17th Annual Sterling Classic Road Race - May 7, 2011

The Sterling Classic has been hosted by my club, The Minuteman Road Club for 17 years and this year marked the second time I competed in the Cat 5 35+ field. Since Battenkill, I made a few trips out to the race course to remind my legs what they would be getting into going up the start/finish along Meeetinghouse Hill Road.

I also engaged in various religious, non-religious and black arts rituals in an effort to prevent a repeat of last year's horrendous weather. As in the case with Battenkill, the week leading up to Saturday had me so busy with work and personal commitments that my "taper" was dangerously close to a "full stop", training-wise. I found myself still packing up the car and cooler well past 11 pm Friday night.

Head hits pillow, eyes close, alarm goes off.  :: sigh ::

The forecast was looking very good with temps to be in the 50's and 60's with a fairly low chance of rain.

Coffee and oatmeal made and eaten, I headed out to Sterling. After a drive around the course, I head to the staging area at the school, check in with Ian R who gave the volunteers their last minute instructions. I'd be marshaling later after my race.

Pin on my number, set up the bike and start warming up along the roads near the school. Easy pedaling with a few jumps here and there to wake up the type II muscles... knowing that they would get a much more intense stirring when the race began.

Silly bike: even though I gave it a very complete tune up a few days earlier, my drive train was making an annoying clicking sound that I could not pin down. I decided that it would either be lost in the noise of the pack or could work to my advantage, letting others think I was more of a noob/fred/doofus than I really am.

Before I knew it, 8:35 rolled around and it was time for my field to assemble. Jorge H, our former club president call myself and fellow club members John R and Doran A to the front of the field and took our picture.

Yeah, we're all smiles NOW.

The pace car rolled and we started heading into town.

The driver of the pace car kept us honest by going less than 20 mph and I maintained my position at the front all the way in. My race-induced tunnel vision was fully engaged as I was completely unaware of anyone to either side of me. Looking down at my computer showed my HR already starting to climb, surely due to some anxiety about what was soon to happen.

My plan: stay with the main group and not do any ill-advised breaks for the lead like I did last year. If I found myself near the front at the end, unleash myself upon Meetinghouse Hill like no tomorrow and deal with the consequences later.

On the way up to the start, I made one more incantation to "race my race" and not freak out at the beginning if anyone took off on the hill. Up we went, the dozen or so people along the way cheered and I remained in front as the race began.

No wincing, cramping or heavy breathing. Yet.

I let a few people slip by me on MHH and as expected, regained position as we continued under the 190 overpass. Nothing much to report on lap one except that at one point on Route 12, an unattached rider got a few yards ahead of the rest of us and wove his bike back and forth across the road.

Taunting? Showing off? Just feeling good? Beats me. My thought was either he was a ringer or a douche, maybe both.

For the rest of the first lap, I was variously pulling or in the top 10 wheels. Coming back around to MHH, again I lost a few places on the way up but gained them back on the next climb and after. I felt calm and reasonably strong.

When we turned from Rowley to Heywood on lap 2, I did a little seated acceleration just to keep the others on their toes, the pace was THAT leisurely at that point. The course takes a little descent right after the turn so I didn't sacrifice any matches. I got pretty far ahead and somebody who caught my wheel asked if I was serious. I barely had time to shake my head "no" when the pack swallowed us back up on the next incline.

When we got onto the newly paved North Row Road, I was maybe 3 rows back when I heard the dreaded crunch and "UGH!" and "Watch out!" that's concurrent with somebody going down. Hyper alert for the possibility of the tangle being in my path, I saw John R going by to the left of the yellow line, on his ass with his bike laid out before him. And then I heard another crunch as somehow, somebody else was across the yellow line and hit his bike.

At that instant, said to myself, "Now, it's up to YOU!" and felt as if John crashing out of the race passed on some additional "mana" and responsibility to me. I became more resolute in concentrating on my game plan.

