First thing: the
Friday ride from Bicycle Garage Indy North will depend on weather this week. Please call the shop on Thursday and ask for Adam Haines if you're interested.
Race thing: last week, at the Winona Road Race, I was shamefully dropped one hour into a two hour race. This week I was hoping to find out that that was an aberration.
My spring race campaign came to a close this last weekend at an Indianapolis bike racing staple, the
Eagle Creek Traditional Crit. This is a favorite of mine. In 2007, it was my first-ever cat 3 race, and last year, it was the first cat 3 race in which I felt like I might be able to be a
major factor (despite the fact that my team missed the winning breakaway). It has a short power climb with a tricky left turn at the bottom.
As we lined up, it became evident that the field was quite small due to a competing race over at
Brookside Park. There were 4 or 5 guys each from the Sustainable Cycling and CFW teams, and solo riders from several other squads, including me. I started to wonder if it would be wise to ride conservatively and let the larger teams duke it out, but then I decided: whatever. It's more fun to be aggressive.
So off we went, and I was right in the thick of things from the beginning. Only a few riders were content to sit in; most of the field was involved in attacking and counterattacking during the first 20 minutes. I had decided not to go with any attack that didn't include at least one rider from CFW and Sustainable, figuring that if one of those teams missed the break, they would be forced to chase it down. This would turn out to be a mistake.
I got into a couple of mini-breaks that would shortly get chased down by an insufficiently sharp "bridge" attempt. No worries, that's what happens during the first part of the race. I decided to sit in for a bit and see if the field would start to wear down and let a move get a larger gap, which they did, almost immediately, right when I was out of position, right at the exact same time as last year. Whoops. Off went a dangerous break of three: Isaiah from Sustainable, Bob Brooks from CFW, and Tim from Tortuga. The field watched them go.
After a few minutes, the Tortuga rider came drifting back, and I started to worry. Then Bob came drifting back, and I knew this was a problem. Isaiah had
won Ceraland in similar circumstances a few weeks back, and I expected that CFW would immediately take up the pursuit. However, they just didn't seem to be able to get a chase rotation going, and Sustainable was diligent about keeping the pace just high enough to discourage them.
The gap was up to about 20 seconds, so the next time we started up the climb, I started to gradually pull away, hoping to draw out a partner for a bridge attempt. No dice. Well, the Lord hates a coward, so I hit the gas and started a make-or-break attempt to get across the gap.
I'll spare you the suspense--it didn't work. Ten long minutes dangling off the front. I got within about 100 yards of him at one point and just couldn't finish it off. The pack reeled me in after I took one slow trip up the climb, and Sustainable had things under control the rest of the way.
I sat in for the remainder of the race and got ready for the field sprint. I've always thought myself a pretty good sprinter, but haven't been able to produce good results in large field finishes. This was a small pack with a couple of decent sprinters, so I figured it'd be a good chance to test myself.
Things stayed pretty calm until the last lap when CFW started to line it out. I snuck into fourth wheel, right behind Bob, sitting pretty--and then I decided to attack from 700 yards out, just before the climb. Why did I think that I would have the gas to stick a move like that after a killer effort in mid-race? I think it was self-sabotage, setting myself up so that I'd have an excuse to fail. One of those weird decisions that you make at a moment of fatigue and weakness. Bob caught me 150 yards from the line, and I limped across, last in the field.
But hey, a nice aggressive attacking safe race, and a heck of a lot better than the DNF I recorded the week before.
Sorry for the lack of cool pictures--I haven't been at the same races as the good photographers lately. I'll see if I can recruit the wife to snap some shots in between child care duties.
Thanks for reading about my little adventures!