edgar soto - stage 1

Stage one was a seven-mile time trial over moderately hilly terrain. Last year I finished in 17:24, which was good enough for 11th place in the Cat 4 field. My goal was to shave a minute off that time today.

And I got a minute nineteen.

I pulled in today with a time of 16:05. Forty-three and one half seconds off the Cat 3 leader and good enough for sixth place. My time would have put me in the leader's jersey had I been racing Cat 4; 17th (of 98) in the masters field; 42nd (of 96) in the P/1/2/3 field.

I feel great about the ride, but there's a tight bunch right behind me. Fifth through ninth place are separated by less than two seconds, and I beat the three riders behind me by less than a second. That's close stuff.

Which makes you wonder... My coach was nice enough to loan me a rear disc wheel, a deep section carbon front wheel, and a TT helmet. How much time is all that stuff worth? Ten seconds? Thirty seconds? Had I rode 30 seconds slower I'd be in 28th place. It may all be worth the money... Thanks, Coach.

frogginess

I complained yesterday about not feeling so froggy, but a closer look at my power output Saturday tells a more nuanced story.

True, my max power output Saturday wasn't anything near my true max, but TrainingPeaks tells me I did record a new six-minute critical power high, as well as throwing down my best effort in the 12, 30, and 60 minute critical power ranges in the past 28 days.

So, new (mixed) conclusions... The race was harder and faster than I thought it was. I put in a solid effort. And my "solid" effort wasn't enough to be competitive.

:-|

st. mary's crit

I raced this last Saturday down in Maryland, but don't have much to show for it. It was a Cat 3 only field, maybe only 35 riders; 60 minutes on a 1.1 km course. One little climb and a moderately sketchy downhill turn.

Nothing spectacular to report on the race. The field set a fast pace from the beginning, bunching up on the climb and stringing out on the downhill and the downhill turns, as is to be expected. I'm not super good at holding my position in a fast-moving, aggressive field. Perhaps I'm too tentative. So I like a crit with a hill because the inclines allow me the opportunity to get back near the front when I want to be near the front.

My best opportunity for success came about 1/3 to 1/2 into the race. There was a three-man break some 100 yards off the front and I attacked on the hill in an attempt to bridge the gap. I was successful at putting some distance between me and the field and was gaining on the break--maybe needed another lap to close the deal--but the pack picked up the pace, swallowing me and the break in short order.

I attacked two other times on the course but both efforts came of nothing, and I could tell with each successive effort that I was losing my punch. On the last few laps I tried heartily to get into the front five, and not so much go for a win, but perhaps let one of the better sprinters pull me in to a respectable finish. At that point though I was sapped, my legs were feeling soggy, and I ended up coasting across the finish line safely out of contention in 18th place.

It really wasn't such a hot day. My max power on the day was a good 150 watts lower than I would have expected it to be, which seems to confirm my sense that I felt less than 100 percent physically. Too little sleep lately. Too much crap food. I've got to get things cleaned up in the next couple weeks before Edgar Soto.

It's interesting how one's expectations change. Two years ago I would have counted a race a success finishing with the field as a Cat 4. Now I'm disappointed w/o a top 5 finish in a Cat 3 race. Every loss just makes me mad, mad, mad. It's time to start winning.

a closer look

Y'all will remember my wreck from a couple weeks ago. As luck would have it, the race photographer was sitting at the finish line snapping away and pretty much got the whole alarming sequence on film.

The pictures are best viewed large, so click on 'em.


Here you can see (above), on the rider's left side of the road, the beginnings of the pile-up. I'm on the right hand side of the road, see what's going on, but think I'll be able to sneak past without any trouble. It's worth pointing out that while the field looks exceptionally bunched up from this angle, we're actually taking up quite a bit of road from front to back.


Chaos ensues.

See the riders off the left side of the road in the grass? And the wheel in the air? But of personal concern is my own position on the right side of the road. Someone hit me from my left and here you see the effect--a death lean. Things aren't looking good for the goatman.


Now I'm on the side of the road (see arrow). From my road rash (and the previous photo) it's clear that I spent some time--and skin--sliding across the road, and I remember (or at least think I remember) coming down on the grass headfirst (a later helmet shot substantiates this claim), but how I got from near the middle of the road to where you see me here without taking out several others I don't know. Though the guy you see riding in the grass was probably displaced there by me.


This is actually a pretty big picture, so click on it to see the whole thing. You see me there behind the 100m to go sign and riders in the grass on either side. (It's actually not grass, but rough farm plow with early spring growth.)


...

From the prior picture you thought that guy in the field was going to make it, didn't you? Nuts.

I'm totally obscured from view behind the sign. You can see a bit of handlebar, brake lever, and a front wheel from my bike. The angle obscures depth perception, but when I finally got up I was a good 10-15 feet up the road from my bike.


