Lake Sunapee RR 5/22

[jraguin]

Starting the story here. Cat 5 35+.

In summary, there was a crash in the Cat 4s at the rotary (Rob can give more detail and thankfully he was ahead of the crash). That caused a complete shutdown of the fields after them, including us, the Pro/Cat 1/Cat 2 men, as well as the Pro/Cat 1/Cat 2 women.

We were a mile from the finish. I think all of the MRC guys were in the pack of 20-25 guys left for the race to the finish. Doug, Scott, and I were all in the top 6 or 8 guys and looking for a high finish. The race was neutralized from the crash, if you can call it neutralized, as we were told immediately to stop completely. We stood there for about 1 hour before they told us we could soft-pedal it to the finish, or they might have a 1 mile sprint to the finish. The organizer seemed unclear, even after 1 hour, on what they were going to do. We (at least Carl, Doug, Scott, and I) decided to bag it and just soft pedal to the finish. Not sure if Todd or Doran stuck around to do the 1 mile sprint or even if they had the sprint. I should say that Doug and Scott looked great the whole race and I think they would have both had solid finishes, definite top-10, maybe top-5.

The only other note on me is that I dropped a chain about 20 miles into in the race. I then spent 8 miles virtually solo catching back up to the field and pulled it off. At first I was spent and thought I would just be a domestique, but by the build-up to the finish, I felt good again and thought I could have put in a solid sprint and certainly stayed in the top 10 if not higher.

Hope the guy/guys who crashed in Cat 4 are OK. It didn't sound good.

John R

[RFollansbee]

Had a good race overall, came in 9th. Kind of blew up on the final approach but after what happened I was not going to complain. Approaching the rotary I was in the top 5. The guy next to me just goes down right as we approach the rotary doing about 35-40. All I heard was bikes crashing everywhere behind me. At the finish the rumor was about 30 guys got taken out. We saw a bunch of people come up w/ bad road rash and that doesn't include the ones who were on the ground for upwards of an hour. At least 3 ambulances were at the scene and came and went. This is the 3rd race this Spring where someone literally within 5-10 feet of me has gone down approaching the finish for no apparent reason. Call me Damien I guess...666.

[onegeardoug]

I felt great the whole day and was totally disappointed at the stoppage. I was sitting 4th wheel headed down toward the rotary, thanks in part to John who said "get on that guys wheel!" and let me move over in front of him on the last roller. I was in perfect position, as were several of us, for the grand finale, and I was totally looking for a good result. I had good legs and had been salivating about the uphill sprint finish for the entire second lap. Then we got stopped. And stood there. For a long time. Doing nothing. Except thinking about what could have been...

From a team perspective, I have to say that I was really impressed. A few miles after John lost his chain, Scott asked me if I thought he should go pace him up to the group. I didn't feel it appropriate for me to offer any advise on the matter, as I didn't know the situation on road, but I was totally impressed with the "thought". All I could say was "he might not even be back there." I had no idea. Sorry John. After John got back on, he came up to me and said that he had chased for 8 miles and was spent, but would try to get a good result for me. Again, really impressed at the selflessness.

As for me, I decided early on to sit in front in the top 5-8 riders for the whole race. I did enough work to not be a total D.B. but was basically looking out for numero uno. Not impressive from a team perspective. Seemed like the right thing to do, though.

Hope the guys from the 4's are ok. Hope that I at least get credit for a Cat 5 mass start....

[Smudger]

Great result Rob seems like you were in exactly the right position very glad to hear you missed the crash.

What a bummer for all the 5s. Also sounds like you had the race in hand which makes it even more frustrating.

PJ, Steve,

How'd the 3s go? Did you avoid the stoppage and finish your race?

[pace21]

My race was pretty worthless. Suffered for 1 lap, then got a flat approaching the rotary for the start of the second lap. Since I didn't have a spare wheel and I was a short walk from the finish, I decided to end my day right there. The unfortunate thing -- the 45+ came through about 30 seconds afterward, and Rob says they neutralized the 4's right after the rotary. If I had a wheel I could have easily caught back on. It's probably better anyway as it is highly likely I would have been near (and likely behind) Rob approaching the finish, and you heard about the carnage. Maybe a lucky flat tire?

Here's a link to the story about the crash. Unfortunately the good things about the bike race are a footnote in this article from the local paper....

http://www.unionleader.com/article.aspx ... 94a5212226

--- Chris

[RFollansbee]

Nice article Chris. Here was one of the comments attached to it:

"I was in this race and it was one of the worst crashes I have ever seen including TV events. I also use to race motorcycles at Formerly NHIS and this by far scared me more. There were more around the 20-25# of riders that crashed. It was a domino effect the lasted about a foot ball field in length. We were traveling more around 40MPH. I had a bicycle just nearly miss my head as I was trying to avoid a rider that was crashing At one point of the race we hit 52MPH down a hill prior to this hill."

Also, per PJ, Stephen Wright was 3rd and PJ top 15 in the 3's. Hopefully they'll have more details. Nice results on that course. Luckily the 3's were ahead of us.

And Chris was being modest - he was having a better race than I was until he flatted. He was using a lot less energy by being near the front the entire first lap.

[Steve Wright]

Glad to hear that everyone was able to avoid that crash and get to th finish safely. Bummer that they had to neutralize the finish as it sounds like you would have had great results. Rob, Congrats on your finish! We'll see you in the 3s soon!

