SingleSpeed-A-Palooza
A long time ago I put in for a vacation day on April 30, knowing fully well that I would be hungover today. I guess to make sure I earned that day, I drank more yesterday than I have in years. I was hungover by 5:00 pm, and still at 5:00 am. I think that's a testament to how the day went yesterday. Good times, good people, if I only did 1 race a year this would be it.
The Ride Up
Uneventful, which is good. Fred slept, Jeremy & I predicted Mitch would win, and we got there before 8:00. Parked halfway down the long road to Nowhere and waved at 409 people on the way. This is a race of friends, for sure.
We get ready, warm up for 17 minutes, and find we're at the back of the pack. Whatever, it's a long race.
What were my expectations? Truth? Very, very low. With the (yes I said it) allergies, Julia's cold hitting me the day before, and maybe a drink or 3 the night before, I sort of mailed it in. I planned to do a 2 hour hard ride, then get drunk with my friends.
I was really concerned about not going too hard too soon, and having my legs explode and fail like they have done a few times over the past few weeks.
Prolog
I always wonder if I should say prolog or prologue. Everylong writes prolog not but that's not right. Anyway, perception is reality so Pro Log it is. The prolog is dusty, and packed. And the hill does little to thin the crowd. I move from the back to the middle, but am not able to jump that blob of 20 people and go into the ST in 30th or 40th or whatever. Not very good is all I know.
It's a long congo line, and I pass a few but not many. It's too tight, and too early to burn matches, and I know that after the S/F the ST will be packed again. I didn't get a good start (by design) so I have to eat it.
Eventually Utah would beat me by 3:50. Strava tells me his prolog was 2:16 faster. That's so much of the race right there. I bet if you extended that out to the end of the first ST, it would be 3:00 of that 3:50. It was packed.
Speed 14.7
HR 173
Overall that was probably fine, as I did not need to go deeper there anyway. But I do need to work on my race starts.
Lap 1
This is a series of follow-pass, follow-pass, follow-pass. It's pretty gummed up. I figured after about a mile I would be able to make up bigger chunks of real estate but for the first 8 miles or so of the course, this was not to be. So I would track someone, pass them, drop them, etc etc. This literally went on for a solid 20 racers. Most of them would try to hold me off, but I was riding within myself so I wasn't cooking myself too much. So I was able to hold them all off. One guy rode the walk-up, which I watched with some amusement. At the top of the hill I hopped on, caught him, and dropped him for good.
At the bottom of the Orchard I'm mostly by myself, and pop out on the fire road with only a few ahead. By the end of the fire road I catch them all, then pass them one-by-on on Scofield. Towards the end I catch the last guy wearing a black kit with TOGA! on the ass. I thought it was Dave Lyons at first but he looked back and it turns out to be Chris Long. We come out at the end of lap 1 together.
Mandi gives me a perfect bottle hand up.
Speed 12.7
HR: 172
Doing well, where I want to be.
Lap 2
The one thing I love about this race is that the field is so deep that you're always racing someone. Right? Right?
I follow Long into that first ST, and in the rocky stuff he's really struggling so I bolt by him and leave him there. I'm feeling good, but I know there's a lot of race left. I come out onto the road and see Robin walking. This is a bummer but she's smiling, so I'm happy to see that. No other racers are in sight.
For the next 11 miles I ride alone. So much for always having someone to race against.
Somehow, I feel amazing. I drank most of 2 bottles by this point and started in on the 3rd. I took Utah's suggestion to put GU in the flask, and I down maybe 3 of the 5 in there before it gets too hard to really get more out. Next time we'll need to work on doing something to water it down so it comes out easier. And that Roctane does sort of burn your throat in those quantities. But it does work well.
I seem to be getting stronger as the lap goes on and I am railing a lot of sections, seeming to go faster on this lap than I did on the first. I really worked on not using brakes a lot on this lap, and my speed was higher than the first lap. But my HR is lower. This is a god thing.