Here you see a bit of the aftermath. The guy in the field to my right is up, but I'm still down. I was pretty groggy and couldn't really move at first. And when I did start moving, I was super cautious, running through a self-diagnostic check for neck injuries, broken bones, and the like.


Another shot of the aftermath. You can see my back here. I remember curling up in the fetal position for some time. I wasn't able to immediately stand.

But also of note here is Carney, a teammate, in the foreground. And what's that on his face, you ask? A look of empathetic concern that his teammate just went down in a horrendous pile-up? No?


In deed not. Not an ounce of concern, but all mirth. The revelation of his amusement over my tragedy is more than a little disconcerting.

(Though I should mention that I'm now riding Carney's old fork. That kind of generosity more than makes up for his good humor at my expense.)

Eventually I got up. Eventually.

I first crawled up the embankment to the road. I couldn't quite stand. One of the others that went down was laying in the middle of the road, moaning grotesquely, a pool of blood collecting under his ear. I don't know the extent of his injuries or that of others, but at least three riders went to the hospital via ambulance.

I finished 51st. (There were 80+ starters.)

...

I need to give props to the boys at Pedal Pusher in Harrisburg.

I showed up Saturday afternoon with a broken bike and a bloody body and despite their being overwhelmed with customers, they let me have a work stand and Ricky...and Ricky fixed me up. He cut the steerer tube on Carney's fork down to size, installed it, found a pair of 40cm bars from an old Specialized collecting dust in the back of the shop and installed those too. Awesome, awesome.

mountain bike racing

I did my first mountain bike race this past weekend. I mean my first mountain bike race ever. The non-NORBA Michaux Endurance Series.

There were 50 & 25-mile events which more accurately fit the title's description, but I opted for the ten-mile sprint course. Fire roads, winding single-track, muddy creek-crossings, undulating terrain, and a finishing one-mile haul over the shark-toothed super rocky terrain for which Michaux State Forest is famous.

Good times.

And oh yeah... I won.

faulkner honda racing

Also, team site and blog.

springtime nostalgia

Spring has sprung in south-central PA. Daytime temperatures are warm. The nights are mild. Everything is the most exquisite color of green. And the flower gardens are all daffodils and tulips.

Monday night, around 11pm and under a nearly full moon, I went for a little mountain bike ride. Nothing serious, and no light, I just left my house and wandered. My wandering took me through rolling corn fields, along railroad tracks, through construction sites, and finally to an anticlimactic end with a puncture while riding in a ditch. Fortunately, I was only 25 minutes from home by foot.

Riding at night like that is such a rush. The fields are bright with the light of the moon, but the forests are dark and foreboding. Shadows flicker menacingly on all sides (startling a few deer into flight nearly left my shorts soiled). And riding around like that, at night, by myself, without any plan or direction, overloads me with nostalgia for my youth...where I would spend endless hours on my little BMX bike wandering the subdivisions, exploring the schoolyards, picking through construction sites, and navigating barbed-wire fences. Never really making trouble (though I had no qualms with trespassing), but energized nonetheless by the prospect of getting "caught."

...

And speaking of nostalgia, yesterday I rode past a few little league baseball games. Without giving it a single thought--an instantaneous click-whir emotional response--I could taste warm Lemon-Lime Shasta on my tongue. I hope today's little leaguers get better after-game treats. Or at least cold drinks.

because I raced yesterday

Fork:
Bars:
Wheel:
Helmet:
Glasses:
Jersey:

Bibs:
I'll spare you the body shots.

Also, in toto, it keeps me from racing today.

the trailer

Dahron, in his comment to my last post, asked about the trailer.

Yes, the trailer's a Chariot. Specifically, the Chariot Cougar 1.

These things are pretty funkified. You buy the base carrier, then you buy attachments separately based on what you want to do with the thing. So you can buy a front wheel and make it a jogger, or two little swivel front wheels and make it a traditional stroller. Or the bike attachment. Or even a ski-kit and hiker-thingy.
I mean, come on, that ski-kit trailer thing is pretty darn cool.

So the things are pretty stinking expensive, and once you lay down the $400+ for the carrier, you've got to lay down more for the attachments. (We bought ours used on eBay. It came with the jogger and bike trailer kits and we paid just over $200. No shipping...drove down to Alexandria to pick it up.)

Overall, I've been happy with it. It does remarkably well over the bumpy stuff. I also haven't had a bit of trouble with the coupling system (the thing that I was most concerned about pre-purchase) and see no evidence of any performance constraints with it, meaning that it's VERY hard to jack-knife, I can lean WAY into turns with no difficulty, and I don't feel any rubbing or tension or anything else in the joint when I'm riding.

