Been a great season so far; the outline of my 2021 story

• did Elite Nationals in FL back in June - goal was to survive and learn a thing or two; got top 20 in both races (RR & crit)
  • RR was 105 mi on flat terrain - we averaged 29 mph.. I was stupid and tried to go otf a few times lol
  • Crit was 30 mph avg, thanks to Best Buddies team (they won)
• got 3rd at the Bariani RR, a not-totally-flat Norcal classic RR. Current pro crit champ won
• did some races at Intelligentisia in the p/1/2 field
  • crashed myself out the first four minutes in our first day (South Chicago).. wanted to quit bike racing, teammates talked me out of it luckily
  • the next day at Elgin I just wanted to survive - and I did. Which was saying a lot because only ~30 out of 100 finished, and I was one of 'em!
  • on the last day I lined up in the front and really raced; it was hard, and I was in the winning break for about one lap until Tyler Williams attacked.. note to self: don't bridge up to Tyler's break and immediately pull through
  • a highlight of that race was being close to a big crash and jamming my shifter into someone's ass and staying upright/not stopping and carrying on like nothing happened
• got 3rd at Masters Nats in the crit from a break - a decent result, but frustrating bc should/woulda/coulda..
• WON the Suisun P1/2 crit, a race I won back in 2017. Was in every break of the day including the winning one
• I'm leading the p/1/2 BAR for NorCal, a few more races left in our season

Some ups, some downs, but overall I'm glad to still be riding a bike!

Post more Matt! We need your no-nonsense NorCal elite content!

Who are you riding with? MIke's Bike's? Terun still a thing? Where's Chris Evans? Are you training any differently?

Fudgy is recovering being hit by a car.

First cross race of the year last Sunday. It's a relay so I only raced half of it (1 lap on - 1 lap off). raced with my son. We actually ended up finishing mid pack out of all of the teams. It's been a long time since I finished "not last" in a race. My kid is flying but wasn't passing anyone. Only gave up a couple spots. I only gave up a couple of spots. I am riding better than I have in many years. Good stuff.

Oh no! Hope he's doing ok

I think he is recovering. I only know what he posts on other sites.

Still running Terun Elite yeah, and I’ll have y’all know we’ve beaten Mikes a few times this year already!

I did a ton of solo training last year but generally still training the same, just following the Training Bible classic pattern. Also lost like 20 lbs due to not having snacks all day at work lol.

Chris is indeed recovering and doing well, I saw him a few weeks ago. He’s able to ride an indoor bike and is doing a bunch of rowing to get back in shape. He’ll be back!!

yeah, 20 lbs might make a bit of a difference haha! Glad to hear things are good.

I mean, you were bigger than I expected when I met you.

Cross, but whatever.

Callup, 5 or 6 on holeshot. Lap one the guys who will be 18 year ol P1/2 in a month leave us. Lap 2 I have a look to move third my fabe turn. Lots of wear from early rums and bad memory of practice was wrong line. Super aggressive fast turn washout.

Chase. Hurt. Probably 12 of 30.

Also, my genius at TT on road is only rivaled by my idiocy at cross tire choice and pressures. Like moron status.

Oh, our 4/5 lap pace for me being 12 with a fall….faster than 3/4. Wuuut?

Cowbell fun!

I did my first mass start race in 2 years yesterday. Considering I really haven't even done any group rides in that time (maybe 3 times with 3 or 4 guys) either the race went about as well as you could expect. I actually won this race a few years ago in a lower category by lapping the field in a 3 man break, but yesterday was very different. I did the 45+ and spent most of the race trying to get some race/pack skills back and wasted so much energy. I can't count how many times I moved up on the outside instead of up through the pack. We've only had 3 mass starts in our district this year, so the group was a mix of those who had traveled to race and those of us who hadn't. There ended up being one crash and what looked like a broken collar bone and a few sketchy corners, but I managed to stay upright and finish mid-pack.

And that was the last race of the season as well, so it's on to the offseason.

I had my first ever crit race over the weekend (thank you to those who commented on my tips thread), and it went pretty well all things considered. It was a small field (20 riders), so was an E/1/2/3/4 cat women's race. After the neutral half lap start, the group took off led by the E/1/2 women, with most of the 3/4 hanging onto the back. I dropped back into the smaller chase group in hopes of finding my feet. About 2/3rds of the way through the race, one of the girls took off into no man's land. Myself, and my teammates hung back as we knew she would tire herself out pretty quickly (she wasn't really taking any turns on the front anyway), and with about 2.5 laps to go, we easily overtook her and she jumped straight back on our wheels. For the final lap, I took the front to lead out my sprinter team mates, and finished 11th overall, so pretty happy with that result. I think with a few more crits under my belt, I'll feel a bit more comfortable trying my hand in the break.

Congrats rivers , that sounds like a very successfull first race!

