2017- Race Results
 

Just because.. I know there is a hillclimb TT in San Bruno

I start this thread every year so I can see my name all year long.

Anyway, third. 35+ 123

Winner is a climbing superstar and just sat in until time to win. My team was 2-3-4, with me in 3rd. Times were super slow this year, down to 6 guys by the flat section so we basically did z2 for middle 4 minutes into a 18mph headwind. Battled it out on the final ~6min.

http://i.imgur.com/8blPGXMl.jpg

Congrats Fudgy on kicking off the racing season with a podium finish.

Have your Thirsty Bear guys contact the Russian: Fancy Bears and have them change the thread starter name to @Ygduf.

It was weird not even considering racing San Bruno this year. I think we did the race 6 out of 9 times while living in NorCal.

That podium picture reminds me of the 2011 TdF podium with the Schlecks flanking Cadel Evans.

Looks like Ygduf's team scored a Ray-ban sponsorship for 2017

Early Bird Crit yesterday. Smallish, 20 guys in an open 1-2-3 field. Two Echelon development team kids were there (Owen Gillot and Gavin Murray) and definitely the ones to watch. I had one teammate who covered the first attack by Owen (basically from the gun). Field chased and caught them after a few minutes and Gavin shot off the left side at minute 5. I waited until he had a decent ~10 second gap, solo, then jumped across. I brought one Jakroo racing kid on my wheel so we were three. Jakroo kid gave up after about 5 minutes when a moto told us we had 20 seconds. Once we were two I told Gavin I was happy to work with two and we quickly stretched it to about 40 seconds. We quit getting time gaps but after ~10 minutes, so maybe 43 minutes left, we couldn't see the field anymore and settled in.

Good workout and he was kind enough to only beat me by a bike in a straight-up 150m drag race. Pretty happy. Was comfortable the entire time. Only regret was not going for it to lap the field. I think we could have done it once the gap started going up had we stayed on the pressure instead of settling in for the long (slower) move.

http://i.imgur.com/HBlxdF6.png

Nice job.

Wish I'd been there... I could've lost to Gavin by a wheel or so, or maybe even been dropped from that break!

Never seen the field lapped at the EB crits, maybe since the course is so long - but I wanna be in that break when it happens.

Hoping the weather clears up for this Sunday.

Team (1/2's, masters, some 3/4's) did a training crit down in SLO - our team won it the last two years in a row, and the general plan was to do it again.

One of the sub-plans was to lap the field in the A's race, and that's exactly what happened. I went on the first or second lap to get things going, but should have waited - the winning break went on the 4th lap or so. A bunch of guys (including ours) didn't know the break was gone, or that our guys were in it, so they (the 3/4's & masters that is) were chasing or trying to make their own breaks.

So I had to be the ***hole yelling at them to stop chasing down our own guys. When we have >20 people in a race of about 40, it's just too many - especially when they aren't paying attention to who's up the road. It's great that cat 3/4's want to race with us but damn that was annoying. Too many guys to communicate effectively, etc.

Anyway we won so it worked out, but still, damn. I didn't get in their race and screw it up, why are they doing it to mine?

with 20 guys you could've rode the full width of the road to physically block anyone from attacking haha

First race of the year, Cal Aggie crit. Also first time I've ridden in only bibs and jersey, with no base layer since last fall!

Pretty big 1/2/3 field, maybe 60. No teammates, so I spent the majority of the race working to stay near the front. Went with one move with 20' to go, 2 good teams in it but the field was chasing everything. Still we managed to string it out and cause a big split in the field. But of course everyone slowed down and it came together. Hung out just behind the 5 or so teams gathering at the front with 6 to go. Then 4 to go the swarm came and I got shuffled back a bit. Managed to move back up but I'm really terrible at reading 5 other teams leadouts all at once, and knowing where to be. Ended up being way too far back and sprinted for 14th (I think).

Fun race, would have been more fun with teammates though!

1 hour, 95 TSS

Same course as @aaronmcd ... raced the 35+ 123 and the P123.

35+ race was first and really the first intensity I've had in a while. Took a good 20 minutes to get my bearings. Shortly after that, teammate got in the winning break (7 guys), so the rest of us kept near the front for the remaining 35 min covering moves and keeping the pace fast enough to be slow enough. It was refreshing. Fast, but not frantic. Came in with the field around 15th.

P123 was hot from the get go and I was pretty useless hovering near the back end of the field. Guys were getting dropped left and right. With some 4-5 laps to go our Jr got off the front with a former teammate. They stayed away until 1/2 a lap to go ... I think he had the legs to keep away, but that's for another day I guess. With 2 to go, some surging split the field. I was on the wrong side of the split and cruised in with the rest of the stragglers. No clue on placing.

Fun to race and overall it was pretty safe. Legs not quite there though.

Well at least someone from our team went to the 1/2's! Dave was there mentoring early races but had food poisoning or something and bailed on the 1/2/3's. I would have been there, but oh well.

Nice job on the result - it's a fun race, and one of the most underrated - it gets probably a top 5 attendance in the 1/2's of the whole season!

Did Garett win?

As far as reading team leadouts - you probably really only need to watch three of those five team leadouts, which is still tricky.

Owen
Leon
Garrett

I'm not feeling good to sprint often enough to get much practice, but I discovered the obvious fact that if I sit behind ALL 5 teams, the whole leadout from at least a few of those teams beats me lol. Plus a few other guys who also sat behind all 5 leadouts.

