Although I didn't train too much during this week, I felt okay heading into the weekend and my Saturday race. This would be the first race in which I had a teammate and therefore we would get to enjoy the benefits of team tactics. I woke up at 4:30AM on Saturday to drive 2 hours to Snelling, CA for the venue of the race. After picking up my race number I set up my trainer, chatted with a few teammates, and began my warmup. After a good warmup I lined up for the 50 mile race with my teammate Jason. Jason could actually race in the 35+ category but was nice enough to switch and join my race so that we could race together. The course was a 11 mile loop on rolling hills and we were scheduled for 4 laps with a neutral 6 mile rollout from the park where we started.
During the neutral rollout I had the chance to chat with Jason about some tactics for our race. We discussed that I would try to get into a breakaway and that he would stick with the pack and try to be fresh for the finish if the peloton brought back the breakaway that I was hopefully in. This is a pretty typical team tactic but it would be both of our first attempts at making it work. This is about the time when our team tactics went out the window. I began to feel that the back of my bike was hitting some very solid bumps as we were heading out to the course. I peaked down at my rear wheel to see that my back tire had gone flat. Jason saw my wheel at about the same time and we both came to the conclusion that our team tactics were finished. I pulled over from the field and began the long trek back to my car.
I thumbed a ride from a passing car and was dropped off back at the park. I went over to a nearby official and asked if I could change my tire and get back out to the race. He was concerned that the other race officials would not be able to distinguish which lap I was on and he therefore discouraged my re-entry into the race. I changed the tube in my rear wheel (which had a puncture from one of the 2 pieces of glass I found in the tire) and decided to ride out the finish line to watch the different races going on.
I watched the finish of the races, packed up my stuff and headed home. Our team did okay in the races and Jason finished just behind the main field (he was stung by a bee on the forehead with about a quarter mile to go and was forced to take his helmet off to try and get the bee off his head). After the race I pulled the stinger out of his head as it was still giving him problems.
Sunday was the team ride and it was a little bit smaller this week as many of our teammates raced the day before and probably took the day off. I felt pretty strong and am doing a pretty good job of staying with the faster guys on the climbs, a sure sign that I am still getting better at this bike riding thing.
Two very exciting pieces of news to mention before I am done. First, after "competing" in the Snelling Road Race on Saturday I submitted my request for a Category upgrade and was approved on Monday. This means that I am now a Category 4 racer and that I accomplished one of my major goals by getting my upgrade by the end of February. Now I will have the rest of the year to work on my Category 3 upgrade. Secondly, when I logged in today to finish this post the numbers show that I have now surpassed 100 page views for this blog. Thank you all for taking an interest in my life and writing, I am trying my best to make each post interesting and to be consistent with my posting.
I am going to try and keep the next couple of posts shorter but more frequent to see if that works better. I find that it takes me a very long time(2-3 hours) to post a weeks worth of rides/races and I think it might be more interesting to read shorter entries that are more focused. Luckily I have a short break from racing and will have my first Cat. 4 race on March 18th. Plenty of time to take my fitness to another level as the fields will now be larger, the races longer, the talent pool will be deeper, and there is money to be won.
No comments:
Post a Comment