About halfway through I really start to feel even better and just let everything go everywhere. After a short argument with Luke about where Jeremy is, I continue to hammer out the rest of the lap. At some point last week, Eric had mentioned that these bottle cages we got were crap. I never had a problem with them so I didn't really chime in either way. Coming down 1 particularly fast section, the bottle does not merely fall out of the cage, it literally ejects from the cage, flying so far off that it will take years for anyone to ever find it. I'm fairly sure if it hit a squirrel on the way out it would have killed it instantly.
I run up the Orchard and out the fire road, pulling a faster lap 2 than lap 1. Still I see nobody the whole time other than lapping a few people still out on lap 1.
Speed 12.9
HR 167
Overall
Somehow I end up 14th, just 7 seconds behind 13th. I don't know how I never saw this guy. Seems like he was probably struggling and if I had another 1/10 of a mile I would have caught him, but who know. I was only 1:30 off Kraxburger so I know I ran a solid race. If I hadn't given up that 2:16 in the prolog, that would give me a time good enough for 7th. But if I had pushed harder I'm not sure I would have turned as fast an overall race. In all, I think it worked out well for me.
Once I get past these allergies, my own self-destructive drinking-before-race tendencies, and my lousy race starts, I could actually be in some solid form. Or not, maybe this is as good as it gets. It was a solid race for me regardless.
The Party
This is why we come, right? It's all about the party. If you were there, you all know what we talked about. If not, well I guess some of the funnier stuff was discussing Mandell's blue ass, and interviewing Davidson for Manny's video production. I'd love to get my hands on that raw clip, as well as the one with Utah.
Anyway, good times, though I'm still hungover. I also had to rush this out because despite my being off, I've worked all morning because the dicks in the UK suck. But I should get a half-day Friday because of it.
I'm taking 4 days off the bike - today, plus 3 out in Chicago. When I get back I'll be fatter & even more hungover. Then we go to south Jersey for my buddy's 40th, which will do nothing to help me with the form I'm trying to get. Regardless, it should be fun. We fly out in a few hours, the whole family.
Good to see all of you yesterday. If you didn't make it, put it on the calendar for next year. And take the next day off from work. And make sure there's nothing you do that can't be done by someone else.
Not gonna blog from Chicago. Just gonna be. Enjoy!
A long time ago I put in for a vacation day on April 30, knowing fully well that I would be hungover today. I guess to make sure I earned that day, I drank more yesterday than I have in years. I was hungover by 5:00 pm, and still at 5:00 am. I think that's a testament to how the day went yesterday. Good times, good people, if I only did 1 race a year this would be it.
The Ride Up
Uneventful, which is good. Fred slept, Jeremy & I predicted Mitch would win, and we got there before 8:00. Parked halfway down the long road to Nowhere and waved at 409 people on the way. This is a race of friends, for sure.
We get ready, warm up for 17 minutes, and find we're at the back of the pack. Whatever, it's a long race.
What were my expectations? Truth? Very, very low. With the (yes I said it) allergies, Julia's cold hitting me the day before, and maybe a drink or 3 the night before, I sort of mailed it in. I planned to do a 2 hour hard ride, then get drunk with my friends.
I was really concerned about not going too hard too soon, and having my legs explode and fail like they have done a few times over the past few weeks.
Prolog
I always wonder if I should say prolog or prologue. Everylong writes prolog not but that's not right. Anyway, perception is reality so Pro Log it is. The prolog is dusty, and packed. And the hill does little to thin the crowd. I move from the back to the middle, but am not able to jump that blob of 20 people and go into the ST in 30th or 40th or whatever. Not very good is all I know.
It's a long congo line, and I pass a few but not many. It's too tight, and too early to burn matches, and I know that after the S/F the ST will be packed again. I didn't get a good start (by design) so I have to eat it.
Eventually Utah would beat me by 3:50. Strava tells me his prolog was 2:16 faster. That's so much of the race right there. I bet if you extended that out to the end of the first ST, it would be 3:00 of that 3:50. It was packed.
Speed 14.7
HR 173
Overall that was probably fine, as I did not need to go deeper there anyway. But I do need to work on my race starts.
