Despite the ugly weather this weekend, all three crits that I intended to do this weekend went off without any problems. These included the Chris Hinds at Ninigret,
Chris Hinds Memorial Criterium
The cat 4 field for the Chris Hinds went off at 9 AM. This required a 5:30 AM wakeup call to eat a huge breakfast and make the 2-hour trek down to Ninigret. I didn’t get to bed until well after midnight the night before, so I was lacking sleep. Breakfast included a cheese omelet, toast, oatmeal with strawberries and blackberries, a banana, and yogurt. Had two cliff bars and half a coffee with milk on the way down and before the race.
On the drive down the sky was black, rain was coming down in buckets and there were several flashes of lightning. I knew there would be a chance that the weather would cancel the race and I was sure this would be the case. However, as we got close the sky turned blue and suddenly the weather was fine. It did cloud up again before the race but at least it wasn’t raining.
Warmup included 30 minutes of medium spinning with 3, 10 second bursts. I had installed a new chain and cassette the night before, and had to make some adjustments during warmup. Legs felt good and warm before the start.
The cat 4 field was small, 18 starters, no doubt due to the weather. No other NEBC racers in my race. On the second turn of the first lap, the front two riders on the pack crashed. I’m not sure what caused it, the track was a little wet still but traction didn’t seem too bad to me. At least one of these riders continued to race on the next lap (a Quad Cycles guy), and he ended up finishing second. Very impressive I thought.
The pace overall felt pretty easy, I thought it felt easier than any of the Wells Ave B races I did in prior weeks. Maybe this was due to only having 18 racers? The pace was smooth and steady, very seldom did the pack get very stretched out.
Half way through the race the prime bell rang, and Tim yelled at me from the sidelines to move up in the pack. I thought I was sitting 10 or 15 guys back, but I guess in a field of 18 people that’s pretty much at the back. My heart rate was in the 150’s (threshold is ~180), so when we got to the back straight I attacked hard up the side (900W, 5s). I drew a good gap and put the hammer down the best I could. A rider was off the front already by about 100m, and I quickly overtook him. Coming around the last turn I was really starting to hurt, so I gave a quick peek back and only saw the field way back. Down the finishing straight I was mashing too big a gear, and I was really blowing up. As I approached the line I could hear a racer coming up behind me. I stomped on the pedals with one last effort but ended up losing the prime by inches. Hit my max HR of 199 in doing so. The effort ended up being a 540W 70s effort. When the field overtook me half a lap later it was very painful to hold on the back.
Not a whole lot else happened during the race. Two riders did ride off the front for 5 laps or so, but I don’t think they ever got more than 10 seconds or so away. The field did a good job of keeping them within reach.
My finish for this race sucked. I figured I probably couldn’t try another 1-minute break after my prime, so I decided to practice a sprint finish. My plan was to get on the wheel of the racer that beat me out in the prime. He had won the first prime as well, and I thought he looked strong. Staying on his wheel during the last lap lost me several positions, and with half a lap to go I must’ve been 15th wheel. I kept hoping my guy would make some heroic move to the finish and tow me along but it never happened. Coming out of the last turn I was still way back, so I jumped ship and sprinted in (933W, 13s, 1006 5s max). This wasn’t nearly enough, and I finished 9th. I crossed the line feeling like I had a lot left, and my heart rate never even hit 190 (199 max). In hindsight I should have spent more energy jockeying for better position. A top 5 or possibly top 3 finish seems like it would have been a realistic possibility with more experience.
Normally about a 10 AM start, and with only a 30 minute bike ride down this meant I could sleep in a bit. Had a similar breakfast as Saturday. Also got 9+ hours of sleep. Legs felt good upon wakening. Saturday volume was smaller than I had hoped due to bad weather. The weather was better this day, but overcast skies made things a bit chilly.
The A & B fields were combined, likely due to having both Turtle Pond and the Beanpot going on. The race had around 40 starters in it, maybe slightly more with more riders entering late. NEBC had 4 riders in the race, including Josh, Pat, Rick (I think?) and myself.
After two calls for riders to line up, no one was there, so I decided to grab a spot on the front line. I normally don’t worry too much about where I start, and it’s unusual that I start here. At roll out, I clipped in right away so I decided to start out at a hard pace and make those that had trouble clicking in suffer a little bit. Turns out I started way too hard, averaging 500W for the first minute, 400W for the first lap. Two other guys went with me and we enjoyed our one lap of glory taking a big (and totally 100% pointless) gap. Around turn 2 of lap 2, a handful of riders went flying by. I jumped to this group and hammered for another lap but man did I hurt by this point. They were going way too fast for me so I drifted back to sit in.
The pace in the A/B field was a good amount harder than the previous B races this season. I think we averaged another 2 mph faster or so (25 mph maybe?). It turned out that three of the riders that emerged on that second lap break would stay away for the entire race. The field struggled to work together and never had a real chance of bringing them back. I don’t think it would have mattered much anyways, two of those guys (Bikebarn?) looked ridiculously strong. Even if caught I’m sure they would have been able to break away again without any trouble.
