Posted by Paul on Sunday, April 27, 2003 at 8:59 PM
Sulphur Springs Road Race - Stage 1
Distance: 46 miles
Terrain: mixed
Conditions: nice, mid 60's to start
Description:
This course has a bathtub profile: you start at the top, descend for 10 miles, then it's flat, then you climb up to where you started, although on a different road.
How it went down:
This was a fun race. Vaughn and I agreed to take it easy today and try to conserve for the TT tonight. So we tried to keep our noses out of the wind. Vaughn also kindly agreed to sacrifice himself for me and pull me if we got into some ugly crosswind situations. Everything went pretty smoothly for most of the race - it was a very safe race.
Doug lost his leader's jersey (at least temporarily) at the bonus sprint at the 16 mile marker. So we easily and comfortably descend the bathtub and through the flat part without incident. Then we turned back onto Highway 80 where there were a few rollers and then a 1k climb back into Bisbee for the finish. There were a few guys up the road at this point - but since I was in 10th, it didn't really make sense for Vaughn and I to do any work to bring 'em back. Besides Doug had 2 strong teammates with him.
I'm gradually trying to work my way up through the pack to the front for the uphill finish, which suits my abilities. The main group is still mostly together as we catch the breakaways on the rollers leading up to the climb. Doug is doing a little work, but his teammates are never far from the front and they're making sure he doesn't have to do too much. His faithful teammate, the legendary Paul Wolfe takes the pull at the 1K sign and through the roundabout (roundabouts: so Euro!). Some skinny dude takes a long pull up the hill - I'm not sure why, because he was cooked when he was done.
This is a big ring climb and I'd say we were doing around 20 mph all the way up. There are a few other mousey efforts which amount to nothing. I'm perfectly positioned in the top 5 at this point, and vigilant. The legs feel good and I've decided expending a little energy for the finish shouldn't hurt me too much for the TT later tonight.
Doug jumps at about 800m and I'm all over him like a bad suit. He's out of the saddle clearly trying to get a gap opened up. He pulls for a long time, but eventually pulls off and I take over. I pull to the 200m marker and well, put a fork in me, 'cause I'm done. Well done. I manage hang on for 7th in the sprint, but the group had caught us, so we all got the same time, which was a bummer since there were about 15 seconds separating 4th-15th place. We found out after the finish that there were 3 guys up the road - so I actually got 10th!!! Yeah, I don't know how we missed that either, but Doug's team needs to be watching that *shrug* Oh well.
After the ride I approached Doug (aka "Lovedog", "Lovejuice") and reintroduced myself. It took him awhile but he remembered me. I gave him an earful about being a sandbagger and then he pointed out that he actually lost the leader's jersey today. Anyway, we had a good time catching up - talking about racing, wives, kids, etc. As I mentioned, I learned a lot about bike racing from him so it's weird to be racing against him.
They posted the results and I slipped one spot to 11th overall. Ain't no thang - the TT will shake things up later today, and the road race tomorrow, with a gnarly uphill finish, will shake things up again.
Distance: 46 miles
Terrain: mixed
Conditions: nice, mid 60's to start
Description:
This course has a bathtub profile: you start at the top, descend for 10 miles, then it's flat, then you climb up to where you started, although on a different road.
How it went down:
This was a fun race. Vaughn and I agreed to take it easy today and try to conserve for the TT tonight. So we tried to keep our noses out of the wind. Vaughn also kindly agreed to sacrifice himself for me and pull me if we got into some ugly crosswind situations. Everything went pretty smoothly for most of the race - it was a very safe race.
Doug lost his leader's jersey (at least temporarily) at the bonus sprint at the 16 mile marker. So we easily and comfortably descend the bathtub and through the flat part without incident. Then we turned back onto Highway 80 where there were a few rollers and then a 1k climb back into Bisbee for the finish. There were a few guys up the road at this point - but since I was in 10th, it didn't really make sense for Vaughn and I to do any work to bring 'em back. Besides Doug had 2 strong teammates with him.
I'm gradually trying to work my way up through the pack to the front for the uphill finish, which suits my abilities. The main group is still mostly together as we catch the breakaways on the rollers leading up to the climb. Doug is doing a little work, but his teammates are never far from the front and they're making sure he doesn't have to do too much. His faithful teammate, the legendary Paul Wolfe takes the pull at the 1K sign and through the roundabout (roundabouts: so Euro!). Some skinny dude takes a long pull up the hill - I'm not sure why, because he was cooked when he was done.
This is a big ring climb and I'd say we were doing around 20 mph all the way up. There are a few other mousey efforts which amount to nothing. I'm perfectly positioned in the top 5 at this point, and vigilant. The legs feel good and I've decided expending a little energy for the finish shouldn't hurt me too much for the TT later tonight.
Doug jumps at about 800m and I'm all over him like a bad suit. He's out of the saddle clearly trying to get a gap opened up. He pulls for a long time, but eventually pulls off and I take over. I pull to the 200m marker and well, put a fork in me, 'cause I'm done. Well done. I manage hang on for 7th in the sprint, but the group had caught us, so we all got the same time, which was a bummer since there were about 15 seconds separating 4th-15th place. We found out after the finish that there were 3 guys up the road - so I actually got 10th!!! Yeah, I don't know how we missed that either, but Doug's team needs to be watching that *shrug* Oh well.
After the ride I approached Doug (aka "Lovedog", "Lovejuice") and reintroduced myself. It took him awhile but he remembered me. I gave him an earful about being a sandbagger and then he pointed out that he actually lost the leader's jersey today. Anyway, we had a good time catching up - talking about racing, wives, kids, etc. As I mentioned, I learned a lot about bike racing from him so it's weird to be racing against him.
They posted the results and I slipped one spot to 11th overall. Ain't no thang - the TT will shake things up later today, and the road race tomorrow, with a gnarly uphill finish, will shake things up again.
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