mattm

******

Radish_legs

Set a 25s power PR in the final sprint, first time I have ever set a sprint PR in a race. Last lap at 45:43. 5th.

mattm

Intelligentsia Cup has been lit so far.

My teammate's vid from the first day, using some of my footage as well.

Radish_legs

A Crit (1/2/3)

So I made the winning break. That's the good part. Bad part is that I was in way over my head, redlined in the break after about 20 minutes, and after multiple attacks, got dropped. The sequence where I made the break starts at 9:25. I was hanging on the back of a chasing group that was just bridging back to the leading group, and followed a wheel. The two guys on the Cadence team are Cat 1s, and very fast ones at that. I was in way over my head in that break. And the result for me was...disappointing but predictable. And bad for my team. But it was a good learning experience for me, and that's what these weeknight crits are for.

davids11

Curious what people think of this crash at the USA crit championship (@1:08 in):
Another view here (@4:00 in):
I have my own opinions but I'd like to know what higher level crit racers think.

topflightpro

Please post the times when the crash happens. I don't want to watch two 9 minute videos looking for a crash.

davids11

Ah sorry, the links were supposed to go to the correct times. I'll edit to add times.

mattm

At a high level, I think it was a dick move to squeeze in to that gap that early in the race. Last lap? By all means. 15 mins in? Why.

Then again, it's easy to look in hindsight and say shoulda/woulda/coulda. The gap was bigger before the guy in blue on the left move right. Justin's not afraid of contact and not afraid of making contact - and there's nothing wrong with that.

Normally it would have just been a random part of the race where two guys bumped and went on with life - I bet shoulders touched 100 times in that race - but Dillon wasn't ready for it and had his bars taken out.. basically bad luck.

Also, this was discussed in our NCNCA fb group (where one of the guys who got crashed out is from), and Justin came in and said:
a) he apologized to Dillon (guy he crashed out), but that
b) Mike's Bikes (Dillon's team) shouldn't have been blocking and looking back

The 2nd part was a little weak in my opinion. I wouldn't be surprised if there was some bad blood from the RR in regards to b)..

Anyway I don't think there was a protest, and I'd be surprised if there was. Nobody took their hands off the bars, so even if the refs saw both videos I think they'd shrug and say "that's racing".

rubiksoval

I think it was a moment of inattention by dude that fell. He looks like he'd swung out and was drifting back over (after looking over his shoulder the opposite way). It was an unnecessary hole shot (most of them are), but it shouldn't have caused a crash, but maybe he hooked his handlebar or something.

Just racing. Crit nats are notorious for stupid crashes. Always have been, likely always will be.

Radish_legs

in what sense were Mike's Bikes supposedly blocking? As in physically obstructing, or just breaking up the flow on the front?

hack

Cory's comments in the Youtube string were a little uncool and suggests there wasn't much remorse for Justin's move. Cory says something like Mikes blocked at Chico and got taken out for it there, too. Agreed that given the situation and timing of the race, a tap of the brakes could have prevented that. Shrug.

Also, not a knock on Dillon in anyway, but he sky rocketed from a 5 to a 1 in about a season (mostly from just riding away from everyone). Contact may not be something he's totally accustomed to while others may have been able to absorb it w/o issue. Again ... dunno.

mattm

I assume the latter, but I wasn't there so I don't know.

topflightpro

These are not the same crash, correct?

In the first video, it looks to me like the guy in front move over, the guy behind was overlapping wheels and didn't adjust and had his front wheel taken out. It happens.

Second video, looks like the guy in Assos went for a gap a bit aggressively though not outside the bounds of normal racing. The gap closed, but he pushed through, hit the arm of the Mikes Bikes guy, who then went down. It honestly took me several viewings to figure out why the Mikes guy went down as the contact didn't seem that egregious. (I wonder if he'd been in his drops if he would have gone down.)

davids11

First video the same crash is really at 1:17 but I put 1:08 for a bit of context. There's another crash just before 1:08 that is unrelated.

davids11

Also, thanks for all the comments. Seems like everyone involved had some degree of fault, I guess.

topflightpro

Ah. I stopped watching after that first crash.

mattm

Sorry - no crashing or drama in this vid, just me winning a training crit. (then doing a training post-up bc you gotta practice it sometimes!!)


(my bud took the video)

Brian Ratliff

I love watching sprinters just destroy breakaway specialists. Accelerates around three people like they are standing still on a 7 second effort 100m from the line.

Radish_legs

I think this is arguably the best Saturday hammerfest on the north side of the Dallas metroplex. It's treated like a road race, and the top 3 get free lattes at the shop afterward. I think my previous best was 5th on this ride. Yesterday I won it, from a breakaway. While the very best Cat 1s were not present yesterday, still some good racers there at the end. Including state track champ who has almost singlehandedly put his team in first place in the season long crit series with all his wins (cat 1 or 2), one of the very best masters' racers/sprinters in Texas (cat 2, but could easily cat up to 1 if he wanted), and a young guy who is up and coming (won the Cat 4 state crit championship, and then went to 3, and has gotten first in the local A crit with numerous podiums. So "upset" would be the word of the day. The two riders dropped from the break were a Cat 2 and a Cat 3 won the Corsicana Omnium 35+. Anyway, I think this one is more entertaining than the other vids I have posted.

UmneyDurak

Giro Di SF E3
Got pretty bad cold a week before, and still wasn't back to normal. Started towards the back, moved to the front within 10 minutes. Just couldn't keep up with accelerations and slid back mid(ish) pack towards the end, around 19 minute mark after I tried to go for prim and discovered legs were not there for sprint. With 6 to go thought I was getting a flat. Slid to the back. By the time I confirmed it wasn't a flat, didn't have a whole lot to move up past few riders. Still no idea what a hell went wrong. It felt like something was loose/rear was going flat. Super disappointing race.
Second to last corner was very bumpy/full of potholes. Few times rear wheel skipped around a bit.

Somehow managed to PR:
5m 331W
20m 289W
Third best 10m 305w
Normalized power 294W
Average 285W
According to training peaks it's barely CAT3, top CAT4 numbers. FML. lol

spectastic

only showing part of the race, but open to opinions and critiques

Radish_legs

so the other (unmentioned) factor in the feedzone attack is the shift in wind?

spectastic

I think for the most part, the wind was cross. it was only during one shorter section of the course, where it was a headwind.

rubiksoval

What's the question? Is it ****ty to attack in the feed zone towards the end of a hot race where water is probably needed by everyone? Yeah. But you gotta put yourself into a position to not be flicked when people do ****ty things (I say that after being on the wrong end of several feed zone attacks).

I mean, if you're the strong guy, and you see people gassed and hanging on, and they start letting gaps go because they're not comfortable taking feeds in a group or whatever other reason there may be, then why should they let up to make things easier? Even if there's no atttack, per se, it's in the interest of the front guys to keep things moving at a decent clip.

Pack positioning is super important in the closing stages of hard races. Gaps can be a bear to close, so best just to not be on the wrong end, even though that may mean staying up towards the front/in the front more than may be ideal.

mattm

Watched 2001 Paris-Roubaix.

Man it looks old!!

RIP Paul Sherwin.