Wolfpack Classic Crit

Yesterday I did the Wolfpack Classic Criterium. Being my first crit of the year, I knew that the numerous accelerations and decelerations would be a little bit of a shock to the system, but was nonetheless pretty confident after my good result in the Road Race the day before.

I got the chance to ride the 1 k. course a couple of times before the race and it seemed fairly nontechnical, but I soon discovered that a chicane and 3 turns within about 300 meters of each other made it very sketchy when 4 wide in a pack.

Around the 4th or 5th lap, there was a 3+ rider crash, with one person catapulting over the curb and landing in a bush. That left me about 50 meters behind the field, and only my hardest chase got me back. I didn't realize it then, but I was the only rider from the group stalled by the crash to make it back up to the field. It took me a pretty long time to recover from that, with the pace never seeming to let up. The pack split several times from the high speeds, and I was forced to bridged numerous gaps in the last half of the race.

At 10 laps to go I found myself in a bad position. I moved up and lost ground too many times to count after that, but halfway through the last lap I was in 6th, and thankfully the pace was too fast for anyone to pass me. I started the final sprint in the same position, passed someone, and then got a little boxed in at the end to finish 6th, one better place than in the Road Race!

Congratulations to my whole team, and especially to Nic for a great result in the collegiate B's, for the Guillens and Craig doing great in the cat. 5's, and for Michael's amazing win in the 5's from a 2 man breakaway!

I also got the chance to meet Ben King, a 19 year-old who races for the Trek-Livestrong team. He raced in the pro 1 2 race and got 7th.


Here are the statistics (w/out the Power meter):

18.01 miles for the 43 min. crit
24.95 mph avg. for the crit

Here are some photos from my race:

Wolfpack Cycling Classic

Today was my first official race of the 2009 season, the Wolfpack Classic Road Race. I raced in the cat. 4's. The course consisted of 3 laps on an 18 mile lap with 4 main hills, one of them ending just 1 kilometer before the finish line.

I came into this race knowing my work was cut out for me . Since I am hoping to cat. up to a 3 before CAN-AM, a prestigious juniors race in New Jersey, I don't have a whole lot of time to waste on anonymous pack finishes. My strategy going into the race was to stay in a good position the whole time, and start a breakaway by the 3rd and biggest hill of the last lap.

The race started easily and I stayed in the top 15 for the first few miles. I dropped back and moved up several times after that until the opportunity represented itself on the last hill of the 2nd to last lap when I got into a break with 2 other riders that lasted about one and a half miles. Unfortunately we were caught right after the crest of the next hill. I then settled back into the peleton to try to recover for my planned breakaway. I got to the base of the climb thinking that I couldn't get away after seeing other breaks getting swept up by the pack, but nonetheless put in a max effort and hoped for the best. Thankfully, my attack did create a split in the field and drew out my teammate Andy Hart, and another rider. We shared pulls for a minute or so, but then were caught. After that I tried to stay in the top 15 and recover as much as possible in time for the finish.

Up the last hill the pace was fast and 2 riders got away, Andy again being one of them. They dangled right in front of the field for about half a kilometer, before being caught by myself and about 5 other riders. Since I knew that I didn't have a good chance in the sprint and was slightly ahead of the pack, I just went as hard as I could. With 200 meters to go I was in 2nd, but was swarmed at the end and got 7th. This was also my fastest cat. 4 RR ever, with an avg. speed of 23.1!

All in all, I am very happy with my result, and also just being a factor in a cat. 4 race, something I never could have imagined last season. Tomorrow is the crit, which I 'll try to post by Monday.

Youngs Road TT #2

Today I did the Young's Road TT for the second time this season. The Young's Road TT is a 10 k out and back course with a slight downhill going there and a slight uphill coming back. A couple of posts ago I described it in more detail.

Anyways, last time I did the YRTT, January 1st, I did it in 17:24, although that wasn't an accurate gauge of my form because it was cold. Luckily, though, I have a power meter so I can do accurate power tests outdoors regardless of wind conditions or air density. I ended up averaging 193 watts that time, with a power to weight of 4.82, and a Threshold of 4.64 wpk.

Today I was pretty confident of a good result as my form is much better than it was a month and a half ago. However, there was a crosswind this time, and although the temperature was perfect at 70 degrees I wasn't expecting an amazing time.