Solid result. I was hurting early, mid, and late in that race. I was up near your wheel when the swarm came and just didn't have the legs to move back up. Sad face.

Cal Aggie Criterium - E4 - did not win (3rd)

Was not really planning on racing this weekend because driving 2 hours both ways for less than an hour of racing did not seem to be a good trade off. Especially on a course with what appeared to be superfluous sketchy turns. However, coach @mattm chastised me for not racing, and when I looked at some race videos online of the course the turns didn't seem *that* bad. After a promising workout on Friday I decided I would just drive up and try to race it after all after asking for some advice on how the race would play out:

http://i.imgur.com/nqFVkafm.png

Without any teammates in the race the game plan was pretty simple - I was just going to stay in the top 5 at all times so that I could cover any break (no way am I driving 4 hours to let a break go away) and have good line of sight on the chicane so that I would feel safe. This proved to be useful because there was a crash in the pack the very first time coming into the turn. I'm not sure I ever figured out how to nail that turn (1) even by the end of the race, but at least I kept both wheels on the ground.

http://i.imgur.com/qfdcZ5l.png

I was able to sit near the front for the majority of the race - I think I was probably in the pack for less than 3-4 minutes over the 50 minutes of racing. On the occasions that I was swallowed by the pack I felt boxed in and anxious about having to do the turn surrounded by people. I think I maybe did have to do the turn within the pack once over the course of the race and it was fine, but I was much more comfortable when I was sitting 2nd or 3rd wheel. Riders took flyers and tried to get away on occasion throughout the race, but thats pretty hard to do off of such a slow pace when there's 40+ riders in the field who are all motivated to not let anyone get away. I chased down a couple more serious ones myself, but ended up pulling the whole field back with me.

Going into the last lap everyone was together, so I was set up to follow mattm's advice of attacking with a minute to go (3). There was a crash on the back stretch of the last lap where I think people were getting jittery, but I was ahead of it and followed someone who had taken off. Through the turns I was in the top 5 getting ready to launch when someone beat me to the punch and attacked coming out of these turns (2) and got the jump on me. I still attacked going into the last turn as I had planned, but I think I left too much of a gap to close. Also, earlier on in the race I had decided I would need to stay as far left as possible in the final stretch because given the wind direction that would minimize possible avenues for someone to draft, however, I seem to have forgot about this when the time came and was more concerned with chasing down the rider who went early than closing the door. In the end, someone came up the inside of both of us, leaving me in 3rd.

Overall, the race was super slow, like 23mph. I believe I've averaged more power on a recovery ride (which may speak to me being fairly undisciplined on recovery rides...) and I've definitely gone faster solo. However, I guess I shouldn't be surprised given no one wanted to lead and the only injections of pace were around closing down breaks or trying to get to the front before the turns. My power for the last minute was also super low, not much more than I held for 16 minutes the day before (albeit up a hill), so that's something to think about.

Some takeaways:

a) I think if I wanted to get into a break I should have considering trying to let a serious one form and then try jumping across. I'm too passive to try and start a break myself (it seems quite unappetizing to have to try and stay away for the entire race - I would have no problem doing this if my hand was forced, its another thing entirely to take it on willingly). That being said, I dont think a break would really have happened given how slow the race went.
b) I should have went earlier. At least I didn't try to leave it for the finishing straight, but I could have launched out of the chicane and preempted the early attack. I think I value being the first mover.
c) I need to work on 1 minute flat efforts. My power curve has my 1-min power at ~600W (9+ W/kg) but thats up a steep hill. It's another thing entirely to do that in an aerodynamic position on the flat. I think if I'm going to be racing crits my game plan will always be to get in a break or to launch early, so I should practice the 1:00 attack on the flat.

In the end, 3/20 upgrade points. 7 more races planned in February, all with more favorable courses than Saturday.

I remember thinking through all my early races to that degree.

Sunday I did the earlybird 123 crit. Probably double the crowd and warmer temps. Everyone was eager to chase. Countered an attack at 25 minutes. Solo for a few minutes, ended up seeding the winning break of 5. 3rd or 4th in the long-ass sprint. Lost to a cat 1 young adult, a masters track world champ, and was neck-and-neck with another masters guy. At least I beat the 100lb junior.

Yes, but you've learned how to race and have internalized all that, I'm trying to figure it all out! That said, I still agonize over tactics in running (and when I competed, in swimming), so I'll probably always be a headcase. :)

3rd is really good, btw.

thanks. 4th is good too. winning seems like itd be better though :)

I like 2nd or 3rd. Winning (the four times I've done it anyway) was really deflating. Losing, but being really close to winning, always left me feeling more motivated than winning.

No way, I remember the wins in crits/road. Track, different story. But also, epic situations are memorable. The solo efforts in no man's land for 4th place, or the 60 mile breaks getting caught in the last kilometer. Or even getting dropped on a hill and TTing all day to pass stragglers. Crits are fun, but rarely epic.

Don't get me wrong ... I remember the wins and that's what I drive for, but just missing out on the win is what pushes me more at the end of an interval and leaves enough of a bitter taste that I feel obligated to train harder.

I agree with Hack. I like winning, but I still think about the race I lost to Hack at Colavita after being in the break all day. Did I pull too much, why was I at the front in the last lap, etc.

Still fun though.