Stick a Fork in Me....

Sunday's Cat. 1-2-3 criterium

Just spent the weekend in Lafayette doing the Tour de Vuelta stage race. Two days of three stages of bike racing and I am whipped! First stage race I've done in 3-4 years...maybe I'll do some more next year...none left that I want to do this year. Jonnene didn't come with me since her weekends from here on are gonna be kinda busy so I told her that she needs to spend a nice weekend at home just vegging out and relaxing. And she did, too...got a lot of stuff done, finished a book, did some repair work on the irrigation system in the yard...I think it was good for her. Oh, yeah, I missed her alright and we're not going to do this very often. But every once in a while is fine.

Headed for Lafayette Friday afternoon, got a good night's sleep at the Comfort Inn, and headed to the site of Saturday morning's road race. I was in the Masters 35+ race where we had to cover 48 miles on board-flat roads among the sugar cane fields. Plus there was a nice wind coming out of the west, which would be interesting because the last 5K of each 16-mile lap was a bee-line to the finish. We'd have a tailwind so it'd be real fast. My concern was just surviving the race and not coming in solo behind everyone else. A flat course means you get very little rest, you're always having to pedal so drafting is important if you need to take a break.

We started at 8:20 am and soon our little group of 17 riders is cruising at 26 mph and it's not so bad for me. The speed would ramp up sometimes but I was handling it well and even chased down a couple of attempted breaks. We had two large teams represented: Jeep/CJB with seven riders and MidSouth Masters with three. The rest of us were lonely reps of whatever team we were riding for, so we knew that Jeep and MidSouth would be trying to get some of their guys off the front on a few breakaway attempts. During the first lap none of that succeeded, so we turned into the straight 5K (3.1 mile) stretch to the finish we were hitting 30-33 mph. When we passed the one kilometer to go sign, everyone started attacking to get one of the two hot spot time bonuses. I stayed in the back (I got no sprint) and just kept up best I could. I crossed the line of Lap One at 37 mph and I heard later that the two guys who got the bonuses were topping 40 mph! Our average speed for that lap was 24.6 mph.

The pack broke apart halfway thru the second lap when Jeep and MidSouth sent off three each of their riders and started gapping the rest of us. I was in the back when it started and started wondering why nobody in our group was going after them. Then I saw Randy of the New Orleans team bridge the gap to the front group by himself, dragging another rider with him. I thought about jumping up to them at that point but then realized I'd have to go around six other riders, bridge a longer gap, and then hope I'd have enough energy left to hang to that group. It was frustrating because I knew I could bridge up but I didn't want to burn myself out with 24 miles to go. So I sat with my group and that's where I'd stay for the rest of the race. There was myself, VJ of the NBO team, an unattached rider, and three Jeep guys...we had dropped the other rider by then...and we just rode on. Finally, we finished the last lap going about 34 mph and I got group time with those guys. Surprisingly, we were less than 4 minutes behind the lead group...I thought we'd be 7-10 minutes back the way they took off from us and got out of sight. So I was in 16th place and survived the first stage.

I put everything up in the car and headed back to the hotel. I had 5 hours until the time trial late in the afternoon so I had lunch and took a 90-minute power nap (nice!). Headed back to the race site for the TT, parked the car near a tree which would cover the car with shade as the sun went down. My legs felt toasted and tired but I tried to warm them up and get ready for the pain. The time trial was 3.75 miles (later we determined it was closer to 3.9 miles) into the wind. My goal was to keep my run under 10 minutes, accounting for the tiredness in my legs and the headwind, and I ended up with a 9:51 which moved me up a spot to 15th place. And it did hurt.

Watched the time trial in the Tour de France that night in the hotel room, slept the sleep of the dead overnight, got up Sunday morning for the criterium stage north of Lafayette. It was freakin' HOT out there and I tried to stay hydrated. As soon as the gun went off, Heath shot out of the blocks like a bullet while I was still trying to get my foot into the pedal. Got it in, and had to work like crazy to catch up to the pack. This was my first criterium in 4 or 5 years and it showed. I felt awkward out there, especially in the corners and we had a headwind on the backside. I managed to stay with the pack for the first two laps, then I was off the back and that's pretty much where I stayed the rest of the race. Thanks to attrition during the race I would end up in 13th place overall which means I get to contribute some LA/MISS cycling cup points to my team.

I had a lot of fun but it was hard, it was hot out there, and I still have some conditioning that needs to be done. But I'm heading to Houston this Friday for the Texas State Time Trial Championships as training for the LA/MISS time trials in September. I'm going to see what I need to do for training in the intervening five weeks.