This time, along Rte. 12, a different unattached rider had the lead position with me as second wheel. After a minute pulling or so, he began drifting to one side then then other, looking for me (or someone else) to take over. I let him know the futility in this and advised him to instead, hold a straight line and just slow down until somebody got sick of going so slow.

That somebody was me.

But I didn't pick up the pace that much and as we passed Dunkin Donuts and began the gradual climb back into town, others grew impatient with MY pace and I let them by. Somewhere along this section, I realized that John R had miraculously rejoined the race. Woot!

Once again, I drifted back through the pack up MHH but this time,  just as I was regaining contact with the group as we turned onto Heywood, two guys were 30-40 yards up the road with no one seeming to care.

Following the example set by my Cat 4 team mates in races earlier this season, I saw a chance to help John. As I passed him, I said something like, "latch on" or "let's go get 'em" and I turned on the gas. Later, somebody else confessed that he grabbed my wheel before John did but I assumed John (and a bunch of others) followed suit. I hammered hard for a good long minute until we swallowed up the break.

Could they have sustained the break? A more prudent mind would likely have said "no" but as I found out watching the 4's later on, you ignore a break at your peril: a solo break early in their race maintained a 1 minute lead for many laps all the way to victory. And you never know if you got a ringer in your field when you are racing the 5's.

Soon after that, John had a near miss at a SECOND crash on North Row. Meanwhile, even though I fired off a bunch of bullets catching the break, the peloton graciously resumed it's pokey pace, allowing me to recover once again.

We hit Rte. 12 at a reasonably fast clip, me taking a fairly wide line just in case a squirrely noob-bot lost his nerve on the turn. The pace continued to slowly increase and when we got to the DD's this time, the race was finally ON. Of course, this was the moment my quads decided to hint that they'd had enough, but I was able to continue to feather on the power without upsetting them into total crampage.

Unfortunately, others in the field were feeling a bit better than I was and soon enough, dribs and drabs of them began passing me as we rounded the turn past the fire station at the bottom of MHH. I had to stop this erosion of my postion in the race, but I knew if I got out of the saddle on the hill, I'd be a knotted mess of cramped muscle on the ground.

Meanwhile, John was ahead, in a pitched battle up the hill to the finish and was beat there by Mr. Swervy Pants from early in the race, who later confessed that he was a former Cat 2 racer returning to the sport after many years. That's two 2nd place finishes for John in a row, the last one being at Blue Hills.

For my part, I progressively shifted to easier and easier gears while ramping up my cadence. This seemed to the way to go as I reeled in three of the guys that had just passed me and, breathing as hard as I ever have in my life, wheeled across in 16th.

It's a wonder I didn't grind my teeth down to little stumps.

Turns out, I matched the climb time I recorded on the way up the first time, when my legs were "fresh". Go figure.

Afterwards, I got some constructive criticism from John R regarding the amount of time I spent on the front. I don't know, I wasn't working that hard when I was up there and yes, even if I wasn't working very hard, everyone else behind me had it easier. Could less time up front have left me with more joules for the finish?

Interesting footnote - while rooting around on Colin Reuter's road-results.com, I stumbled upon this happenstance: I finished one place ahead of the SAME GUY I beat by one place in this race last year:

(click for easier viewing)

This year, the ride back to the staging area at the school was much more pleasurable and after a quick change and repacking my bike in the car, I was headed back up to Meetinghouse Hill Road. Of course I brought my camera along and got photos of the mens 4's before I went on duty as marshal above the start/finish and later, the mens 3's, and both the pro 1/2 men's and pro 1/2/3 women's races (many more photos here):

2011 Tour of the Battenkill

Well, yesterday was the culmination of a winter’s worth of hard work for me. I’m just as proud of the preparation I completed as I am about the result I was able to achieve in the race.

After doing 20 or so minutes of spinning/tempo/jumps up and down Rte. 22, I was at the point where I was thinking, “let’s do this thing already”. Scott Sweeney mentioned he had an upset stomach and Todd P, Jeremy and Matt seemed to me to be pretty antsy too.

