Jul 21, 03:41 PM by Steve | Rubber Side Down
Posted in Cycling & Race-ReportI felt really good in the race and was right up in the front coming into the finish, but a Fast Friday rider pulled a bonehead move and took out Chester right in front of me. Tom and Bill bounced off the melée but none of us went down.
The morning started out well enough, we got a really easy start beacause I misjudged the time it would take to get there, but it was good because it gave lots of time to register, take a leak, etc. However, when I started getting dressed I realized that I forgot my jersey… I rembered that I had my skinsuit for tomorrow’s crit. It felt kinda funny wearing a skinsuit for a road race, but it made me really glad I picked the one with a pocket.
Race time, and we line up near the front. Jason was also there, as was Bill, but he was in the porta-potty when we lined up and had to start from the back. There were 5 of us (Chester, Tom, Mark, Doug, and I) there and we were going to try to help Chester get a win. We didn’t really have a plan, and Tom rode off the front about 1 mile into the first lap. It gave me and Mark a chance to do some classic blocking and patrolling the front. There were a few guys up there who clearly didn’t know what was going on. One guy in red kept going up to the front, pulled for a few moments and then would motion me to pull through. Ocassionally some people tried to chase and I would mark them and sit on their wheel, and a few times I would pull through but soft-pedal. People were more than happy to let me sit on front and the gap grew to more than 20 seconds at one point. After we passed the actual town of Sisquoc (the race used to start there, hence the name) and turned onto Palmer to begin a gradual climb, another guy attacked but this time the field didn’t let him go. Although it took some prodding—someone shouted “are you going to let two people get up the road?!” I wasn’t on the front at that point, maybe about 10 places back, but a few riders chased and the field responded and caught him, then the field slowed and the gap top Tom grew again. He apparently wasn’t trying to stay away and didn’t push the climb, and that’s where he was finally caught.
For most of the race I was not aggressive about maintaining position and generally let people move in front of me whenever challenged for a wheel. But I would move up a lot on the climb without really having to work hard and tried to get as far up as I could for the big dip because it was frustrating getting blocked by everyone getting bogged down on the climb. The last lap I decided I needed to maintain position so I moved through the field more agressively, worked my way up to Chester and asked him what the plan was, and he told me to drill it on the final climb. I found Tom and he said that we needed to keep the pace high after the climb, to keep the field strung out to reduce the bunching at the sprint. When we came over the top of the climb and went into the rolling section, the field kept slowing so I worked my way up the front and jumped off to keep the pack moving. I wasn’t trying to make an early move or anything, but figured that people would chase and the pace would be kept up. I looked back after a bit and saw that we were getting more strung out and we were heading for the downhill section, so I figured my work was done and moved off. I stayed near the front right up the crash.
I didn’t see it begin, but I saw bikes and bodies flying and was almost caught up in it. I was right on this wheel or maybe one more wheel back (I don’t remember) and the carnage—I was sure I was going to be taken out but I managed to skirt around, and under it. According to Chester
“A Fast Friday guy came burling through on the inside and shoved me into riders to the left of me… No biggie, We keept it upright… then He broke a chain and As we were moving to avoid him a team mate of his came charging through me and rider I was shoulder to shoulder with on my left- He came hurtling into both of our hoods, I immediately flipped over my handle bars and went hurtling to the asphalt below. Caitlin said she could see my bike flying through the air.”
That killed my momentum and my motivation and I just kind of cruised into the finish for 40th. There were over 100 riders in the field (72 finished) and pretty much everyone that was still in the front group passed me, so we had dropped most of the riders at some point. I was really bummed because that was the best I have ever felt in a race—I was right near the front and possibly headed for a top 10 finish. As it was I was happy to finish in one piece.
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