Lap 1
This is a series of follow-pass, follow-pass, follow-pass. It's pretty gummed up. I figured after about a mile I would be able to make up bigger chunks of real estate but for the first 8 miles or so of the course, this was not to be. So I would track someone, pass them, drop them, etc etc. This literally went on for a solid 20 racers. Most of them would try to hold me off, but I was riding within myself so I wasn't cooking myself too much. So I was able to hold them all off. One guy rode the walk-up, which I watched with some amusement. At the top of the hill I hopped on, caught him, and dropped him for good.
At the bottom of the Orchard I'm mostly by myself, and pop out on the fire road with only a few ahead. By the end of the fire road I catch them all, then pass them one-by-on on Scofield. Towards the end I catch the last guy wearing a black kit with TOGA! on the ass. I thought it was Dave Lyons at first but he looked back and it turns out to be Chris Long. We come out at the end of lap 1 together.
Mandi gives me a perfect bottle hand up.
Speed 12.7
HR: 172
Doing well, where I want to be.
Lap 2
The one thing I love about this race is that the field is so deep that you're always racing someone. Right? Right?
I follow Long into that first ST, and in the rocky stuff he's really struggling so I bolt by him and leave him there. I'm feeling good, but I know there's a lot of race left. I come out onto the road and see Robin walking. This is a bummer but she's smiling, so I'm happy to see that. No other racers are in sight.
For the next 11 miles I ride alone. So much for always having someone to race against.
Somehow, I feel amazing. I drank most of 2 bottles by this point and started in on the 3rd. I took Utah's suggestion to put GU in the flask, and I down maybe 3 of the 5 in there before it gets too hard to really get more out. Next time we'll need to work on doing something to water it down so it comes out easier. And that Roctane does sort of burn your throat in those quantities. But it does work well.
I seem to be getting stronger as the lap goes on and I am railing a lot of sections, seeming to go faster on this lap than I did on the first. I really worked on not using brakes a lot on this lap, and my speed was higher than the first lap. But my HR is lower. This is a god thing.
About halfway through I really start to feel even better and just let everything go everywhere. After a short argument with Luke about where Jeremy is, I continue to hammer out the rest of the lap. At some point last week, Eric had mentioned that these bottle cages we got were crap. I never had a problem with them so I didn't really chime in either way. Coming down 1 particularly fast section, the bottle does not merely fall out of the cage, it literally ejects from the cage, flying so far off that it will take years for anyone to ever find it. I'm fairly sure if it hit a squirrel on the way out it would have killed it instantly.
I run up the Orchard and out the fire road, pulling a faster lap 2 than lap 1. Still I see nobody the whole time other than lapping a few people still out on lap 1.
Speed 12.9
HR 167
Overall
Somehow I end up 14th, just 7 seconds behind 13th. I don't know how I never saw this guy. Seems like he was probably struggling and if I had another 1/10 of a mile I would have caught him, but who know. I was only 1:30 off Kraxburger so I know I ran a solid race. If I hadn't given up that 2:16 in the prolog, that would give me a time good enough for 7th. But if I had pushed harder I'm not sure I would have turned as fast an overall race. In all, I think it worked out well for me.
Once I get past these allergies, my own self-destructive drinking-before-race tendencies, and my lousy race starts, I could actually be in some solid form. Or not, maybe this is as good as it gets. It was a solid race for me regardless.
The Party
This is why we come, right? It's all about the party. If you were there, you all know what we talked about. If not, well I guess some of the funnier stuff was discussing Mandell's blue ass, and interviewing Davidson for Manny's video production. I'd love to get my hands on that raw clip, as well as the one with Utah.
Anyway, good times, though I'm still hungover. I also had to rush this out because despite my being off, I've worked all morning because the dicks in the UK suck. But I should get a half-day Friday because of it.
I'm taking 4 days off the bike - today, plus 3 out in Chicago. When I get back I'll be fatter & even more hungover. Then we go to south Jersey for my buddy's 40th, which will do nothing to help me with the form I'm trying to get. Regardless, it should be fun. We fly out in a few hours, the whole family.
Good to see all of you yesterday. If you didn't make it, put it on the calendar for next year. And take the next day off from work. And make sure there's nothing you do that can't be done by someone else.
Not gonna blog from Chicago. Just gonna be. Enjoy!
