UWW Road Race. 54 miles.
Coming off a successful day at the track on Saturday, my legs were still feeling the sprints but I also had no expectations coming in, so no real pressure. My knee feels like it may be on the upswing, but it's not 100% and the lack of anything resembling training for the last couple of weeks had me prepared for the worst.
The omnium competition for the weekend was coming to a head, and the contenders were conspiring with and against each other, and generally knew who they needed to mark. I had one teammate in the race, and neither of us had raced the other events so were free to try and capitalize on how things unfolded.
The race started off in a fairly tame manner. For most of the day there was a rider or two up the road, but several attempts were slowly brought back without any real coordinated chasing. I found myself staying in the front few positions most of the time, a couple of times pulling the group; not chasing the breaks, necessarily, and there was no real reason for me to ever be at the front, but I was feeling pretty decent and wanted to keep things moving. I had to get back for 24MOTAB in a timely fashion, after all. I charged up a hill at one point and found myself with a little gap. This might have been a good chance to try to sneak away, but a couple minutes of dangling there confirmed that my lack of threshold work would be an obstacle and I willingly came back to the peloton.
Eventually it became clear that the lone rider who had gotten away would not be caught, and the field began ignoring the time gap and settling in for the finish. I was still feeling remarkably good; I was enjoying the course, the race length, making sure to eat and drink enough. It dispelled my (mostly irrational) fears about losing all my fitness from being off the bike. I certainly don't have the speed I did earlier in the year, but I wasn't totally back to square one.
In the closing miles there was some shuffling and surging, but nothing too hard to deal with and I kept myself in the top ten. With about a mile to go, somebody jumped and the group followed. I got swarmed a little bit but didn't panic, and opened up my sprint at the bottom of the finishing climb. I must have timed it well, because I was gaining positions and was almost clear of the group toward the top! One rider was ahead, but unfortunately I started to fade in the last 20 or 30 meters and held on as best I could. I ended up taking fifth in the field sprint, and with the winner soloing in that bumped me just out of the money at 6th place.
I can't help but think that maybe all the time off the bike has caused some sort of inadvertent mini-peak in my fitness, or at least some freshness in the legs. This was my best sprint and certainly best finish of an otherwise mediocre season, and is a welcome morale booster. Hopefully I can start putting in some harder work in the next few weeks and keep the ball rolling.
Next weekend is the Elm Grove crit, which is a fun one if I remember correctly from last year.
Tuesday, June 26, 2007
Monday, June 25, 2007
Velo City Tour 2007
What a great weekend of racing. Saturday was the 2007 edition of the Velo City Tour. Held in New York, Chicago (actually at the Kenosha velodrome), and Los Angeles, top male and female messengers at each event receive round-trip airfare to the 15th annual Cycle Messenger World Championships in Dublin.
Madison was well-represented by Scott, Kelly, Frank, Zack, Jon, and myself. We brought along Kelly's bike so she could get a chance to ride on the track and see what she thought, and was actually talked into doing a couple of races. She raced with the messenger women due to the fact that she actually does transport stuff by bicycle as an aspect of her job, and she did great. Once she gets a little race experience she'll be a force to be reckoned with.
The rest of us raced with the non-messengers. It was fun to get to race with my Madison pals and my pals/rivals from Chicago and Milwaukee. Zack made a strong move with a lap to go in an early match sprint, and I followed it and came around him to claim the first two spots for Madison. I think Frank found himself boxed in with bad positioning early on in one of his races, so would later take a flyer for a few laps to try an alternate strategy. The track is fun because your racing tactics and experience from the road still apply, but there's still a whole other set of skills and strategy to learn.
I wasn't feeling particularly strong at any point, which I guess is normal for me, but the knee had subsided to a dull ache and I felt like I could get some power to the pedals for once. Phil's Trek T1 was once again perfect. Stiff and smooth. Winning my match sprint heat, semi, and the final, I basically stuck to the same plan throughout. Stay in front, even if it meant pulling the pack, because nobody got the jump on me and my last-lap acceleration was good enough to stay there.
Later was the miss and out. I had never done one before and was worried about getting pinched off the back by not paying attention, but managed to stay in front until the final selection, and come around for the win. I'm not sure if this was one of the races or not, but I confounded Simon several times at what, for him, would be inopportune moments.
Somewhere in there (my memory is foggy already) was a scratch race. What was interesting is that although there were probably several riders in the bunch who could have made a break work, there was no attacking and I was happy to sit on the front until the end.