Raced CX last weekend, and twice this weekend. I've been working slowly up to a race level effort since I strained my hamstring (and subsequently had back pain) at the start of August, so I'm really happy to be back at it. My hamstring feels completely fine, and while my lower back was a little sore after my second race this weekend, it is a-OK today. As for results, last weekend I took 18th and this weekend I took 8th both Saturday and Sunday out of ~30 starts each race. The best part was that my son won both of his races this weekend and is now moving out of the beginner category into Cat 4. Tremendous fun!

i've been racing CX too, usual string of midpack results for the most part, but this past Sunday was my A race (and my club's race too) and I was as high as 9th in the first lap, I think (based on my video) but gave up some spots in the first lap due to some sloppiness and being unable to really accelerate to catch guys, but I ended up crashing near the end of the first lap and gave up an additional couple of spots and then one guy who had been on my wheel the whole race got me toward the end of the final lap, so ended up 15/40, but had things gone well could have been 11th possibly. Fitness is there, skill isn't, so I'm really hoping to do a clinic next summer and improve on the skills. I had the same avg power and NP as the race winner on a pretty flat course, so the effort is most certainly being misused in my case. Anyhow, still trying to have fun and not burden myself with expectations!

Top 10 cx Sunday. Would have done better but no callup and then guy went down right in front of me up a muddy bit and lost time.

We have a pretty competitive region for cross. Given that, I don't get how/why our cat 4/5 open (not masters) is a full mph faster than the masters and then almost exact same speed as the 3/4 open race. I mean, the folks on podium in open 4/5 speeds are the same as the podium for 3/4. Guy I train with at the course sometimes did get 3rd in his 3/4 race and in 4/5 my same speed was only good for a top 10.

Just a USAC points oddity? A bunch of 4's that don't want to move up to 3's so they can do well in both 4/5 and 3/4 instead of only in 3/4?

Etiquette question (and yes I know Zwift racing isn't real racing): In a Zwift race tonight, a teammate and I were fighting with one other guy for the bottom 2 spots on the podium with 300 m left. With maybe 50 m left, my teammate (in front of me) sees we've got 2s on the other guy and sits up. I don't notice where the other guy is as I've got tunnel vision at that point and keep accelerating right to the line just barely passing my teammate (0.03s). How bad of a faux pas is it to sprint past a teammate who is sitting up right at the line? He didn't say anything at the time, but I looked back at the feed afterward and felt like an *******. It was his spot and there was no need to sprint past him as top of the podium was 11s up the road and 4th came in 2s after us. Again Zwift (pretend) racing so no prize money.

Why did your teammate sit up? Also, I can't imagine executing a sprint with that sort of precision in Zwift, let alone racing as a team! The speed benefit of the "blob" in Zwift is huge compared to a pack or chase IRL, which needs to be at least somewhat organized.

Update from the last cx race, myself and a few others got poison ivy. They ran the tape right by a bush with it in it apparently. We'd smack the bush taking the line every lap.

Greaaaaaat.

Also another guy had to quit in middle of the 3/4 race as he got fire ants up his leg.

I'm not sure why he sat up. It could be that he'd just blown up and was done (sprint segment for points that finished 1 km from the end and then he - and to a lesser extent me - kept the gas on to blow up our group as they tried to regorup and then made the final move to get ride of the last hanger on at the ~400 m mark). Or it could be he thought it was over as we'd gotten a solid gap on the other guy. Dunno. I was just watching the video after (while recovering from injury/surgery my top end is gone and I can no longer win sprints just by muscling through them, so I'm trying to get better on positioning my effort which I didn't used to care as much about) and saw that he eases off about the same time as I'm hitting my final kick and it sure looks like I'm trying to chase down a teammate to take his spot even though I would have been hitting that the same way if no one had been around because I just can't finish a race without a sprint to the line (even if my sprint is incredibly feeble as it was last night because I was done).

:eek::eek::eek:

I did my first Cat 5 race at the end of the season this year (last local crit). I won, so I would say it went well. But the bigger story was my buddy, who forgot his shoes and managed to finish with the pack in street shoes!

I don't really race on Zwift but honestly there's so much lag in the system that if you sat up when you noticed your teammate sitting up, you'd be sprinting for another second or two before your avatar sat up. So I wouldn't worry about it. But your teammate would probably appreciate a "hey, I realized I sprinted by you at the finish, and I wouldn't have if I knew you would be sitting up".

He sat up a couple seconds before you saw him sit up. I would bet he blew sky high or he thought he had it in the bag. Either way, I'm sure he's not blaming you for passing him.

I don't do offroad stuff because of poison ivy, mosquitoes, and ticks. Even watching races is tricky sometimes, because you might get some random poison ivy near the road. Around here if poison ivy was a salable crop we'd be rich. And so many people I know have had Lyme disease it's crazy.

Mosquitoes... I just hate them. I'm a mosquito magnet, except when my sister is around. Then I'm no longer "it".

Ah, the hazards of CX . I've been continuing CX racing this fall with medium results (last 3 races were 13th place of 40-50 starters). I'm not as fit as I'd hoped I'd be due to injuring my hamstring this summer, but my hamstring hasn't been giving me any trouble even with run ups and running and sand and stupid CX stuff. So I'm pretty happy with how it has been going.