Hilly course: One longer climb (2k?), several small steep hills, fast winding descent, no flats Elite 4/5 A
4 laps- 51 miles
Touchstone riders: Markham Connolly, Ken Dick, Jonathan Buck, Elmar Stefke, Valentino Pelizier
Woke up to a beautiful but brisk morning at the Alladin Hotel in Sonora. I went downstairs to the lobby at 5:45am and had a prerace meal with a guy in a cowboy hat, shorts, birks, and earphones clearly engaged in his own world. Shortly after, Andrew, who now rides for Zteam, Pieps, an old Telluride buddy who now resides in Grass Valley, and I loaded up the car to head to the start. After taking a wrong turn out of the hotel and losing, uh…hum, valuable warm-up time we finally got to registration. Burrrrrr….it’s cold. Veterans said that it was warmer than last year and that it'll get hot when we get on the course. I have to admit, it was hard to believe. I started digging for extra clothing. Do I wear knee warmers? Nope…because I can’t find the left one. Do I wear full fingered gloves? Nope…because I can’t find the right one. Fortunately, the sun started to shine on us and made the temp much more comfortable. I love the sun. The veterans were right on. I got the bike on the trainer and was able to get a good 25 minute warm-up and had plenty of time to get to the start without rushing. This was a first.
50 of us paraded out to the course behind the race official on a motorcycle. He pulled off but apparently we were still in neutral. I never quite got when the race started. I asked Andrew when the race started. He said, “now, you idiot.” The pace all of sudden started picking up. Great! Let’s get the show on the road.
The first lap was slower than I thought it would be. I stayed behind two guys at the front waiting for an attack on the first climb, which turned to be the longest climb of the course- about 2k. On the descent to the backside, the field was jittery and unsettled. I made sure to stay near the front because the winding roads were narrow with potholes. We were going pretty darn fast. We hit a couple of rollers after the first descent which slowed everyone down quite a bit and then another fast but shorter descent lead us to the next series of steeper hills. I decided to make the first and longer one a place to feed every lap. The subsequent shorter but steeper hills felt stiff and the hill to the finish was going to be a leg burner. It was good to see what was in store for the next three laps.
Shortly after the finish hill, we passed the feed zone and turned to start the second lap. I stayed in the top 5 on the longer climbs. Two guys (I think it was a Zteam and Davis rider) decided to "gitty up" and try to create a gap. I was in the front of the group watching them. They pulled away a little more, so I decided to bridge to them making sure that they didn't sneak away. It was a pretty easy effort and knew that I'd cause a little surge for the folks in the back. At this point, possible contenders started to appear (1 member of each): ZTeam, Fusion, and Davis. We, along with a few others, controlled the front. Fusion was just sitting in with us. I noticed that Andrew would start towards the front when we started climbing but then drift back. When we crested the hill he would then jet up to the very front for the descent. He said it was by design because he was getting taxed on the climbs and didn’t want to be gapped on the descent. The descent felt smoother and the short steep hills felt better this time around. I was starting to loosen up and getting into a good rhythm. Still, I felt there were too many of us at front for this race.
When we approached the feedzone at the start of lap 3 I decided to pick up the pace for the longer climb because I felt good and at home on this climb. I got out on front and picked up the pace but still within a reasonable heart rate zone. I looked back to see who was still hanging on. More were starting to hurt and I almost felt that I could take off at that point and make a real break for it. But, I also thought that I’d pull too many guys with me and worried about blowing up. That’s the risk, huh. This is where lack of experience comes in. I stayed at front to the top and then let the contenders come around to do some pulling. No one wanted to, so I slowed down and started demanding that they do it. Andrew told me that I should go pull. I had to remind him that I pulled everyone up the hill. This is where I really felt in control of the race. The backside was fine and some of us pushed it on the steep climbs and really pushed it on the finish hill before starting the fourth lap. We turned the corner with fewer guys.
