So as I felt I was kinda tipping off form for the year, I backed off on my race plans for the season and am opting for stage races so I can get time on the TT bike in race mode. The plan is to prep for Church Creek this month and then the bike leg of an Ironman tri at the end of September. Now that the ING Capital Crit is cancelled, the season really lost excitement for me. On top of that, looks like the Marine Corps will likely move me next summer so I might shift to race hard in the spring next year so my planning is just kinda rolling around. I haven’t looked at my performance management chart in a month or more. I download my power files once a week at most and I’m just kinda training like I know I should without a lot of pressure.
So, on the calendar was Tour of Lancaster County and its “flat and fast” TT. Next is Millersburg and another “flat and fast” TT. I’ll slide Turkey Day on the calendar in September and finish the season off with that 112 mile “TT” in September.
Road Race:
I rolled up to Lancaster County this last weekend feeling “okay.” I had a good recovery/pre-race day spin on the TT bike. Driving up to the race I had those sorta “butterflies” in the stomach like - I’ve got good legs, question is how good? I like those kinda races. No pressure really, so let’s see what happens. Teammate Pete Warner - arguably one of the strongest 4’s in the district rolled up there as well, so it was a small WWVC contingent. We did a little chatting pre-race and both kinda did a “ah, we’ll just see what happens” with the plan that I’d lead him out to the hill at the end if we were all together.
Off we went on the neutral roll out. We rolled to the base of the hill and hung a right. Immediate a guy started rolling off the front. I chuckled and said to someone something like, “Doesn’t he realize we got 50 miles to go?” Did some chatting with one of the NCVC duo about not knowing the course and planning to sit in for a lap to see the layout. While we were talking two more guys just sorta rolled off the front. No real attack, just rolling. The course was fast along the creek bed and easy to move through the pack. I saw Lance Anderson roll up the left side so I rolled up the right to keep an eye on him. He got to the front, and momentum carried him 10-15 feet away. Alrighty, time to roll then… wait.. this is the first break of the day. No chance this is sticking. Ah well.. I’m just here to TT tomorrow anyway, what the heck. I pushed, Lance hopped on my wheel and we started rotating smoothly across the gap.
We got the break 8 minutes later. They dropped one of theirs, so our two plus their two made 4. A lap later we had a 2 minute gap to the peloton. 3 riders coming across 30 seconds back, so we sat easier and let them come through. We still dropped one of our fellas and the chase dropped one of theirs. So their 2 plus our 3 and we had 5. Off we set. End of the story, we stuck the break to the end. My legs were toast on the finishing climb and cramping so I came in 5th. Good day for not planning on it.
TT:
“Flat and fast with some pitches” was the advertisement. Uh.. yah right. Not sure if there was anything really “flat” on the course. On the other hand, I’m comparing it to Church Creek. I squeezed my TT in between torrential rain out of sheer luck. Not a great ride for me, but was good enough for second. I still have some work to do on the TT position and power differences. More time in the bars… I just have to get better. The difference between me and the good guys is just too big.
Crit:
I rolled into the crit in 1st place on the GC. I looked at the stats and looked at who was close. Lance Lacy showed to do the crit only and was just looking for some fun, so between him, PeteW and the NCVC folks, we just figured we’d make it a MABRA crushing at the end keeping the other GC guys out of contention.
This course was WICKED fun. Lance was crushing it on the freshest legs of the day (being that he was a major wuss and only raced the crit!) - but he was seriously crushing it and every time he pulled off the front the pack was strung out. Did I mention the course was WAY fun?
Finally a break of 5 went up the road and I started marking the #2 and #3 guys on GC. They tried to get away a couple times and I was able to easily take their wheels and keep them from going away. The plan was to get to 5 to go, bring Pete to the front to pick up the pace and keep the attacks down. Lance takes it from a lap to go and finishes the deal.
We got to 5 to go and Pete was pooped. You could see it in his eyes - but it worked out fine because the rest of the pack seemed pretty whooped. The #2 guy from Shirks racing had leadout guys settle in and I just surfed their wheels staying 2-3 wheels back. I felt fantastic hopping wheels and total control of the bike. Me and the Blue were one machine.
We started the turn in to the finish and the Shirks guy started to go. He cut the corner hard so I Oscar Freire’d the grass on his inside. I saw out of the right eye the #2 GC guy rolling hard and at the same time NCVC Greg go down hard. Still not sure what happened there. The tall Shirks racing guy almost made it worse as he looked over his shoulder - IN TURN, IN THE SPRINT. Dude! He looked right and guess what…. leaned left on top of me. I leaned back in to him bringing us both upright and took off.
His guy got pinched and the #3 GC guy was too far down to scoop me on GC. Phew!
But wait… there’s MORE! Filip Capella, strong 3… yah. He won from the break. His 27 points took him to 56 points for the day. My 11 points… that took me to 55. Yep.. I didn’t check the results deep enough. And a guy 10 places down on GC took the win. Ahhh… cruddos.
S’all right though. Final results: RR 5th, TT 2nd, Crit 10th, GC 2nd. Maxed the stage race points at 15. Difference between 1st GC and 2nd GC was 10 bucks, so that’s really all I missed out on.
I felt way comfortable all weekend on the bike and all around. This laid back thing may be working out well.
Kudos to Lance Anderson on his road race finish. He was clearly the best rider on the road race. He was climbing really well all day. He might have been able to solo the last half of the last lap, but there was clearly no need to. Shame he wasn’t there for the crit and to protest his DNS on the TT. The crit would have been way fun with him in it.
Kudos to Lance Lacy - looking way strong. He’s obviously putting some serious steady state stuff in and he’s going to be a guy to watch on the upcoming TTs.
Kudos to Pete Warner in his first 3/4 race. Looking strong and took 4th in the TT. He’ll should be out of the 4’s fast early next season if he comes in to the next season on some form.
BIG Kudos to Rich and Allthatisgood.org racing folks. I don’t know what happened last year with the politics up there in the PA area with his races. But he clearly puts on great races, well organized, on awesome courses. Hey, did I mention that crit course was really, really fun? The road races are challenging.
Kudos to Capella. Now upgrade already dude! We all see your results man.
Hope to see more folks at Millersburg. Reg’d last night and got the hotel today.