Last was some variation of a points/tempo race. Points given every 3 or so laps. Feeling fatigued and weird from too much sun, I was thankful the day was almost over. After the first sprint for points it was Ted Burger and I holding a gap on the field and trading half-lap pulls. I knew him to be a strong rider from the Tour and other various races, but on the bell laps I was able to come around him for the points. I think Scott's war horn, made famous by its appearance at the WI state cross championships in Sun Praire last year, gave me the extra drive I needed.
I'm really happy with how the day went, and I'm excited to get a track bike built up for myself and do this more often. I won a Crumpler bag, Kelly got a sweet multi-tool, and we had a great time with a ton of awesome people. Jonny made an awesome stem (presented to Squid), and Jason contributed a sweet hammerhead paintjob.
Full results:
Messenger Male
1. Andrew Nordyke, CHI
2. Jeff Perkins, CHI
3. (tie) Brean Shea, CHI / James Lalonde, MKE
5. Al Urbanski, CHI
Messenger Female
1. Jen Greenberg, CHI
2. Anzie Nelson, CHI
3. Kelly Petersen, Madison
Non-messenger Male
1. Lyle Hanson, Madison
2. Ted Burger, CHI
3. Henry Loud, CHI
4. Simon May, CHI
5. (tie) TJ Kells, MKE / Ben Van Couvering, CHI
Non-messenger Female
1. Val Brostrom, CHI
2. Katy Steudel, MKE
3. Michelle Davis, CHI
4. Emily Willobee, CHI
Stay tuned for a report of Sunday's road race in Whitewater.
Madison was well-represented by Scott, Kelly, Frank, Zack, Jon, and myself. We brought along Kelly's bike so she could get a chance to ride on the track and see what she thought, and was actually talked into doing a couple of races. She raced with the messenger women due to the fact that she actually does transport stuff by bicycle as an aspect of her job, and she did great. Once she gets a little race experience she'll be a force to be reckoned with.
The rest of us raced with the non-messengers. It was fun to get to race with my Madison pals and my pals/rivals from Chicago and Milwaukee. Zack made a strong move with a lap to go in an early match sprint, and I followed it and came around him to claim the first two spots for Madison. I think Frank found himself boxed in with bad positioning early on in one of his races, so would later take a flyer for a few laps to try an alternate strategy. The track is fun because your racing tactics and experience from the road still apply, but there's still a whole other set of skills and strategy to learn.
I wasn't feeling particularly strong at any point, which I guess is normal for me, but the knee had subsided to a dull ache and I felt like I could get some power to the pedals for once. Phil's Trek T1 was once again perfect. Stiff and smooth. Winning my match sprint heat, semi, and the final, I basically stuck to the same plan throughout. Stay in front, even if it meant pulling the pack, because nobody got the jump on me and my last-lap acceleration was good enough to stay there.
Later was the miss and out. I had never done one before and was worried about getting pinched off the back by not paying attention, but managed to stay in front until the final selection, and come around for the win. I'm not sure if this was one of the races or not, but I confounded Simon several times at what, for him, would be inopportune moments.
Somewhere in there (my memory is foggy already) was a scratch race. What was interesting is that although there were probably several riders in the bunch who could have made a break work, there was no attacking and I was happy to sit on the front until the end.
Last was some variation of a points/tempo race. Points given every 3 or so laps. Feeling fatigued and weird from too much sun, I was thankful the day was almost over. After the first sprint for points it was Ted Burger and I holding a gap on the field and trading half-lap pulls. I knew him to be a strong rider from the Tour and other various races, but on the bell laps I was able to come around him for the points. I think Scott's war horn, made famous by its appearance at the WI state cross championships in Sun Praire last year, gave me the extra drive I needed.
I'm really happy with how the day went, and I'm excited to get a track bike built up for myself and do this more often. I won a Crumpler bag, Kelly got a sweet multi-tool, and we had a great time with a ton of awesome people. Jonny made an awesome stem (presented to Squid), and Jason contributed a sweet hammerhead paintjob.
Full results:
Messenger Male
1. Andrew Nordyke, CHI
2. Jeff Perkins, CHI
3. (tie) Brean Shea, CHI / James Lalonde, MKE
5. Al Urbanski, CHI
Messenger Female
1. Jen Greenberg, CHI
2. Anzie Nelson, CHI
3. Kelly Petersen, Madison
Non-messenger Male
1. Lyle Hanson, Madison
2. Ted Burger, CHI
3. Henry Loud, CHI
4. Simon May, CHI
5. (tie) TJ Kells, MKE / Ben Van Couvering, CHI
Non-messenger Female
1. Val Brostrom, CHI
2. Katy Steudel, MKE
3. Michelle Davis, CHI
4. Emily Willobee, CHI
Stay tuned for a report of Sunday's road race in Whitewater.
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