My biggest complaints about the trailer have to do with the fact that I'm towing a trailer--for instance, the tug of the trailer puts my mountain bike's rear suspension to work, giving me a lot of butt-bobbing in high-torque situations like starting and hill climbing. (I don't feel this hardly at all on my road bike--especially with tubular-clinchers I can inflate to 170 psi.) I also don't like going slow.

Chariot makes a big deal about their special suspension system, though it's hard for me to say how effective it is because I haven't ridden in the trailer. We also have a jogger stroller that doesn't have a fancy suspension and Marian hasn't said the Chariot is an improvement, so who knows...

Anyway, I like my Chariot. Whether or not a less expensive trailer would perform just as well I can't say, but at the price I paid I'm completely satisfied.

new cycling exploits

A month ago or so we bought this:


Last Saturday:


Marian is considerably easier to tow, but gets bored quicker than Audrey. Falls asleep. On Friday, Audrey let me tow her all the way up here:


...but of course there's no longer snow up there. She made up poems and recited them to me while I huffed and puffed up the 1000+ vertical feet of dirt road to the top of South Mountain. But Audrey doesn't really fit in the trailer very well.

In general, I'm impressed with the trailer. It's hard to go too fast, because besides being heavy, the trailer is shaped like a parachute. But down hills you can get moving along pretty quick. Down from South Mountain we were moving at over 30 mph, on a dirt road, around lots of corners...the combination of which--and the fact that at the time I hadn't even considered that this might be dangerous--leads me in hindsight to question my fitness as a parent.

But we had fun!

climbing like a wild, hairy mountain goat

Oh what a wonderful ride today.

About 45 miles, around 4000 feet of climbing. Seventy-five degrees warm.

And I'm telling you, I was feeling it.

the wild rocky singletrack of Michaux

Friday and Saturday I spent some time in Michaux exploring the single (and other) track scattered haphazardly through the forest.

Saturday I rode some crazy hard trails--imagine a field of rocks of roughly two to three feet in diameter--shear edges, sharp corners--with a bit of dirt sprinkled about here and there. Frankly, I impressed myself with my technical riding prowess (except on the downhill parts, where I'm a certified wuss), and was able to clear quite a bit of terrain that I had no business clearing.

During one section I slit a pretty decent size hole in the sidewall of my rear tire. Bam! Tube explodes. After fixing that I hurried to catch up to a guy that passed by me while I was down. A Mountain Biker of Michaux, he was pretty familiar with the area and told me a bit about some of the trails. (Then later I schooled him on a few extra nasty stretches of uphill trail...and then he schooled me on the downhills.)

Later in the day, again riding alone, I made an abrupt turn uphill accompanied by a chain-grinding down shift, and again: Pop! Except this time my chain.

It feels kind of cool to break a chain like that...except that then you don't have a chain.

Fortunately I wasn't too far out and almost directly above my car. It took me about a half hour to coast/scoot/walk back.

gray weather blues

I'm so sick of this unseasonably cold, dreary weather. The ten-day forecast for Shippensburg lists highs in the 40s and 50s, with a ten-day high of 58. And little sunshine. Lame. (Average highs in this area for this time of the year should be in the low 60s.)

easter weekend racing

The girls had a spring break that would wrap around Easter weekend and Val was anxious to get out of town. So Val and the girls ran away to Asheville to visit friends Jeff & Sara leaving me home alone to work.

But I still had the weekend, so Friday night I packed up and drove the 3+ hours to New York City. A friend hooked me up with a friend of hers with some spare floor space and an extra matress so I had a place to stay...in an apartment building one block away from ground zero, actually. Anyway, off to the city for really the first time.


Pictures like this (above) make it look romantic.



When really it looks much more like this, which to me is devoid of romance. Gotham. You can almost see the stink. These human animals can and do make some pretty cool shmiz...but mostly rot. The complexity of the collage of architecture, asphalt, rail, signage, garbage, flesh, clothing, food, and sound which is the city speaks to the complexity of the human soul...in NYC it is almost all grand, but much more grand horrid than grand wonderful. I think I could live in the city for a while, but it's no place no one should have to call home.

But enough of that.

...

SATURDAY'S RACE

Prospect Park. Brooklyn. 6:30am. 31 degrees.

On Saturday I raced with the P/1/2/3 field--15 laps around a 3.2 mile course with one gradual, maybe 1/2 mile climb just after the start/finish line. I estimated 80-100 riders at the start line.

The race started with a fairly casual pace. I think we were all too cold to get jumping right off the gun, but once your feet have turned a few hundred circles and your legs feel like legs again (instead of butcher slabs) I think the cold actually motivated a bit more spirited race than we might otherwise would have had.

