Cat 4 Men, 41 miles, 2 laps of rolling country roads with 2 major climbs
Avg Speed 25.5 mph
Max Speed 50.5 mph
8th place of 66
IVRR is becoming a true 'hardman' spring classic race of the Pacific Northwest. The long steep climbs definitely separate the billy goats from the boys. Then you have the rollers that fill one valley between the climbs and open windy farmland in the other valley. It's an all around tough course.
Fortunately I learned a lesson after year's race. My teammate, Jake Langdon, and I chased the 6-man breakaway (included one of our guys, Ted Schwartz) that formed immediately after the first climb, for nearly the entire race. Ted 3rd place and 6 minutes later Jake and I rolled in for 7th & 8th. Although this was an impressive effort for all of us, had we warmed up before the race, the three of us could have controlled the break. Instead, Jake and I were dropped with a handful of other poor souls that we eventually rode away from ourselves.
8:05am - Warm Up
My HSP teammate, Chris Carter, drove us to the race and got us there with almost an hour and a half to warm up and get situated. Score. We set up our trainers next to the truck, kitted up, and sipped on coffee and killed a bottle of water as we spun it out. I've never warmed up on the trainer before a race before; I don't know if that makes me an idiot or what. It was supposed to get into the mid-50's and you could feel it coming too, so I backed down on my embro application a little and got away with ARMWARMERS - woohoo! Finally a spring race where you can see the sun, feel it, and not have to wear everything you own to stay warm/dry enough to make it to the finish line.
9:20am - Line it up!
The official calls us up to the line, gives us the schpeel. As he is telling us we get the whole road at 1k to go instead of 200m, race organizer, Erik O Anderson, calls me out for not having a WSBA # yet. He then proceeds to make me feel like an ass for talking shit on his newest project, Capital Stage Race. Ooops. Who knew the internet was pubic? Or that people even read my blog for that matter? I couldn't tell if I should be flattered or embarrassed. I was a little of both. He wanted to kick me in the shin, regardless.
9:29am - Race
As we follow the lead car for neutral roll-out onto the race course, I find myself riding next to a familiar face, Nick Koops (Fischer Plumber Cycling, formerly ByrneInvent), and we get to chatting. We are talking about training, the course, and how we may or may not fare this gorgeous morning. I-shit-you-not, less than 10seconds after I compliment his Madfiber wheels, he hits a pothole, endos and eats major shit right next to me. His face hit my shoes, it was so close.
The car honks for the race to get under way, I had to forget about what just happened and start focusing on the climb that awaited us less than 2 miles up the road. I moved up to mid-pack and before I knew it, there we were. Boy was I glad I warmed up, I felt like a million bucks and just whizzed my way to the front group. It's fair to say nobody really expected what happened next, the entire field blew up and a selection was immediately made. I saw the fast guys in the lead group ahead of me so I began to bridge a seemingly small gap. This gap wasn't truly bridged until well after the decent because SOMEONE (Francis Atkinson SCCA/Starbucks Cycling) made it a point to "tear the legs off" anyone who tried to hold on. I sat on his wheel and look over my shoulder to find there were only 20 of us in the race now.
The Selection
With 20 of us working together I knew this was the move (crushing the first climb) that was going to win the race. Crazy. We had enough horsepower to split this group in half on the 2nd climb seeing as we had Garret, Paul and Martin (Audi), Francis and Jeff (SCCA), Todd (Stanley) then HSP boys Chris Carter and yours truly. These are all guys that usually make the break or instigate them on any given weekend, plus there has to be a couple new faces that wanted it bad enough to hang on.
We round the turn after miles of pacelining on open rolling farmland and begin the ascent we've all been anticipating. It's not that this climb is particularly gnarly, but that it's the last thing you want to deal with after driving the pace up and down rollers at threshold. Welcome to bicycle racing. I was mid pack starting the climb, and since there were only around 20 of us, it was pretty easy to just pull off to the left and pass anyone who was falling behind. It was then I saw the true beastmode strength of my teammate, Chris, as he motored up this hill effortlessly and almost dropped the whole group. WTF? I didn't know he was the Billy Goat King, sorry guys. By the time we finished our 50.5mph descent I noticed yet again the group had been split. There were now only 11 of us, woohoo.
Pain Cave
I often hear cyclists talk about the "Pain Cave", but as a frequent visitor myself, I know most of them don't know what it's like to really enter that dark place. I'm confident that our group of 11 went there atleast 4 or 5 different times as we finished out this last lap. I say this because no matter what moves were made we all finished the race together. Ouch. As we took turns pulling, well by we I mean everyone except the guy on Olympic Orthopaedic, the thought on everyones mind was in anticipation as to who would drive the train up that first hill again. These moments are probably my favorite aspects of racing, when friends become enemies. We all worked so hard to get away and stay away, but on this last lap, it's all about shaking off a few more people (to increase your odds at finishing well) then working together again with whoever survived.
To properly 'cut to the chase,' I will say that we all tried to shake eachother multiple times and all failed. However, there was this moment on the final climb when Chris attacked but nobody could possibly hold his wheel, so he just soloed up to the top and down the climb. He was caught by us before we got to the bottom. If a couple people could have caught him, that could have been it. The true hadman of the day was Francis. He drove the pace of our group almost the whole time, then in the final 5k decideds to counter attack after Garrett and I have our fun. This guy proceeds to just time trial away from all of us. We let him dangle out there, but not so much because it's a tactical decision, but more because none of us want to kill ourselves just to catch him. We are getting close to 2k, so we unanimously decide to chase. It sucks but we caught that SOB. Uh oh, there's the 1k sign! We get the whole road, whose gonna lead it out? I don't care I'm sitting 3rd wheel. Crap everyone just slowed down and now I'm leading the sprint. Fine, full gas and I'm hoping nobody has the legs to come around. But they all do. 150m and everyone jumps around me and it's just a battle to catch a draft then BOOM Jeff Reed (SCCA) takes the win, compliments to his teammate Francis. I finished right behind Paul for 8th place - 2 points YAY!
I wanted 1st pretty badly, but I made the mistake of working a little too much though out the race and not sitting further back in the final lead up to the sprint. Not to mention, it was a really fucking hard race and we went fast the whole time, so I'm not sure I'd have the legs to deliver in the end anyways.
Next week, one of my favorite races the Volunteer Park Criterium.
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