First Loser

The past eight Mondays in a row have been rest days. Usually this means I make every effort to get to Tuesday night Wompatuck early, in order to get a good warmup. With aging I've found pedaling very gently at the start can make a big difference later on in the ride. Yesterday I did not make it down to the park in good time, and only had enough spare minutes to kit up and ride in to the race loop before the start. And oh yeah, the BRC guy in the breakaway last week was David Tremblay, not Tom Francis. Sorry Dave!

Coming off of the Concord Criterium - Central NH Road Race double weekend, I was feeling a bit Bow-legged as I slowly rolled through the park. My Bow race deserves a story to itself, but it's not that unique, so I'll be brief: the course was hard, the race was hard, the new hill was hard, we lost over twenty of the fifty starters within the first ten minutes of the race, and were down to 21 by the end of the second lap. The third time up the double climbs, I lost contact twice, the second time ending up behind the "caravan" of a wheel van and official's car, but ultimately got back on the field at the bottom of the first "old" descent. The fourth and final time up the new climb, the race exploded and I was relegated to the third small group on the road, finishing 15th. I was pretty happy because I managed my energy well and paced myself on the new climb so as to be able to regroup on the short descent before the "old" climb, thus conquering it each time without blowing to smithereens and losing minutes. Course management, you know?

Back to the 'tuck. With no warmup and no pressing plans for serious work, I sat at the back for the first few laps, but the hostilities up front started quickly. A group of four or five attacked and rode away, and a second group formed a chase. Both groups went out of sight. The pack was not going all that slow either, just slow enough, but luckily none of the Coast juniors/espoirs team made either break and these strong lads organized a nice chase. We started flying. This was the fastest and smoothest Wompatuck race all year. By now I was feeling better and I joined in, but there were at least ten riders sharing the pacemaking and we motored along in a glorious high-speed single-file rotation. It took almost ten laps to catch the first group, but the leaders were still nowhere to be seen. I'm not sure exactly who was up there, but I believe it was Adam Myerson (NERAC), Johs Huseby (Fiordifrutta), the Skipinator, and someone else, so plenty of horsepower. Eventually the group of professional sportsmen came back in to view up ahead of the chasing pack.

The first 45 minutes of the race, we averaged over 44 kph! I wish every week was like this. Everyone later commented on how much fun it was. With about eight laps to go it was now grouppo compacto. Things slowed down a bit, but a flurry of attacks kept it spirited until about three to go, when it finally bunched up. I was in the back and even thought about just going home, keeping a cork in it and saving something for later in the week. I'd ended up feeling great all night and had got in some good work without too much muscle strain. I wish I'd had a cadence sensor on, because even when we were flying, I used mostly my 16 and 15 cogs, only using the 14 a little, and never the 13. I stayed in though, stuck at the back.

At a lap and a half to go, you could tell a fierce sprint was shaping up. Coast has Jake Keough, and Myerson looked to be gunning for it as he aggressively pushed his way up nearer the front. A little attack of a few guys went ahead, and it strung out just a bit coming back toward where the race starts. I took the opportunity to slide up the left side, almost all the way to the front. The road stayed clear, so I started to accelerate, and the front of the group slowed, so I popped out of there and took off. One of the break guys looked to be starting his own move, but I flew right by. I later saw my speed at this point was 55 kph, which is faster than my usual sprint!

I knew this was going to be tough. The bell was ringing for one to go and I did not look back. I went over the hump hill and tucked in for the little downhill, pedaling like a madman. Then I sensed a rider behind, and it turned out to be Rick Kotch (Union Velo), team mate of the 'rat. Rick took a strong pull and I rotated through. We were clear by a good margin but had 800 meters to go with a ferocious pack bearing down on us from behind. I've been here many times before, and getting caught in the final stretch is not always pretty. Pretty dangerous is more like it. I pulled hard. Rick came through again, almost like a jump. I looked back and we appeared to be all set, but I was not certain. He slowed at 250 meters but I continued to bury myself. I did not want to get caught. Rick came around for the win at the end, and Myerson sprinted in for third less than five seconds behind us. The 31 mile/50k race had taken just under 1:07 (almost 45 kph avg). The last lap with Rick was 48 kph. Great night, pocketed $5 for second, thanks for reading.