Jeremy had announced his intention to be at or near the front at the top of Juniper Swamp. Sure, I thought, I’ll go for some of that.

Lined up on the center line maybe five riders back with Jeremy just in front of me and Scott and Todd to my side and behind. After a couple of minutes we were on our way.

The first couple of miles, I had some pretty good butterflies in my stomach as I was a) unsure about some of the wobbly guys around me (not my team mates) b) being hyper attentive to staying near Scott, Jeremy and Todd and c) riding on the centerline. Soon enough, the pack thinned out just enough so that the front was only 2-3 wide which left plenty of room to maneuver. After some jockeying around, I think I was around 8th wheel.

We wound our way along Rte. 313 at a fair clip when suddenly, it seemed to me, everybody slowed down a few mph. Well, most of you know me well enough to not be surprised to find out that I swung to the left and kept the pace up at the mid-20 mph place that it had been. I could almost hear Jeremy say, “There he goes again.”

Just before the turn off 313, I settled back into a slot near the front of the pack as we wound our way to Perry Mill Road. It’s only 1/2 mile or so longer than Oak Hill but oh, that extra 1/2 mile at 8% avg gradient (w/some 12% thrown in) is a killer. I stayed in the front 10 or so and hoped the descent towards Juniper Swamp would allow my HR to return from the stratosphere.

No such luck: we turned onto J.S. and were headed up with me still huffing and puffing, but my legs felt pretty good and I was able to keep up. The road surface was well packed (by previous fields?) and you could actually climb out of the saddle if you carefully kept your rear wheel to the ground. At the top, nobody seemed to spank it hard and so we settled into it once again.

The next 24 miles, from 13 to 37 are kind of a blur for me but I remember these few things:
I can’t recall exactly when it happened, but it was in this stretch that I had my last glimpse of Jeremy and the lead group as they gapped the rest of us (6?) over the top of some hill or other.
When we weren’t headed into the wind, my super-thin (and black) base layer had me feeling pretty hot, so I put it into my head to be careful about water consumption (I carried three bottles and was on vapors at the end).
As we went on, I began to get gapped on the hills, a little bit, maybe 4 or 5 bike lengths but then hammered onto the last wheel ahead on the descents. I knew this was going to cost me in the long run.
There were a couple of husky guys who were in the same get-dropped/hammer-back-on cycle and I let them pull me back on a few times, glad they were around. They were good wind blocks too.
One guy got his chain royally tangled up as he shifted on a climb, thought that was the last I’d see of him but he heroically made it back to our group.
Scott appeared steady as a rock the whole time.

Nearly two hours into the race and I realized that I didn’t take any Endurolytes since before the start. I reached into my jersey to pull them out when suddenly we were descending Carney-Cassidy Road and I thought better of one-handing it just then. Sure enough, on the next rise, I got out of the saddle to narrow a gap and BOOM: right quad cramped. My Garmin data clearly shows the moment when my cadence went from the mid 80’s to 25 rpm when it happened. I shifted to an easier gear to get my cadence back up but it was too late: they gapped me real good.

I kept them in sight  for few minutes but every turn seemed to put me into more wind and I knew I would not finish at all if I kept trying to close that gap on my own. I was prepared for the likelyhood that I would finish this race on my own so I settled into finding a groove that I could carry for the next 27 miles.

These next, long, miles consisted of getting low to the wind, doing what I could on the ascents and pushing as hard as I could on the flats and descents. One part of me was half expecting a huge pack from our field to come and overtake me, the nagging thought  of this helped keep me from converting the race into a sight-seeing ride.

Soon, however, I also had to deal with some serious lower back pain. Not like any I’ve had before, it was really low and overlapped the top of my hips. Strangely, it would come and go with no correlation to the effort I was putting out.

