Dead Dog Classic Stage Race
Laramie, WY
6/20-6/21/12
This was my first non-collegiate road race. It consisted of a
55-mi road race, a 40-min crit, and a 10-mi ITT around Laramie, WY. I raced as
a cat 3 in a P/1/2/3 field, and the incredibly strong women totally flattened
me; it was a good weekend, quite an experience despite an abysmal placing.
Road Race:
53 mi, 4500 vertical, 3:30, last place (8/8 W3, 18/18 P/1/2/3)
I expected that as a not-so-great climber not fully adjusted
to the altitude and racing in such a tough field, I would be dropped on the
first big climb. I did not expect to
be dropped on the flats. Yet, that is what happened; 14 miles (30 min) into the
race, I was pushing my 5-min power even drafting, and we certainly had more than 5 minutes of that stretch left…so,
I fell off the back. This was a pretty unfortunate occurrence, because we were
riding into a crazy-strong headwind (typical of Laramie), so I continued to
struggle and lose more and more time on the main group.
Heading up the mountain, I actually gained on some of the
women, but didn’t realize that until I saw them after the turnaround (at 10,800
feet in elevation). I kept up a steady zone 3 effort for the climb, and though
men from fields who started behind us passed me, was in no danger of finishing
after the time limit; you had to finish each stage to move on to the next, and
since I’d driven a couple of hours and set up a campsite in the mountains, I
had no desire to be kicked out after the first day!
I set a new record speed on the descent, hitting 53 mph –
good thing my Garmin wasn’t actually showing speed, or I would have probably
freaked out and started to worry about crashing! In any case, the downhill was
very very fast, and then came the final 12 miles back up to the finish. That
part was miserable, because the headwind was blowing at a consistent 20-30 mph
and I had no one with whom to draft, so it went very slowly. I started “bribing”
myself with a sip of water or HEED every 5 minutes to make it seem like I was
making progress; this strategy is one that I continue to use on long, slow
climbs now.
Anyway, I finished a few minutes behind the nearest W3, but
not as far behind as I’d expected. Brutal race, basically a 30-min easy ride
followed by a 3-hr ITT. Too bad I’m not doing a Half Ironman this summer,
because that would have been perfect training.
Then, I went back to the campground and stood in the icy cold
lake for a while. It was nice.
Crit: 40
min, 4/7 W3
After the road race, I was pretty terrified for the crit;
those women were all so strong! (And
I also had by far the heaviest, least-nice bike out of the entire field, which
isn’t a good excuse but probably did make a difference on those long climbs). Actually,
the crit was fine; it was flat, had a fair number of not-so-technical corners,
and I pretty much just sat near the back the entire time until it came time for
the finish, where I moved up early in the last lap and ended up placing
decently. I didn’t bother sprinting for any primes, because the “prizes” were
gains in GC time of 5s, 3s, 1s, and I really needed a gain of more like 5 MIN
in order to move up, so…
ITT: 10 mi
@ 8900 feet, 29:24, 5/7 W3
I usually excel at ITTs, but upon seeing everyone’s gear I
became quite intimidated; every single woman except 1 had either a full TT bike
or a full-carbon road bike with deep wheels and aerobars and aerohelmets and
skinsuits. Well. I didn’t even have my aerobars or helmet (in Boston still). That
was an unfortunate disadvantage, since the course was fairly flat and windy. It
really bothers me how spending more money can make you do better, just like
that, regardless of strength. Anyway, I taped some makeshift pads (bike gloves)
to my handlebars so I could at least go into aero position a bit without
bruising my arms (didn’t work – they bruised anyway), and raced hard. I was
pleased to not get last.
Summary
A week after that race, I bought a “new” bike from an
ultra-endurance mountain bike racer on Craigslist. It is over 5 pounds lighter
than the old one, beautiful, and feels fast. In preliminary tests on a
10-12-min climb, it seems around 5% faster and much quicker to accelerate. I
look forward to competing in races in the future where I have no excuse of gear
slowing me down, just my own strength/endurance J
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