This race was mostly uneventful for me. After my race yesterday, I decided to spend as much energy as it took to stay at the front. My intention was to get good position for prime laps and hopefully the finish. I think I buried myself a little too hard when I got to the front though. In the back of my mind I wanted to try and catch the break. This caused me to be way too gased to make a real effort at any primes. In fact, I hardly can recall the prime bell being rung more than once or twice. Too much time spent being anaerobic.
The last 10 laps or so were going great. I was on Josh’s wheel for a good 6 or 7 laps, and we were poking around nice and easy in the front 10 riders. Went I got to the front I took it much easier and didn’t kill myself.
With 3 laps to go all hell broke loose for me. I was swarmed by riders on both sides and got totally boxed in around the middle. I lost a ton of positions and couldn’t move at all. After a lap of losing positions I must’ve been mid-field, but I was finally able to swing to the outside to move up. As I was sitting on the outside of the three-man wide field another racer came up on the outside. He sort of paused just to the left of me, and kept creeping closer and closer, perhaps trying to get more drafting benefit. Before long we were bumping elbows. Suddenly the rider to my right must’ve bumped the rider to his right and I got completely sandwiched, hard contact on both sides. My handlebars totally locked up with the rider to my right, and then broke free all at once. I was thrown completely off balance and shot off to my left a good 5 or 10 feet, nearly taking out the rider to my left. For an instant I was sure I was going down. I was extremely lucky to stay upright.
On the last lap I spent a lot of energy moving up. By turn 3 I was about 15th wheel, but was definitely starting to feel it. The marshal at BSC yelled to us that there was a car up the road, and in turn 4 riders sat up and waved there arms in the air. I think all but 8 racers or so thought we were neutralized and sat up. Turns out that the last lap wasn’t neutralized, and that was it. Very anti-climatic. I probably didn't have a real shot anyways but it would have been nice to be able to actually finish strong. Seems like all the racing is for nothing when that happens, oh well.
The third and final race of the weekend for me was the Boston Beanpot Classic crit through Tufts. After Wells finished it started to rain and I considered not going, but the forecast said it would clear up so Erica and I rode over.
The course is described as being a highly technical six turn, 1km course. It was hard to move around by bike before my race because the ‘A’ race (college race) was going on. I only had my bike shoes with me so I couldn’t walk the course. The ¾ race started immediately after the A race finished, and I didn’t get to see more than half the course. Watching the A race was really impressive though, one rider (Josh Lipka) nearly lapped the field twice.
There were only about 20 racers or so, including a handful of college racers and one other NEBC racer. Again, I think the weather was probably the cause of this.
On roll-out, I clicked in quickly and was able to get a decent position in the front half despite starting in the back. The pace for the first two laps was blistering fast and unbelievably sketchy for me without getting to see the course. Turn two came after a pretty steep downhill, and turned onto a narrow street with big six-inch curbs on the outside. There were a ton of hay bails stacked up here. Word was that there were some pretty ugly crashes on this turn in the earlier races. I could totally see why. Luckily our field was pretty conservative on this turn and slowed down significantly coming into it.
However, although we slowed down significantly for the turns, the pace coming out of the turns was extremely hard. On the first lap my power meter shows 800+W accelerations after each turn. Turn 3,4, and 5 were especially important because they were each uphill turns, and excessive braking meant you had to use that much more power to accelerate up the hills. Turn 5 turned onto the steepest rise of the course, which must have been at least 8% grade.
The first lap included way too much sprinting then braking for me. 440W average for the first minute which includes almost nothing but 800W or 0W. I smartened up for the second lap and was able to expand a ton less energy. I didn’t power nearly as hard coming out of the turns. Instead, I gave the rider in front of me just a little more space (we were super strung out) and accelerated into the turn. As a result I didn’t have to sprint coming out of turns and mostly just coasted in between.
Unfortunately that first lap completely cooked me. By just lap 4 I was shutting down and fell off the back coming up the hill. There were a few other racers that had been dropped also. I tried riding with them to catch back on but I was toast. My power wasn’t really that high for the five minutes it took me to get dropped, I think the other races this weekend had taken their toll.
This was a really cool race and I really wish it had been my first race of the weekend rather than my last as it was certainly the hardest. I’ve never raced on a course anywhere near this technical and it was a good experience. It looked like the pace may have really slowed down a bit after the initial hammering. In the future I’ll have to be more prepared and inspect the course better in order to survive the initial selection.
Summary
This was a great race weekend. My legs got a good trashing and I learned a lot about finishing tactics. In addition, when off the bike I got to practice recovering for the next race. I’m hoping this will help build stage racing strength.
The forecast for this week looks great. After 3 big volume weeks I’m considering taking rest, but I think I’ll wait another week. The first Charlie Baker TT is Wednesday, and I’ve outfitted my bike with aero bars. I took some pictures and made some tweeks, and I don’t think my position is too ugly, especially for a rode bike. On Saturday I will be up in
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