Nutmeg Crit - Cat4 and Cat4/5

[swawersik]

I always like this course for some reason. It's not particularly technical, so favors power riders. But it has some small elevation gain per lap to make stuff interesting, and because the course is not terribly selective, it's a good place to practice your crit positioning.

I was expecting to need a snorkel for the 9AM start, but the sun was shining in Hartford, and the only evidence of last night's deluge was some puddles.

The racing was a little nondescript. A few people attacked, and I resisted the urge to chase them down, letting others do that. At times we slowed to parade speed, but we must've been going pretty hard when it was on, as my NP for the race was a respectable 268. I tried to stay near the front all day, but got swamped when things slowed up on the second to last lap. So I was further back than I should have been when the last lap surge came. I managed to fight back into marginally OK position, but was sprinting from the back in the end, and was not helped by having to grab a fistful of brake to avoid the guy who'd done all the leadout work on the last lap (that's my fault, not his - he was riding a steady line). In the end I finished 9th.

Many of the stronger cat4's were back immediately for the cat4/5 race. Since so many guys had already raced, some of the fresher riders would roll off the front to a shrug from the pack, then die on their own and come back. So I let myself slide back into that mid-pack pocket where moving up isn't that hard, but you're not doing much work. You're also not as aware of what's going on up front, so I missed the day's real break. I tried to bridge briefly, but only made it to the struggling late bridgers. I then tried to rally some sort of chase, but got no response. When the break of three had 30 seconds, under 10 laps to go, and somebody responded to my efforts to spark a chase by saying "we've got plenty of time," I mentally switched to field sprint mode. The sprint wasn't great for me - the laps leading up weren't that hard, which favors the punchy sprinters (instead of my long sprint) and forces constant shuffling. And it's kinda sketchy with all that reshuffling and a bunch of Cat5 riders. Entered the sprint a few wheels further back than I'd have liked, and fought through a calf cramp to finish 11th overall, 9th in the field sprint.

A good day of training, but I should've done better.

[Jacob]

Those are good results.