NY Capital Region Road Race | 7/11/2015

[Bradford]

A strong showing from MRC at this one, with riders in the 5, 4, 3/4, and Masters fields.

I will take you through the Men's 3/4

(Very) hot and sunny for our start, with 69 guys rolling out. MRC had four in the field, with John, PJ, Patrick, and myself.

3 mile neutral start was enough to get comfortable on the bike, taking us up towards the finish (200 ft of climbing), and then we were off for 60 more miles and 5,000 feet of climbing (3 laps).

This was a tough race - very front loaded with several key selections, steep, grinding climbs. First up was a 2 mile, stair stepping climb, several sections at 10% grade. About a mile and a half later, was a wall of a climb featuring a 16% grade after a sharp 180 degree turn up hill. It's not long, but turns to a false flat before another .04 miles of steep climbing. If you could survive the first 8 miles or so, you could roll for the back half of the lap through rollers and windy flats.

I spent most of the day in the first 10 wheels, making sure to move to the front before all of the climbs to allow me to slide back to 20th or so by the top of the hill, before rolling back up to the front. Lap 1 featured a number of attacks from a Quebec Jr team who seemed to have 8-10 guys in the race - so lots of matches to burn. They were brought back each time.

Lap 2 featured a feed zone, with neutral water. This was important because it was so hot. I opted for two large bottles (fully consumed by the end), but was happy to catch a neutral water on my way by. This was sketchy - people really wanted bottles - and they were swerving and braking to get them.

MRC made all of the selections up to lap 3. There was obviously significant attrition throughout the race - John was riding very strong with us for the first two laps but ended up getting separated on one of the steep climbs on the last lap.

Lap 3 featured several more attacks that didn't stick - many of them were across a long stretch of flat road right into a headwind - but John Eckert eventually made one stick, soloing to the finish for half a lap or so, finishing a minute and half before the rest of us.

Coming into the last two miles, we had three MRC riders setting up for the finish. The field was now down to about 20 riders. Patrick had joined me near the front and we discussed that I would lay it out coming into the uphill finish. It wasn't a steep climb, but as John pointed out, enough of a grade to separate those struggling to hang on. With about 500 meters to go, I drilled it with Patrick in tow - we had a bit of a gap to the guys in front of us and were unable to close, but everything blew up at the end, and we flew past a few people in the process. We finished together 6th and 7th. PJ was just behind finishing 10th, giving us three MRC inside the top 10.

This race required significant exertion to make the selection each lap - everyone gave a tremendous effort today in a very challenging race.

Sounded like we had some interesting races from others too. More race reports to come.

[Smudger]

Great results guys. Sounds like hell to me.

PJ what's with the 10th place finish. Don't they know you should be 9th!

[djming]

Sounded like we had some interesting races from others too. More race reports to come.

"Interesting" would be one way to describe mine.
Cat 4's - Kevin T and I lined up for this one. John R's comments about if you have the legs, trying to get away on the 2nd part of Whitbeck road could work came true on lap 1. Unfortunately, I wasn't positioned properly to see it after the climb and into the long straight section we could see 2 off the front. Despite at least two, and maybe 3 teams having numbers, nobody wanted to chase. Okay, lets see what happens on lap 2. Rode within myself up Tracy Rd, being near enough the front. Into Whitbeck and after the initial shock of the 16%+ grades got into a good groove and after the dip and into 2nd part of the climb was right at the front of what seemed like a 2nd break of ~10. Once again, nobody wanted to work. Sure enough, pace continues to dawdle and group swells by probably double that anyway. Feeling good, bit over 4 miles to go and KT and I start talking about how to approach the final 1-2K. Suddenly someone yells "car up". I'm close to right side so no big deal I think. WRONG! The guy right on my left, for whatever reason (there was nobody swerving over towards us), turns right into me. I yell and try to hold my line but instead of pulling up he actually puts out the forearm and I get pushed right off the road. This at good speed. Hit the soft dirt into gravel and just bracing to go down. Manage to get unclipped as I'm now staring at a ditch. Catch a glance of a tree and limb to my left and I reach out with the left arm to grab the tree to stop my progress (and old skiing in the trees trick I've learned). Right hand still with firm grasp on the handlebars and I just kind of stop with the front wheel on the precipice. Shaken and quite PO'd but no injury and (more importantly!) no damage to bike after I cleared a couple twigs from the gears. Into TT mode and just tried to hammer as best I could the final 4 miles to the finish. Oh well. Didn't even think to check the results.

[jraguin]

Quick post: I echo everything that Brad said. Super hard race and hot. My kit was covered white with salt by the end. Probably not a good sign. I went through 4 bottles and felt like I could have drank more. The start of my undoing was getting a bottle in the feed zone at the beginning of the last lap. The weaving to get the bottle and securing it (I pulled a rookie move not throwing out my bottles BEFORE I grabbed the 3rd bottle) left me on the tail end of the group when guys decided to attack on the feed. I was holding on for dear life in a section that I was hoping to recover before hitting the steep hills again. Stayed on through some of the hills, but came slowly unglued on one of the steep uphill sections andI couldn't get back on. Rode in with two other guys at a relatively easy pace as we were all cooked. I finished 28th of 70. Note that there were 22 DNFs, which says how hard the race was. Incredible job by PJ, Patrick, and Brad. All three were super solid against a field which had a bunch of sandbaggers.

