First H2H race in the books.
I got to the race early enough to sell my Orbea (Thanks
@KenS). As I was pulling in, the road was also part of the race course. As the promoter already mentioned, they have some bugs to work out and this is one of them, but it wasn’t bad. I hope this doesn’t come out the wrong way, but most of the traffic was coming in during the cat 3 race. These guys are not going at the same clip the cat 1 guys are so it wasn’t as big an issue as it could have been.
As I was sitting there, a course marshal had stopped me to allow racers to go. No problem. I’m there with my windows down taking it all in and I hear 2 guys coming out of the woods and they are arguing back and forth while racing. “F*ck you”, “f*ck you a$$hole”, “take off your ear phones”, “I’m not wearing ear phones you piece of sh!t”, etc, etc… Really nasty. At first I laughed but then it made me sad. I don’t know what triggered it but there’s no reason for that. I like to think of Cat 3 as a time when you can learn, enjoy yourself, make some friends, and get a taste for racing. Maybe I sound a little arrogant, (possibly naïve?), but Cat 3 guys shouldn’t take it this serious. If they do, move to Cat 2 where its more about racing. Just my opinion .
Moving on. I was able to do a warm up lap with
@muddybike. The course was pretty unique as far a H2H races go. It starts off with a ¾ mile fireroad before dumping into a tight section of singletrack. Eventually the singletrack becomes a little more open and flowy before dumping back onto a fire road. After that it is a combination of fireroad, single track, and sections where you go though camp ground villages. You do about 5 miles of this before dumping back into the fire road that you started on. Then there’s approximately ½ mile until the finish.
Wide open is an understatement. Absolutely no rocks, just a few roots here and there, and most of the turns are long sweepers where you carry a ton of speed. Other than 1 small pitch that took ~ 10 seconds to climb, it’s completely flat…..Not a single place to recover….At All. Full throttle for as much as your engine can handle. It was almost like an hour and 40 minute cross race.
As we line up to race I am reminded that I am the old man in my class. Its 19-39 and I am 39. The pro men go (huge group of around 30), then pro women, then Single Speed, then my group of 9. Small groups kind of stink because if you’re not in one of the top spots, you don’t feel like you did well.
Anyway, once we start I’m near the front, and eventually I’m leading. Those short track starts really helped my body prepare for this moment. With the course the way it is, being near the front going into the singletrack was ultra important. Getting stuck in traffic while a fast group pulled away could kill any chance of a podium. So being in front going into the single track was best case scenario.
I ride the singletrack at an aggressive pace hoping to put some space between me and everyone else. Once I get to the fireroad I look back there’s one other racer. We gapped the entire pack to the point that they weren’t in sight. I didn’t see that coming…
Me and this kid (I’ll call him “T”) kept pushing at race pace nonetheless. We took turns leading on the fire roads but he would get in front whenever we got into the singletrack He had a killer engine, but was making mistakes with his lines. Unfortunately for me, this course was forgiving for someone with that skill set. After a while I was happy sitting right on his wheel.
Halfway through the 2nd lap, the third place guy started gaining. At the next fireroad I dropped the hammer and put out a pretty hard effort for ~ 30 seconds. Thinking I put a little daylight behind me I let up and continued at race pace. The good news was that this effort came pretty easily and I could recover while keeping the pedal down. The bad news was that T was still right behind me. Right on my wheel. Like that effort didn’t happen. WTF. At this point I realized this kid had a serious engine. Also, he probably wasn’t working as hard as I was.
I let him go by and got back on his wheel. He rode at a decent clip but I was able to stay right on him. It was still race pace and my HR was up there, but I was ok.
3rd place guy caught us again and the three of us were together for about 4 minutes until we hit that previously mentioned small pitch. T and I stood and mashed over it, it clearing it in seconds. That was the breaking point for 3rd place guy. I heard click, click, click downshifting and I never saw him again during the race.
Once we dumped onto the fire road going into the last lap, T dropped the hammer. In the mile and change of fireroad he probably put 15 seconds on me. He just went into TT mode and calmly rode away, out of sight. I had no answer.
I thought I may be able to bridge once we got into the singletrack, but not a f’ing chance. He had too much of a lead and after a few minutes of heavy efforts I realized it wasn’t going to happen and just rode my own conservative race pace. I kept looking over my shoulder for the 3rd place guy and I made sure I had enough to burn a few matches to maintain my position, but he never popped up. I finished the race in second.
Overall it was a successful day. The 40 age group never caught me. I never even saw them which means I was around a minute or so of the winner’s time. That group passed me on the first or second lap almost every race last year.
I also passed the entire Singlespeed group except for Dan S, who is a freaking beast this year. If he races SS, I’m not sure anybody will be able to compete. He may race open though. SS was a definite disadvantage with all the fire roads though so on a more varied course I’m not sure I would have caught them.
My dissertation is over. Thanks for reading
Once of these things is not like the others...
C.R.E.A.M