While there were attacks and breakaway attempts on nearly every lap, there were only three or four laps of consequence. With 10 laps to go things got pretty spunky. There were attacks and counterattacks all the way up the hill and down the backside. At one point about 15 of us had a pretty substantial gap on the field, but there was little organization, the pace stalled, and the field swallowed us up again by the time we made it back around to the hill again.

While all of this was developing I put in some pretty intense efforts bridging gaps and following out attacks and whatnot. Pretty intense for me, anyway. By the time we were caught and things slowed a bit I remember thinking about my laboring breath and realizing that I hadn't previously realized how intense the effort was I was putting out.

Things didn't get really intense again until about four laps to go, but the decisive move came with two laps to go. The pressure came from all around up the climb and a group of 15-20 put a gap on the field. I'm still kicking myself for not being in position to take advantage of the gap. I could sort of see it unfolding and I was just wasn't in position. At the top of the climb there was maybe a 50 yard gap between myself at the front of the field and the break. I gave it all I had on the downhill, but couldn't bridge. Unfortunately there was no interest in organizing a chase, but rather self-interested riders (myself included) making solo attempts to bridge one after another and none succeeding.

With one lap to go the mood of the pack changed, reflecting the collective resignation of the race to the leaders. The pace stayed high during the last lap, again with several attacks and counterattacks, but it ended in a field sprint. I maintained a good position, and despite my putt-putt sprint finished four or fifth in the field sprint, with an overall result somewhere in the 20s.


SUNDAY'S RACE

Central Park. Manhattan. 6:30am. 30 degrees.

On Sunday I opted for the 3/4 field, four laps around a six-mile course with two decent climbs, one at the end of the lap with the start/finish line atop, the other about two miles into the course on the backside. About 40 starters

The attacks started early in this race, and during the first lap I jumped into one short-lived three-man break. But as we were caught about 3/4 miles from the finish of the first lap a group of what became three riders sort of just rode away on the outside. I think they just caught us all by surprise, but they proved to be strong riders, and despite efforts from several of us to bridge their early lead proved too substantial and they rode away with the race.

One rider in the group was backed up by a big team (Morgan Stanley). They effectively ran interference every time we tried to organize a chase and no one else had a big enough team or was organized enough to make any real attempt at bringing back the break.

Anyway...as we pulled around to the finishing climb for the third time I decided to throw down a little pressure and see if anyone would respond. I jumped out of the field and pounded up the climb looking over my shoulder to see if anyone was going to join up. At the top of the climb I had about 50 feet on a fairly apathetic looking field so I decided that if I had one this was my chance. I dropped my head and launched into TT mode.

Just after the crest of the climb a Morgan Stanley rider bridged up to me, but just sat on my wheel. I told him what I thought was obvious, that there was no way we were going to catch the other break so let's work together and try to stay away. He argued that he couldn't work...that he couldn't risk catching his man. Well, this seemed totally unreasonable to me. Not only were the three leaders in no risk of being caught, but we weren't pulling up the field, we were on our own, so even if we did catch the group that would just put to MS riders together in a breakaway group of five, which seems to me pretty good odds for MS. But there was no time (and at this level of intensity, not enough mental fortitude) to argue persuasively, so though I was a little pissed me , I figured fifth place was still worth the effort so I just buried it, trying to ignore the guy on my wheel.

As we crested the backside hill, still with a healthy gap on the field, I tried to talk the wheelsucker into working again. We argued back and forth a while until he conceded not to contest the sprint. After that he sat back there occasionally throwing out words of encouragement--which was kind of lame because I was pulling this guy to a top-five finish, but nonetheless it was appreciated, and I no doubt rode faster with that guy behind me telling me how strong I was than I would have had I been out all alone.

Also helping were the various straggling groups that had fallen off the 1/2/3, Cat 5, and Masters fields. I'd set little goals for myself--just catch that little group right there; that solo rider up there, you're stronger than that guy, go get him--stuff like that to keep me going. And every bend of the road I'd turn around to see how much of a gap I had on the field and I was gaining confidence with each passing mile.

About halfway up the final climb I stole a look around and saw the pack charging up behind me. At that point I was pretty well spent and had to really dig deep to finish the climb. The rider behind me stayed true to his word and let me finish in front of him...and I held off the charging pack to squeak through two or three bike lengths in front of the first sprinters. A fourth place that felt like a victory. And in the money. Very happy.

And a new max power.

After the race the wheelsucker conceded again, noting that he now realized I was right--the break had a huge gap that we were in no danger of closing and that he could have (and should have) helped. At that point it didn't matter. I held off the field. However, had they caught us I would have been pretty steamed.

Ah yeah. That's bike racing...

crit pics

A little delayed, but here's some shots from the UMD crit of a few weeks ago, courtesy of Greg.

Audrey was also there and snapped half a roll of film on my SLR (and looked darn cute doing it), but I haven't developed the film yet.