Meanwhile, I passed a couple of guys that either Jeremy’s and/or Scott’s group had dropped. I thought they’d cling to my increasingly feeble wheel, but they didn’t even try. A couple of those dirt road descents in this last third of the race were pretty hairy, with loose dirt and crushed rock dust about 2 inches thick on top. I could see some pretty wavy tracks laid down by earlier passers-by but kept an even keel as I went along. I passed one guy getting medical attention in that stretch.

MRC Team mate Matt Pierson climbing Meeting House Road. Photo Courtesy Beth Trickett

The ups and downs of Meeting House Road were torture, the pain enhanced for a moment when 5 guys went blasting by me on one of the rises: “Here comes the rest of the pack!”, I thought. It took me a moment to notice they had different colored numbers on and were the leaders of a field that started after ours. Phew.

Onto Stage Road and, like on most of the last climbs, there was no spark left in my legs so I shifted all the way to 39/27 and ground my way up. I was keenly aware of all the people set up on their front yards or end of the driveways, cheering, ringing bells and enjoying the passing parade of pain. It definitely gave me a lift when I really needed it.

I was in heaven when one lone lady leaning on her mailbox shouted to me: “One more climb and then five miles to go!”

The last miles had me, forearms my bar tops, in tri-mode, pedaling towards the end. Somehow, after all previous agony, I managed a 20 mph avg for the final 4 miles. That last turn into the finish straight was a real treat with people hanging over the barriers, cheering as I crossed the line with no one else in sight. My assumption was that I finished barely in the top 20 and was going to confirm that later on BikeReg, I felt good all right about it but was not exactly jazzed.

Afterwards, I greedily grabbed a bottle of water that was handed to me and downed right away. I wandered with my bike along the vendor area until I came upon Len near the start-finish line and gave him the short version of my race. Then he gave me directions back to the high school which left me dreading getting back on my bike for the  short ride back.

I bounced back a bit after I changed/ate/drank and returned to the podium area with Jeremy, Scott, Todd, Matt and connected with Carl “Old Salt” Shimer and Gary “Wasabe Chin” Sclar.

Finally, I wandered over to the posted results, looked up my field and found to my surprise that I had finished 12th.

Cool!

CRW Fall Century

Distance: 109.8 miles

Time: 6:58:57

Avg. speed: 15.73 mph

Weather: 37-71º, humidity 93-38%, calm-SW1

Song stuck in head: Old Style - Orbital

September mileage total: 377 miles

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Been a busy week and had no time or inclination to make posts about the last two modest workout rides of 30 and 18 miles before today.

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Roughly the one-year anniversary of my first century, last year's CRW Fall Century, I was looking forward to besting my performance from last year where I spent the last 25 miles wishing it was over. I felt like I had the right amount of training and rest under my belt and the bike was tuned up nicely. One chink in the armor was that I didn't get a very good night's sleep last night.

It was VERY cold this morning as I rode up to Acton-Boxboro High School to meet some other folks and start the ride. I decided against any leggings as I knew I'd want to take them off not long after the start and did not want to have to figure out a way to carry them. I did have on a medium weight base layer, arm warmers and some thin booties that are great at blocking the wind.

At the high school, while waiting-and shivering, the other participants and I were treated with the appearance of not one, but two hot-air balloons taking off nearby and then flying overhead.

Soon after, Chad, Pattie, Chris P and Lisa L showed up and we got going. The cold penetrated my fingers and legs but was worst on my cheeks. But it wasn't long before I forgot about it and paid more attention to spinning along with the group.

I confirmed with Pattie that she was expecting to ride at an endurance pace today: she is riding in the Kona Ironman in a few weeks and this was her last century before the taper. Good, I should be able to keep up with her then. This was to be Chad's first century and I knew Lisa was apprehensive about keeping up. So, I didn't think I would set any records for a 100 mile ride but thought I would be going at a respectable pace.

Just like last year, an ambiguous road marking led us and many others (20+) the wrong way for a couple of miles. Lisa realized the error, got us turned around and going the right way again.

