are there training races in your area? I'd imagine that RDU has enough population to support a series of such events. The reason i ask is that they would be more conducive to you learning and appreciating things around you. When you are cross-eyed from a serious effort (say when the local cat-1 puts down a vicious charge up a hill), you are hanging on for dear life and really don't have many other things to think about. Doing a race with people of similar physiology would help here.
The other thing is that "seeing it coming" often has two components a) having a front row seat to the action and b) knowing the course. If those seats are taken by the big hitters, while you may have it to make it across had you been at the very forefront, being in the 10-15th position will mean that you'd need to burn a much larger match in order to make it across. For the latter, this means studying the course before hand and taking note of rollers, descents, sketchy sections, and wind-exposed sections, so that you can anticipate where people may make a move (and be at the front and be unencumbered when you launch). Granted, sometimes people will attack in a relatively non-descript section of the course, but more often, people use geographical features to do this.
One thing you can practice in rides like the P-RIde is taking a pull on the front and slotting back into the shielded pack. This is an important skill to have in its own right. The other things about avoiding eating wind is that this is often an exercise in patience and awareness of your surroundings. You should move up in one of two situations: someone sideblasting and you catch said rider's back wheel or waiting for a gap to open and sliding forward. Even the former is not as recommended, all things considered, you could still eat a lot of wind on the upwind side even when following another rider.