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What Mike N. saw:
Category: 5
Result: Mid-pack
I came into this race with more pressure being a hometown crit. I got
a decent but short 25 minute warmup. At the start line I managed to
squeeze myself into the front, but the announcer told all of us FFBC
riders to go up front anyways.
Out strategy was to go up front for a couple of a laps to avoid the
accordian effect at the hairpin. A lot of the rider should be calmed
down by then and then we would go into survival mode until 3 laps to
go where we do some form of a leadout.
On the whistle I get a good clipin and dive towards the hairpin. I
brakes and bit and trail-brake into the apex. I ended up early apexing
and see myself heading towards the curb. I gave a little brake,
probably some front brake too, while turning in sharper and my front
wheel slides out on me. Quite embarrassing.
I get up and my shifters are bent inward and my chain fell off and got
jammed. Frank helped me out and got my stuff back in order. I got a
free lap and was reinserted in the back of the pack.
The back was a horrible place to be. There would always be some kind
of accordian effect on every corner, but the hairpin was the worst.
The back would be accelerating for ~200 meters. From there I started to stay in the middle behind Tim. The pace was
more manageable, but most knew that it was easier up front in the pack
so rider would constantly try to move up. On the long straight before
turn 2, several riders bunch up and I see Tim come down with them.
Luckily he was ok and got a free lap.
When the race was at several lap to go, the riders got more
aggressive. A lot would dive on the inside and attack on the inside,
causing the pack to snake around. There was another crash when the
pack changed direction from left to right. A rider said that his spoke
broke and caused him to superman off the bike. It sounded, though,
that his front wheel was rubbing another's tire.
With just 3 laps to go I am near the back of the dwindled ~25-man
pack. I can hear people yelling at me to move up position. I tried to
find the best spots to carry my speed and grab some spots. I found
that when the pack was going fast, I would corner through the gutter
and be able to come out in front of a few riders. Then when I saw that
there were too many riders on the inside straight I would move to the
outside and accelerate before the corner and nip a few more riders.
With this cornering tactic, 2 laps to go, and whatever gas I had left,
I managed to go through the final corner in 16th and sprinted past one
rider for 15th.
I got the same result as last year, but I knew I could have done
better. The course suited me because I can acclerate well at low
speeds. Hopefully the course will be out here again next year. This
time I'll have my shot at the 4's.
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What Brian M. saw:
Category: 3
Result: Did not finish
FIRST THINGS FIRST: WAY TO GO CHRIS!!! CONGRATULATIONS ON YOUR WIN!!!
Go figure, I actually lined up to race something this year. I use "race" loosely because I really had no chance in the event.
My warm up consisted of a quick drive to Los Gatos to drop off 3 of my daughters at their moms house, a stop at Chuck E. Cheese's to drop one more at a friends birthday party, a quick change in the van, a 10 minute leg loosener that ended with a puncture, and a wheel swap just in time for the roll out to the start. According to Chris Carmichael, this is the BEST way to prep for a race: don't trai n, don't warm up and make sure your equipment is jacked up. I'll give myself A+'s on all points.
Riding (not to mention any organized training) has been sparse, so heading into the race, my goal was to try and make it to turn one first.
The whistle blew and I couldn't clip in. NIIICE. My wonderful front row spot was now buried 25 deep. First lap, one foot in, but I kept up with the group. I completely sucked, but not as bad as I was fearing. LOL
Finally get clipped in just in time for hairpin 2. Make it around alright and hanging in on the back of the group. I honestly didn't expect to still be in the race at that point. The pace was comfortable, so I even started to think that I'll just sit in and see what happens. Should have knocked on wood.
The group bunched up going around hairpin 3 and I was slowed down behind it. When they all sped up to close the gap, I didn't have the speed in my legs to move up. Shit. At that point I knew I couldn't chase back on so I rolled off the course after 2.5 laps. That's 2 laps more than I thought I would do, so I actually was happy.
Caught up with Matt and Ziggy for a cool down ride. Funny thing, my cool down was longer than my race. HAHAHA.
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What Tim saw:
Category: 5
Result: Off the back
I started the race second behind Mike who did a slow-motion face-
plant on the hair-pin while trying to do some fancy braking maneuver
he learned from God knows where. Anyway, I stayed top 10 for about 20
minutes so I could keep speed in the hairpin.
After the midpoint of the race, I started feeling tired and drifted
toward the back. As a result, I was caught behind a crash before turn
2; a couple of guys started rubbing shoulders and went down. I was
directly behind them and couldn't stop before hitting them, so I did
one of those slow-motion rolling falls over them. I rolled back to
wheel pit to get my free lap. Now that I think about it, I was
fortunate that I fell. If I would have been able to stop, I would
have had to chase, which would suck. Free laps are much better.
I got back into the race but was still getting tired because of that
damn hair-pin. With 5 and less laps to go, I was pretty much spent
and continuously contemplated pulling out. The one-to-go card finally
came out and I heard Richard yell to get to the front, but that
wasn't gonna happen - if anything, I'd go the reverse direction. A
crash occurred after turn 2 which I had to slow-down for, then catch
the group. This was the last surge left in the tank because I was
toast when the surge before the last corner happened. I rolled off
the back and finished well behind the main group.
Summary:
In addition to my dislike of hills, I no longer like 180-degree hair-
pin turns.
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