I should preface this post by saying that it is more like a summary of the dangerous excitement of bike racing. My buddy Drew A. said it best to me last year, "This is a tough, sometimes very dangerous sport--you gotta be out there to win or really help your team win, or else it's not worth the risk."
Enjoy the re-cap of the mayhem, because from my end there was little strategic action overall. I was off my game.
Photo courtesy of Jim Wilson.
I was pretty much a sitting duck throughout the race, unwillingly conserving my matches. The few times I was at the front, I was drilling it up the hill instead of on the downhill fast stretch into the hill like most guys. I hoped that it would cause a split sustaining the stronger pace, but with 125 guys, there were always enough riders that could follow easily. If anything, you could recover up the hill as long as you weren't first into the wind. Oh well.
I remembered that this race was sketchy last year, and it reinforced my thoughts that 3/4 races are among the most dangerous events. For this event, it's too many guys, not enough road. The non-selectiveness of the course doesn't help the safety, and the bottleneck taking nearly three lanes of traffic to one before the downhill is just scary. Too many guys disregard the center-line rule, and the referees can't be everywhere at once. The inevitable self-policing doesn't work either.
One of the rounds up the hill I was behind my teammate Chris H., and a rider swerved into his line. He was forced outward and decelerated horribly, so my front wheel went into his rear (sorry Chris!). It was pretty darn scary rubbing wheels, but luckily we got out of that upright. I didn't see him for the rest of the race, but before he sagged back too much he said something about his brake rubbing. (My front brake was rubbing as well but I was able to self-center it while pedaling.) Hopefully I didn't ruin his race...
Soon thereafter, on the next lap, an ABRT or AABC rider was looking behind and to his right, and swerved left into me. Apparently he didn't like it when I held my position, even though I apologized for scaring him. Sorry bro, but I'm going that way, with the race!
Unfortunately, these sorts of incidents were the "highlights" of my race. A good amount of time was also spent strategically socializing with some of the other Cat 3s that I know, respect, and consider great racers. Regardless of the team we were on, we'd help each other get into safer positions knowing we were eager to make something happen. Still, I was just off my game and the field did not encourage much action.
By the way, have I mentioned that the entire field braked HARD every lap before the turn? Oh well, that's racing and definitely was motivation to move up. No huge problems there as far as I know, and the stretch after the turn is always super fun. It sucked for my three junior teammates though, who were holding position better than any other NCVC guys, but spinning out their restricted gears (cough cough, dumb rule).
The final two laps of each Chantilly race were not smooth by any form of the definition, but the chaos that was the final 2-mile lap at Dolan made me uneasy about my health insurance policy and bike racing in general. There were at least two crashes and a whole lot of knuckle-to-knuckle, bar-hooking racing.
Blatant callout: At one point I even saw a certain team's riders pushing each other up the hill trying to help each other reintegrate with the pack. Good teamwork? Sure, but it's definitely not safe when one guy is sinking through the pack and another loses all momentum and forces himself in the other direction, widening the barrier. I am certain these riders were Cat 3, so guys, please, let's take it easy.
The last lap was a total queezy feeling; one that a masters teammate of mine jokes is Scrotal-Tightening Fear™.
Usually the final mayhem is sorta fun, but my mind and legs were not 100% into it and this was unusually bad. I had decent - not great - positioning, and worked with a strong Cat 4 teammate, Mike L. Him and I traded the wind to keep moving up on the outside, but through the backside bottleneck, too many riders regarded the yellow line with little respect. I asked him how he was feeling, and he said he was good. I was doing just fine but knew that my kick got left in the locker at Chantilly 1/2/3.
We were swarmed before the final turn, which meant we were way too far back anyway. By then I knew the podium was too far up the road. With 1k to go I flew on the inside line to bring us up, and caught Jose's wheel, figuring he would sprint. The big lead group that would become the podium was up on the left though. It was for naught.
Jose seemed to agree, and totally turned off the engine early up the hill to find a draft. I kept a hard tempo and came across Michael F. from Harley on my left, who'd outsprinted me the day before. I stood up to get some real estate on him (revenge has weird powers, sorry Michael), then sat back down and kept it as straight as possible, near the right gutter, to the finish. A lot of guys blew up early everywhere, so the shortest route was still a slalom.
Up ahead, I saw Andrew Bridges post up for another V. Kudos buddy. Dominance.
I crossed as the 11th Cat 3, and Mike crossed right behind me as the 11th Cat 4. Mediocre on our part.
After the race, Mike had a pretty ugly scrape on his leg. I asked him if he'd gone down, but nope - someone's wheel had literally rubbed the skin off of the side of his calf. Our 3/4 team's conclusion was that finishing that race rubber-side-up was a bigger victory than we would normally consider that expectation. Somedays you (okay, I mean me) just do not have the guts, luck, or the legs.
Contrasted with the races on Saturday, I will quickly forget this particular race. It is unfortunate, but there's a reason Carl Dolan has a yearly reputation for carnage. As much as everyone appreciates the opportunity to race twice in one day, I think it would be safer to have smaller fields (75 guys?) with straight categories. Call me a wimp, I know, but I like driving home in one piece.
Fool me once, fool me twice; somehow I've dodged the bullet both times, though I don't know how much more Fear™ I can tolerate in Columbia, MD.
8 comments:
Agreed on the craziness of the 125 guys in the 3/4 field. I kept trying to get away, b/c I had no desire to be part of that field sprint. I thought I might stick it, but it wasn't to be. Glad we survived that one. Looking forward to more selective & technical courses where we can get a good break established.
...or at least drop some people!
I was standing in the crowd at the finish line. You should have heard the collective "Ooooooo" as the massive group came up the hill, curb to curb and out of the saddle. We were all expecting a massive wreck. I even heard someone say "oh man, there's sooo going to be a crash." Fortunately, the crash that did happen didn't look serious and only involved like 2 riders (one of which was my teammate Dan).
You had a good weekend overall, Bert; some points and all your skin. Bring on crit month.
racing with 4's is no good. The last corner i had a guy swing into me nearly locking his handle bars with mine, then thanking me for leaning back and helping keep him upright. pretty wild.
Honestly I wouldn't judge a rider by his category, because there were just as many of us Cat 3s doing dumb stuff too.
Between experienced Cat 3s and new Cat 4s, there's a great variation in skill levels and little correlation to who's in control and who's not, or who's making good/bad decisions. Add a non-selective race course, and things get interesting because everyone's feeling strong.
that's very true. but there's a reason there are more wrecks in the 4's and even more in the 5's and its not because we are going faster.
I'd say there are more wrecks in the 4's because of field size, not skill. There are simply fewer cat 3s so the races don't fill, that's why promoters run 3/4 races.
Good post, Bert. I had the same experience in that race: white knuckles and relief at the finish.
Post a Comment