Westlake Training Crit - 6/12/2007

Another Tuesday Worlds of Westlake last night. It gave me a chance to take the new bike out to put it through it's paces.

Interesting evening of "tactics" in the A's. Big numbers in RGF and Lake Effect again, with a field of mabye 35-40. We had Rick, Gary, and Ray. First lap, Dick takes a group of 6 or 7 away. Then another group of 3 goes. Yet almost all the big guns are still in the group.

The breaks get some distance with everyone represented except SBR. So, I go to work... not expecting to actually effect the breaks, but because I came out to get some work in... and sitting on the RGF block was not doing work. I get a little help, and a lot of interference, even though the strong guys haven't done anything yet, and when they do, it won't matter anyway. It probably wasn't the smartest thing to do, but I had my reasons... even Gary, Rick and Ray were sitting back there laughing at me... I mean, if your own team mates can't laugh at you, then why race after all.

Somewhere around lap 6, PM decides he's had enough of a warm up, and comes around with Tris Hopkins, Shawn Adams, Stefan, Rudy and Tom Frueh on his wheel, so I jump on the end of that train... cause you don't let the big boys go if you can help it. And we're away from the group, cooking along at something that was faster than I could have done on my own. In short order, I look back and Brent Evans and Chris Riccardi have bridged... and we're making ground on the first break up the road. Paul closes to the break, and sits up, so we all get a little breather.

I'm sitting near the tail end of the split, when Paul decides it's time to go after the next group up the road. I see him move, and go to follow, but he's got a 2 meter gap before I can stand up... I hear a shout from the back of the group, but nobody moves.... everyone's expecting someone else to do the work, and Paul opens up a big gap. I end up just getting hauled up to the front of the group, instead of continuing on chasing at PMS (Paul Martin Speed), I pull over waiting for the next group to go... and they do. Woof!

I'm able to sit on the tail end again for a short time, but pop off in about a half lap. S*&$. Before the race, Brent said that if I had to use my finish sprint to close a gap, then it's better to stay with the group than get popped.. so I tried that. Uh, it's really hard to go faster than I already was.... at that HR anyway. As the gap opens more Brent and Chris come by, and I jump on the tail end... new life, so I work with them to see if we can close it.. It stays steady for a bit, but then slowly opens. And look, only 17 more laps to go.

It's 7:15, we started at 6:30.... and the race is gone already. I've been in threshold heart rate and above since the first burst of PMS, about 5 minutes ago. Is doing an hour and a half of Threshold considered an interval? The three of us trade pulls, but I can see we're slowing ever so slightly, since my HR is dropping. We watch the front group slowly disappear, and I'm thinking that's the whole thing. A group of 15 or so... the three of us, and then everybody else.

We probably did 3 or 4 laps together, and I was totally happy doing this. I'd get my work in and we were working together. When Chris looked back, and we were getting pulled back into the field... henceforth known as the A- field. They were close too, so Brent and I sat up when Chris decided to attack, probably out of frustration.

As we fall back into the field, Bill Marut made a comment about how hard it is to get anyone to work together. It seems the RGF's were still trying to block the A- field back, even though all the big boys were gone. Whatever, Bill and I decide that we'll work together and start towing the field around. Soon we get some help from Derrick and Jeff Cartledge.. and I'm in the Lake Effect train. The A- field is about 20 guys or so now... I think there were 5 or 6 RGF, 5 or 6 Lake Effect, the 4 SBR and a couple of Spin guys with the rest of the unattached and/or alone riders.

For the most part, it was Bill, Derrick and I doing work. When we came through the line, they rang the bell for a prime... and I joked "If we pull back 3 minutes at better than PMS, we can go for the point." But no, Rick attacks the field on the back stretch.... and as we head to the line Jeff comes up on the right and takes off with just about all the remaining RGF on his wheel. They all catch Rick, and as we regroup after the line I hear "Nice job, Polo."... What! There are primes for the A- field also??? We're not even in the race any more!

I guess that prime did some of the guys in, as we went right back to work. And I was getting pissed. RGF is still playing a little blocking game, so I start pushing them off the wheel when anyone else pulls through. I'm glad they've got team socks, cause it helped me pick them out as I was in the rest line. I'll take extra pulls, but blocking at this point is ridiculous. I then decide that I will go for the next prime.

The problem with that plan is that I've already been doing most of the work. So, they let me sit on the front going at whatever pace I want.... Brent comes through for a pull, and I'm second wheel around the back. When he comes off, I make some comment about attacking from the front. But I mostly just wait. Mehul jumps at about 400 meters, and I jump in to chase, there's an RGF on the right but he's out, I'm closing, but not fast enough... Mehul has time to gauge his efforts, and take it by 2 lengths. Then sits up and asks "does that count for us?"

Big effort, now sit in. The group is now down to maybe 15. So I have to be careful. Gaps are opened, but it still stays together with no one really wanting to work. Then it happens. We lap the B's, and almost simultaneously, we are caught by the A race.

LAPPED! Oh the shame. Of course as they come by, everyone jumps on the end of the group. Now we're all getting mixed in. The good news is that we are now moving at the pace I wanted to be going before. The bad news is it's getting really complicated. I somehow found myself in the position of the gatekeeper. As the A riders drifted off a pull, I would tell them to jump in in front of me, keeping the A and the A- field mostly separate. This worked for a bit especially after Paul took a small group up the road. Then a gap opened around the corner, and I went to close it up... then thought better... and it got really mixed up again.

And so the race finish. We did about 5 laps together. We let the A field go on the last half lap. Then 6 of us A- riders continued and did our own last lap. I ended up ramping the speed up for the finish, since Rick and Gary were with us. They jumped into the sprint and everyone felt like they actually raced.

Overall, the RGF tactics really got to me. If we ALL would have worked together, we could have avoided being lapped. On the other hand, I got a really good night of training. Overall average was 25.0mph. It was only 25.2 before we came off the front groups. I also peaked at 44.4 during that prime sprint, which I'm pretty happy with since it was not in anyone's draft... just all out go. I also got pretty big boost in confidence, even if I didn't hold the PMS all night, I was there at the start of it. More smarts, and I'll give it a go again next time.

I'm also really happy with the bike performance... it felt solid, and I think the position is pretty dialed in. The only problem with the bike was a loose bottle cage that I only noticed rattling on the final lap. I've got a couple more trinkets coming this week, and I think it will be complete.