After a full 6 days of being sick, coughing, snot flying everywhere, two days off work I managed to finish the race today with some good result. My goals for Saturday morning were to sleep in and get to the race site around 11:30 or so. I wanted to get a good quality pre-ride of the course in before the first race at noon and be better prepared for the 1:00 P.M. StartTime. I didn't get myself organized, after arriving at the parking lot, with enough time to pre-ride before the C's, but I did get a good warm up, and get out for a double lap of the course just after the "C" race finished. Good stuff.The crazy part of the day, while I was pumping up the tires, was seeing the USA Cycling race official back all the racers up a large distance from their BIKES! What the??? Yep, there was a "lemans" style start. This meant the bikes were separated from the racer, requiring a distance run and creative mount onto your steed. As I watched the "C's" take off, I was wondering if Andy would do this for t
he other races for the day? Well he did. My big ol' group of about 40 in the "B's" had to start this way. EXCITING Stuff. Thanks Andy!With that out of the way, I focused on tires and wheels and tire pressure during my pre-ride and finding good lines to keep the brakes off. I decided against the carbon tubie wheels, with the large amount of wind in a few key parts of the course. No advantage running lighter wheels/tubie's if they are wind sails.
The Lemans start certainly proved to be a possible place to 'blow up' before even getting on the bike. Here I thought I had a good run, but after looking at the photos, I was slowish. But I recovered some time, because of my super double secret technique and placement of the bike. Once on the bike, I managed to get top 13 or so before the first two turns and into the large puddle of water in sand. The course then got super skinny into some sand, then into slick mud, some roots, a drop off almost into the resavour water itself then a few twisty turns into a giant field of swashbuckling mud. This mud field proved to be an area of challenge for some, but I managed to plow through it every time without issue. On the first two laps, some thought it could be done double wide, but it was more of a solo rider type of section. Once out of pig slop we rolled onto some walking trail of gravel baby heads and dry ground and then onto some limestone walking paths that zig zagged around in the woods. There were three tight-ish turns, some were really slowing down for, but with the right gear and body english, they were not pedal proof. Once off the limestone, we ran downhill on some very bumpy soft grass parallel to Lewis Center Road. Down a little incline and over a wooden jump ramp (Sweet jumps) covering some large boulders, then a long hateful climb up soft bumpy grass into a hard right over another wooden bridge, up a steep mountain bike like climb and ou
t onto the grass for a series of twists, turns, off-camber bits then onto different section of the limestone path. Some more grass, back into the twists, turns, off camber bumpy stuff, then a hard left turn with a double set of barriers. The grass after the barriers, could have been quicksand, it sucked, getting back on, I think I tried every gear to see what worked and what didn't after those dang barriers - it just hurt. A grassy dip and some more soft life sucking grass downhill and back to the start.Two guys from cleveland were off the front fairly quickly and might re-think their sandbagging in the "B's", but Herman, Claus, Gardner and TJ from BioWheels all were within reach at various points. I just couldn't close the gap. I really enjoyed my two other teammates, Mike and Tim rolling with me in back and us slaying several other riders one at a time. Eventually, Mike cracked and Tim started to crack with about 3 to go. I was eyeing Biowheels-TJ and trying in the hardest of sections to put in hard digs and make up the gap. My ever so present, goal of no brakes each race, certainly came into play on this course. I passed one or two folks that in years past I have never beaten - great motivation. In the twisty, off camber bits, I was able to gap many and pick better faster lines with no brakes and distance myself. In the bell lap, my team mate Tim came out of nowhere and was all of a sudden sitting on my wheel, I think waiting to pounce. I was able to look back and see Joe H., Dave G and a few others very close. I put in all out efforts in 4 sections and got some distance before the barriers, looked back and Tim was just off a bit. I continued to go hard just before the finish line. I think he could have taken me though:)
I am not sure how they scored the "B" group with the masters in or out. I Took 10th Place, just behind TJ, Gardner and Claus. The pic to the left< shows how close I was to catching Gardner and TJ. Next time!
Kudo's to my team mates for a great race, Kurtis, Daiska, Tim, Ryan, Mike and Mark B for beating some fast guys in his "A" race.
Props to my buddy Joel for his 2nd Place in the "C's" he's been working hard this season and it was good to see all his hard work paying off.
The fitness is coming around. Good things ahead this weekend at the UCI Cincy Races. It's too bad Shannon and Bonney won't come race with me in the "B's". I have Gers, Chewning and Tinsler (with his downgrade to 3's) to battle, which should keep me busy enough for three days.