At about mile 20 or so, I made sure Chad knew I would stick with him if he started to flag. But then I noticed that Lisa was nowhere in sight, so I doubled back to find her struggling up a climb a short ways back.

I kept her company and thought we could reel in the others if she could stay on my wheel but by mile 35 she was starting to cramp or have spasms in her quads. After a little discussion about what she could do about it (drink more water, take some donated electrolytes, etc.) she decided to press on to the first rest stop at 52 miles.

She did pretty well on the flats and of course, could coast down the descents but it was very slow going on the hills, both of us in our easiest gearing and plodding up at a very low cadence (50-60 rpm, sometimes less). And the biggest climb awaited us after the rest stop.

Lisa's cramping got so bad, on one hill, she got off her bike and walked it up.

About 10 miles from the rest stop, I was descending pretty quickly behind and to the right of another cyclist when the two of us came up fast behind a third rider, who was poking along in the middle of the road, where it started to curve to the left. It was the bottom of a pretty steep hill and it doesn't make sense that anyone could be going all wobbly slow like that after descending such a big hill. I mean, he was going like 10 mph in the middle of the road.

It all came off pretty fast but the descending rider in front of me started to pass the slowpoke on the left (he may have even called "on your left") and as he did, I prepared to pass same slowpoke on the right. I should have called "on your right".

Well, wouldn't you know, ol' slowpoke suddenly realizes a bunch of cyclists are bombing down this hill and he's in the frigging way out there in the middle of the road so he decides to swerve to the right just as I am coming by, driving me to the sand-covered shoulder of the road which is rapidly curving to my left. Ahead of me, beyond the shoulder, is a torn up section of rocks and dirt. All at once, I put on the brakes, yell, "JEBUS!" and end up on my left side, sliding along in the sand.

Slowpoke keeps pedaling along, saying, "sorry" as he put-putted on down the road. He didn't even stop to see if I was ok. Douche.

I turned out to be fine. A few other riders asked how I was, which was appreciated. Lisa rode up and I checked out myself and my bike. Damage: 10 day old bar tape scuffed almost down to the handlebar, left pedal ground down on the outside, left calf suffered some road rash. I'm pretty lucky that's all it was.

I didn't see Mr. Road Hazard later when we arrived at the rest stop. It was a few minutes after noon. Lisa decided that she would keep on going and reassess when we got to the 75 mile rest stop. First thing I did was peel off the arm warmers and base layer: it was pretty warm out by that point. I loaded up on PBJ's and Fig Newtons, replenished my drink and made sure Lisa was well fueled before we started up again.

Of course now we had to face "big climb" for this ride. I told Lisa to take her time and I would ride up to the top, turn around, ride back down to where she was and ride up again with her. She actually made the climb without stopping or walking. Progress. As for me, this particular hill is not as tough as Mile Hill Road on the way to Wawa.

We continued along, Lisa seeming to freshen up a bit on the flats but still having no horsepower for the hills. I'm sure the pain came on the instant she started up any incline. I continued to ride up the hills at my pace and either wait for her at the top or double back to meet her and go up again. Even though I wasn't going at the pace I would have preferred, I was getting extra climbing miles under my belt.

We arrived at the second rest stop just before 2 pm fueled/watered up and left. ETA to finish at this point, in my mind, was 4pm.

Lisa really seemed to be doing better, it certainly helped her to know that there wasn't any more substantial climbing to do. On the flats, she was comfortable keeping a 20 mph pace and she even took the lead for long periods of time. Still, any incline over a few dozen yards long slowed her to a crawl.

When we got to Westford, I started thinking about the things I had to do after the ride: a good sign that I was ready for it to be over.

Finally, we found ourselves back in Acton, rolling down Concord Road. The course goes across Rte. 27 and zig-zags it's way back to the high school but I steered us ON to 27 to shortcut us back a little sooner. We arrived back at 3:40 pm.

By the time I got home, I had been about a minute shy of 7 hours on the bike.