wheel so I pulled off to let him
chase and got on his wheel. We went hard
for the rest of the lap but the gap just wasn’t coming back. I saw that a group
of about 15 of us had formed as the chase group, but after my first pull I felt
burned out and honestly was just hanging on the chase group with all I had.
Within the next lap it became apparent that we just weren’t going to get across
to the front group as the time check came in at 35 secs. At this point I
decided to just settle into this group and see what happened. The next several
laps were rather un eventful with me just hanging onto the chase group. As we
came up to get the bell for one lap to go our group had been whittled down to
10 guys. This is the point I will normally set up knowing there is no chance
for a decent placing and sort of mentally giving up when the pace ramps up for
the sprint. Not this time though, I wanted to see how I would fare in a sprint
finish so I took a big gulf of Gatorade and dumped the rest of the bottle down
my back to cool off. I was toward the rear of the group so I knew I had to move
up. I tried to coast up the side on one
of the downhills, but everyone was guarding their spot well at this point. Half
way through the lap we came to the only steeper climb and I stood up to give it
a go here. Another guy came from the rear with me and I moved up well slotting
into third wheel. Unfortunately, the other guy didn’t slot in but kept
attacking and got a good gap on us. As we hit the incline to the finish I was
in great position. We rounded the final corner the two in front of me opened up
the sprint. I came around the first guy easily and settled back into the wheel
of the leader. I saw Cameron start to come around me so I gritted my teeth hit
another gear and pulled away from him to get third out of our group behind the
attacker and the other sprinter in front of me.
I ended up 20th overall in the race with the 17 guys who had
got away at the first of the race.
I was pretty happy with my finish
after the unfortunate split at the beginning. What can you do. I know I should
stay toward the front of the group, but from now on you better believe I will
be in the top 10 until group settles. It was a very fun race and I probably
pushed myself harder and further than I ever have before to try to close the
gap, hang with the chasers and then sprint at the end.
So that’s it for the summer season,
but the late season still looms. More on that, including some awesome new mtb
parts next time.
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