I still wanted to get more guys off the back. I got up front and again controlled the pace with a reasonable tempo. I noticed the Davis guy who always started the lap up front wanted to increase the tempo as well. I matched him and upped the ante. He couldn’t stick. Zteam was right behind me and Fusion behind him. Andrew hung on. At the top there were 7 of us left. We drove it fairly hard through the descent. I stayed tucked in behind Zteam and Fusion. Zteam decided to do a pull until we got to the steep rollers. Zteam, Fusion, Davis, and I controlled the front. I knew that I was not going to be finishing below 3rd at this point. Don’t really know why but I knew that Davis wasn’t going to be a factor on the steeps and I saw guys behind us hurt on previous hills as well. I kept my eye on Zteam and Fusion. The three of us hit the first steep hill pretty hard. We hit the second steep really hard. We cruised to the 200 meter mark and that’s where the three of us took off for the sprint leaving the others behind. Zteam started in front. I was left of him and Fusion was on the right. With 10 meters left I saw a gap happening. C’mon legs! Damn! Fusion hands went up and won the race. Zteam was a very close second. I crossed the line in third place about 5 yards behind. I felt pretty good about it especially knowing that I put some work into the race to make this happen. Fusion congratulated me for the effort Touchstone put in. I appreciated the Davis and Zteam riders for their effort as well. I never really saw the Fusion rider do any pulls. He just tucked in and hung in there- probably the best strategy.
It was great riding with so many Touchstoners in the race. I think that was the most teammates I’ve ever had in a race. Ken helped me by identifying the contenders and riding strong. I remember Elmar coming up to me to say this isn’t anything like the P-B-P (Paris-Brest-Paris). Valentino was going strong down the descent and hanging in there on the hills. Jonathan had a frustrating race by flatting on the first lap. Jonathan, we’ve all been there. As a matter of fact, my front wheel spoke broke in the first 200 yards of the Brisbane Circuit Race the week before Wards Ferry. Good job everyone.
Results: Markham 3rd,Ken 11th, Valentino 16th, Elmar 19th- please correct me if I’m wrong. The results aren't up yet.
Congrats to Chris, Amy, Vanessa and Anne on their top 10 finishes.
Note: I encourage anyone who was in this race to give their perspective. This report is obviously from the recollection and view from my saddle.
1 comment:
After a strong race the previous weekend at Orosi, I was looking
forward to Wards Ferry. Had a fantastic dinner in Jamestown on the way to Sonora Friday night, and a good night's sleep at the Days Inn (only the best accomodations for me!) Touchstone had quite a crew at this race, which made if fun.
Saturday was a great day for racing - clear, cool, but not cold.
There were two Cat 4/5 fields - unfortunately Chris K. and I were in the second field, while 5 other Touchstone guys were in the first
field. It would have been fun to ride with a bunch of teammates, but
it simply wasn't in the cards. After 15 minutes on the trainer, we
got rolling just about on time, with Chris and I both starting near
the back of the field (he'd done a course recon on Friday, and advised
me of the bumpy section that would eventually come). The pace on the
first of four laps was reasonable, I felt okay, but not great. The
roads were narrow, and it was harder than I thought it would be to move up in the field. Course officials kept zooming by screaming
about the centerline rule, and the pack was kind of jittery, so I
figured it might be safer just to maintain my position near the back.
After a hairpin turn onto a descent on the backside of the course, we hit the bumps. It was absolute carnage - several guys lost water bottles, and a few flatted on the descent - I was amazed that nobody crashed with all the chaos going down the hill. Things settled down a
bit after that, and I was able to move up on some of the climbs. The
second lap was much better - at least I now had some knowledge of the course, and I wasn't so far back in the pack with sketchy riders.
The pace went up a bit on lap 2, but I didn't think much of it until
we neared the end of the lap, where there was a series of stiff short climbs. My heart rate went up and didn't want to come back down! At the beginning of the 3rd lap there was just a slight increase in tempo, and I started to fade. It's a bad feeling, watching riders pull away and simply NOT BEING ABLE to respond. I put my head down and tried to find some hidden strength, but I couldn't turn the pedals over any faster. Damn - what to do now? Wait for some guys to work with? No, I thought, perhaps I can latch back on on the downhill. Wishful thinking! By the time I hit the descent, the lead group (which was a big group) was long gone, though I picked up a few stragglers along the way.
I was feeling a bit dejected at this point, and I think my 3rd lap was pretty slow. If nothing else, it was nice to be able to descend out of traffic. I recovered a bit, and decided I ought to give it everything I had, even if I had no chance of catchting the pack. Every few minutes I'd see a rider up the road, and that was motivation to ride hard and pick up a place. I continued to push myself through the 4th and final lap, passing a few riders in the process. I ended up finishing 24th of 46 riders - a bit of a dissappointment, but I was happy to have not totally given up after getting dropped. Definitely need to work on my fitness if I hope to hang tough in future races!
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