So I started the TT hard, got up to speed, went hard, reached the turnaround, went harder, then really pushed it up the last 3 hills and clocked a time of 15:56, which I was thrilled about because it was only 7 seconds slower than my record that I set at the end of last season.

When I got home I was expecting a new wattage record because I felt really good during the TT, and my watts seemed to be over 200 nearly all the time. But, I was shocked when I saw an average wattage of 217, 24 watts over my old record. In fact, I was so surprised that I would be worried about peaking too soon, but I am not doing a lot of very high intensity work yet so I don't have to be concerned about that.

After I downloaded the power meter, I got out the calculator to find out if I had broken the 5 wpk. at Threshold barrier:

217 ave. watts/(90 pounds/2.2)= 5.3 watts per kilogram, and times that by .95 to get 5.04 wpk at Threshold!

Hear are the numbers for the ride:

29.02 miles
1:33:12
18.68 avg. mph, 23.45 for the TT
129 avg. watts, 217 for the TT
724 Kilojoules

Peak Power Records:

1 min.: 240 watts
5 min.: 222 watts
10 min.: 217 watts, a new record!
30 min.: 171 watts, also a new record!

Nationals 2009

Yesterday I went to the USA cycling website for about the 15th time to see if they had chosen a location and date for Nationals. Bend isn't my first choice because it's not on the East Coast, but hopefully it will be hillier and milder than California. They changed the date too, to make it later in the season. I had already planned out most of the season for an earlier peak, but now I'll have to change that. I really should be thankful though because I was expecting it to be in California along with Track Nationals.

New 2 Hour Record!

Today I got the chance to post my powermeter data from the race yesterday. Here are the numbers from the whole ride including warm up and cool down.



51.82 miles
2 hours 24 minutes 57 seconds
21.45 mph, 22.7 mph for the race
137 avg. watts, 148 avg. watts for the race
1196 Kilojoules

Peak Power records:

1 min.: 300 watts
5 min.: 202 watts 10 min.: 178 watts
30 min.: 155 watts
60 min.: 157 watts
120 min.: 146 watts, a new record!

The World's Most Prestigous Training Ride

Today was my first "race" of the 2009 season, January Nationals (which has actually been in February the last 2 years). Actually, it wasn't a race but "The Worlds most Prestigious Training Ride", where an 80 strong pack of Pros, cat. 5 and everything in between battle it out on a hilly 49 mile course. But before I tell you how I actually did, I'll tell you a little background information about Jan. Nats.

January Nationals started in the late 80's and is a great way for racers to gauge both their and their rivals early season form. It has a proud history of always producing a huge turnout and a strong winner, probably the most famous of these Fred Rodriguez, who won in 1994 when he was 21. Another great thing about it is that it gives me the opportunity to race alongside people I'd never have a chance to race against, such as Terry Huss, who's on my team, Andy Baker, on Time, Ronny Hinson, and Charlie Brown. The race consists of 7 laps on a 7 mile course that has 3 pretty big hills. The first lap is done at a slow pace to serve as a warm up, and then the pain begins.

Last year was my first year doing January Nationals. We had come thinking it was a just one of my teams group rides, but once we saw numerous pros from the local Time Pro Development and Inferno Pro Cycling Teams we knew this had to be more than just a group ride. I ended up just barely staying with the field that year and finished at the back, but I came into today with the intent of staying near the front and in the action.

After warming up on the slower first lap, I could tell that I was feeling good and got used to the acceleration and feel of the pack quickly. In the 2nd and 3rd laps there were some very hard parts, but I was feeling pretty strong until my rear derailleur broke on the 4th lap, leaving me stuck in the 34 and 50-14. That was when I knew just surviving was going to be difficult.

Fast forward to the second to last lap and I was really struggling up some of the hills, being either under or over-geared. However, the pace really slowed down at the end of the 6th lap, the pack tired from constant attacks, and by the time it started up again I was almost fully recovered. In the first couple of miles of the last lap, a pro from Inferno attacked and a 10 strong chase group formed. Being in the perfect position to follow and feeling strong, I caught on to the back of the group. Unfortunately it only stayed away for about a minute and was caught on the biggest hill of the loop, bad for me as I couldn't accelerate back into the pack in such a big gear. By the top of the hill I had gone from the front of the field to the very back. I spent the rest of the lap trying to move up, and eventually finished in the middle of the pack.

Considering I only had 2 gears for more than half the race, I was glad with the result and a great start to the 2009 season. Tomorrow or Tuesday I'll try to post the power data.