[PJ McQuade]

Brad nailed it in his report. I compared my data from last year's edition of this race and this one was a lot faster and harder (same Cat.). All three of my laps in 2015 were faster than 2014 and I PR'd all of the climbs. It was truly a race of attrition. The guy who solo'd is clearly not a true Cat 3. Super strong showing from our squad. Hilltowns and Tokeneke guys!

[pcollins]

This race was a hard, hilly and hot 100km. Before the start I drank as much as my stomach could hold and took two bottles with me. I paced/pack slid the climbs and hydrated perfectly, I even had some water to share with PJ. I was expecting a breakaway of a handful of the favorites but it never happened. Instead, one guy soloed off the greatly reduced peloton with a half lap to go. I took a pull or two to chase but the gap was growing so we all started conserving for the finishing climb. I was on Brad's wheel for most of the last 5 km near the front. Once we hit Jarvis road everybody drilled it. With Brad leading the way up the climb, we weaved our way past riders who blew up. 500m to go my quads start cramping, not too bad though. 100m to go I yelled "Go Brad!" as I knew I probably wouldn't be able to pass him. I finished right behind him for 7th. It was a great race with awesome teamwork and great results, especially by Brad!

[Smudger]

These reports have been good but I want to here from Tyler?????

[t_riegel]

Right here!!

I was our sole representative in the 5's, and with not a lot of familiar faces in the bunch I wasn't sure what to expect. I was really hoping to get in a break, which I had yet to do in a race, and use the early, tough climbs as an opportunity to do this. I was sizing up the group as best I could in neutral section and in the first mile, and I realized there were definitely some guys I would have to watch out for. I was 7th or 8th wheel, doing my best to sit in and watch the front as we hit the stair steppers. A gap formed between the 4th and 5th wheel, so I jumped around and got up to the small group in the front. It didn't take long for gap to grow, and as we reached the end of the stair steps we had a good 20-30sec. Realizing we had something that could stick we organized into a paceline and rotated through doing short 20 second pulls on the flat/downhill leading into 'the wall'. Despite the fact that multiple people suggested shifting into the small ring before hitting the sharp U turn into the climb, I waited too long. I struggled and cursed as we started the painful 16% whilst being stuck in the big ring. About 50m up I dropped my chain, I had no choice but to roll back down the hill to get the chain back on and back in the saddle. The break disappeared around the corner. As I jumped back on, the chase, consisting of 5 riders arrived and I hopped back on just in time to join them. I immediately rode away from them on the climb, desperately hoping to get back in the break, but just couldn't bridge the gap. So I joined the ranks of the chase. We worked fairly well and rolled through the back section. The difficulty was the 2 juniors in the group who refused to pull...damn kids. This disrupted the smooth flow of the paceline, which was frustrating. As we were finishing the first lap and the elevation began to ramp back up, the pace slowed immensely. I was still unsure how far the break was, so as we hit the 1k to go I rode off the front of the group. I heard someone in the group yell 'don't let him get away'. I got a 30 second gap on them and rode solo up the stair steps and the wall (no chain dropping this time). As others mentioned, the back section was flat and windy, so I knew there was a fair chance they would catch me and unfortunately the break was nowhere to be seen. I kept tabs on the chase group and realized they were definitely going to reel me back, so I let them catch me and jumped back on the dysfunctional train. Apparently their only objective was to catch me because once I was absorbed the pace dropped...sigh...The rest of the back section was uneventful, except for the bee that decided to sting me on the lip at about 5k to go. I knew the last 1.5km was uphill and I had dropped these guys on the previous lap. I wound up on the front of the group (due to both juniors pulling off on the same turn in the paceline) just as we hit that 1.5ish to go mark. Not an ideal place to attack from, but I didn't have options. I waited and drug those wheel suckers until we hit the 750m to go and I launched off the front thinking I was sprinting for 5th, just trying to make the best of what wasn't greatest situation. Apparently I got a 6 second gap and rolled across alone. I figured the whole break had stuck together, which would make me 5th. It wasn't until we rolled back to where the results were posted that I learned I had actually gotten second. Apparently the juniors were bunched in with us, but were counted separately. Three of the riders in the break were apparently juniors. So we'll call it a second with an asterisk, more of a 5th in my book. Super fun race, definitely will be back next year!

[Bradford]

Tyler- that's called perseverance - well done and a great result!

[pcollins]

Impressive Tyler! Sounds like very eventful and interesting racing. You never gave up despite adversity and ended up with a great result!

[scottc]

Nice work out there guys. Tyler needs to upgrade.