Finger Lakes, NY add to the race list

[Len_E]

The past few years I've ridden the Owasco Flyer; a tough but short 'citizen' race around one of the smaller Finger Lakes. It usually attracts a bunch of solid racers; a number of cat 1s and 2s, and can be a very tough and tiring race. I've done pretty well, finishing top 10 the past 3 years with a top 5 last year. This year, my son Liam was convinced it was time to try it and was going to ride with a friend of mine. That fell through at the last minute so I decided to ride with him since it was a much tougher course than he's ever done. Since I wasn't racing for the podium I decided to drive out to Watkins Glen International Motor Speedway for a circuit race that many of the guys up here do between the Giro d'Otisco (another Finger Lakes race that occurred last weekend) and Owasco. So after the 5 hour drive to Owasco on Saturday and dropping my family off at the cottage I drove another hour to Watkins Glen and got there 30 minutes before the race. No warm-up, barely time to register and fix-up my bike, I jumped into the 40+ race with about 30 or so gents. It was 11 laps on the 3.3 mile stock car race course.
Great course with bumps, some might call them climbs, fast descents on bank turns, twists and turns and a long straightaway into the stadium that was packed with at least 40 friends and family. Just a fantastic experience to race on something like this.
The racing itself was something of a breakthrough for me. With 7 laps to go I joined the only guy I recognized in the group to be a serious racer and two other guys and we left the pack behind. Being relatively pessimistic about these things, I resigned to get caught but did a fair amount of pulling along with the guy I joined. The other two seemed pretty spent after every uphill although they seemed to easily rejoin us on the flat and descents. With 2 laps to go we got neutralized twice by the Pro 1-2 race and as we came to the end of the second to last lap someone from our pack inexplicably joins us - he just effin shows up in our 4-person group which had been away and alone for an hour. We all look back to see the pack about 100 meters behind us. The guy that joined us was the teammate of the guy I knew and a massive fellow. He yelled for his teammate to jump on and he pulled us away from the chasing pack and by the middle of the last lap we were comfortably in front preparing for a sprint finish. I sized up the situation and realized that the guy I knew had two teammates, one without a kit, and figured a sprint was not in the cards. I had Id'd a short, steep hill climb about 1/2 mile from the line which I cleared pretty well the previous laps and figured that was the do or die moment for me. As we approached the hill, I moved to the back of the 5 person line and at the base of the hill sprinted for all I was worth. I hit the top and threw it down with a 30 pedal sprint that I would have saved for the end. I looked back and had at least 20 meters and expanding. The lead guy had his head down but they were still in a line. I rounded the last corner and headed into the stadium straightaway and with about 25 meters to the line I hear what sounds like a train coming up behind me. Boom, it's over. My three companions disappear toward the line and I cannot lift a finger. My sprint up the hill dropped the guy who bridged but the others had enough left. I finished 4th and in the money but missed the podium to my great dissatisfaction.
The Owasco Flyer was, thankfully, more subdued. Liam had never ridden this far in a race before and with a serious amount of climbing. He did better than I thought and stuck with it to the end and managed to sprint passed a number of people on the last four bumps to the finish. I placed 4th out of 19 in the U-19 category and was the only kid under 16 in the top 5. After riding through someone's puke at the top of a climb he said he never wants to do this again. I hope he feels different in the morning.
I'd love to get a few of us up here for a two-day, two race weekend and see if we can make some noise. The Watkins Glen race is something you have to do at least once.

[JeremyC]

Good times, you can't win without trying.

[Bruce]

Len,
Smart move. That was you're best bet. Sounds like you had a reason to contest, but wtf it wasn't the tdf. Great report.