As for the 3s... Going into the race I was pretty sure a break was going to get away. I figured Josh Lehman, Synjen Marroco, and any one of the svelte guys would be in it so I stayed towards the front during the first lap. As I expected those and svelte launched attack after attack after attack and I did everything I could to get in them after the first lap I realized nothing was going to get away and decided to save a bit for the finish. Still stupidly went with some attacks by those guys out of fear that they would stay away but nothing materialized. About a mile before the rotary I found myself at the back of the field boxed in. I was looking for that one wheel that had space infront of it and could pull me to the front. Luckly PJ was that guy and brought me up nicely towards the front. On the last little climb right before the rotary there was a little attack which allowed me to moveup a bit more a the field thinned out. I was about 8th wheel going into the rotary.

As we hit the rotary the pace was actually very managable and I slowly was moving up. But I wanted to avoid what I did last year when I attacked to early, pulled 3 or 4 guys with me, and have them all pass me with 50 yards to go. So I settled in to 3rd wheel and just waited for someone to go so I could follow their wheel. I don't know what happened or why by nobody seemed to jump, I looked back just before that last final rise and realized it wasn't happening. I tried to open up but had no time to get going before the finish. So I crossed the line in 3rd which I am very happy with. Since it was my first real cat 3 race I had no idea what to expect. I'm a little bummed I wasn't able to open up into a full sprint but I probably would have been 3rd either way. Definitely a fun race and am really happy with the result. I'm kind of bummed Tri season starts soon so my road races will be limited for the rest of the summer but hopefully I can race in a few more.

Has PJ not pulled the entire field up the first big climb of the day, who knows how well he could have done! Congrats to all who raced.

[PJ McQuade]

Awesome result by Steve, who's tactics are always impressive, esp. on this course. I remember last year he had a sweet position on the final stretch of road as well and had the power to maintain. You need both of those elements on this course. For me it's a tricky final K and I can't quite get this one right though. I waited too long to move up and burned a bunch of matches on the last couple of climbs before the descent going into the rotary. I was maybe back 20 or so on the rotary which is too much ground to cover. I was blowing up on the first riser but hung on to the rear of the front group (w/ Steve and co.) - a tiny gap opened here at the "flat" tweener section. I had next to nothing for the final kick, but clearly wasn't alone and managed to pass a few guys to the line. Maybe a top 20. Considering my legs didn't feel fresh I'm not disappointed. Pulling the field up one of the early climbs probably didn't help either. I did this to more or less gauge the legs. It would have been a great time to attack, only - I couldn't Totally blew me up for the next 10 mins. I went from front to back in a hurry to recover. Fun race, great weather (no rain, wow!) and nice to see Steve do well. Stinks what happened to the rest of the 4s and 5s, not to mention the p/1/2 field. Sounds like we may have had a few more guys on the podium. You'll get another shot at Purgatory in a month.

[jraguin]

I was interested in hearing if the guys in the crash were OK, and I found this post on Upper Valley Velo. Sounds like the main guy who was lying immobile for a while on the ground and got taken off in a back board is relatively OK. 5 broken ribs, but other than that OK.

If you want the info, the post also gives more insight to the crash from one of the guys who was in it.
http://groups.google.com/group/upper-va ... 74e4a1c326

John R

[scott_sweeney]

Great race...I think we would have had at least 3 of us in the top 10. Doug was looking great, John recovered beautifully after his 8 mile ITT (sorry man, I totally should have dropped back to help you), and I was feeling strong as well. Todd was right there too (not sure at the time of neutralization where Doran and Carl were?). When we were stopped I think we were sitting 4th, 5th, and 7th wheel. Could have been a solid MRC showing all around considering Rob, Steve, and PJ's performances.

Better luck next year!

[Doran Abel]

For the rest of us in the Cat 5 (35+) race - both Carl and I dropped off the lead pack of 20-25 on the long climb on Rt. 11 and the following mile or two. I was almost hanging on thru Georges Mill for awhile and then saw the pack slowly creap away up the little bump before the Rt. 11/Rt. 103A intersection. I just had to scale back and ride my own pace or blow up. I was picking off a few stragglers on the series of climbs/rollers on Rt. 103A when Carl powered down a downhill and caught me. I stayed on his wheel into Newbury (sorry Carl - that is all I could do at that point) along with a Cambridge Bikeworks rider and then the three of us made the turn back on Rt. 11 for the final rollers (taking turns on the front to relieve Carl - a bit) before the crach happened and stopped everything. I think we were about 2 - 3 minutes back - my guess.

Great chase-back by John R wish I could have helped but didn't have the legs. I had trained for about the mid to high 30's in mileage (but not 45) and that's about exactly where I fell off the pace. Good riding by Doug, John R, Scott, and Taud. Long training ride for me.

[taudep]

Somehow all our names aren't listed as the results. I emailed the promoter explaining that we'd like to have our names on there because of the required upgrade situation. Would suck to not have that count as one of our 10 required.

[onegeardoug]

@Todd: Totally lame. Drive all the way there, do the whole race and not get listed due to fiasco finish. Lame-0.

[scott_sweeney]

Oh gawd....that dude Kevin from Gearworks was behind us! Todd thanks for reaching out to the promoter....I wonder if they had them finish after sitting for 2 hours???????

[Doran Abel]

Can't figure out why I got listed as a finisher and the rest of you didn't. All I know is when (what I thought was) the Cat 5 (35+) group left to go thru the rotary and up the hill - no one raced, under neutral - I didn't see the rest of the MRC group. Nor did I see you in the parking lot. Did you guys leave earlier to go thru the rotary and up the hill? Maybe that was what happened? As we finished under neutral, I think people were still checking numbers.

[jraguin]

The rest of us (Doug, Carl, Scott, Todd, and I) all left because it was unclear what they were going to do and they let us soft-pedal to the parking lot. So we were not in the neutral group that went across the finish line. Now that you explained you finished neutral, that explains why the Landry's guy "won" it, as he was 1st wheel when we got stopped.

I also wrote something to the promoter/organizer pointing out the issue. He said he is going to get back to us.

John R