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Reports by:
Pictures from this event.
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What Richard saw:
Category: 4/5+
Result: Back of pack
I rode the Cat. 4/5+ Early Bird on Sunday despite having a cold - Brad and
Iwan were also in the race. I lined up beside Nate Shaw (Shaw's/Garden
City, fellow trackie) on the start and at the off, I managed to get my foot
into the pedal straight away. A few stomps on the pedal later, I look over
my shoulder and I have a huge gap. What the hell I thought, lets see if I
can get a break formed. Three riders came across to me and I tried to get
them to work together, but we weren't very smooth so I wasn't surprised
when we were caught after a lap and a half. It turned out that that was the
most successful breakaway of the day.
I basically sat in after that, and was amazed how much easier it was in the
bunch. There were a couple of really fast laps in the middle of the race
where we probably averaged above 27 mph for the laps. I felt these laps in
my legs. At the end, though I was in a good position with 1.5 laps to go, I
got washed away and made a half-hearted attempt to get back up there. I was
really just content to roll in near the back having stayed upright for the
duration, which was the plan going into my first race of the season. Iwan
finished near the front - I saw him sprinting, but he said afterwards that
he wasn't contesting the win.
Equiped with my camera, I stayed and watched Scott and Gaelan race in their
new Cat. 5 race and got lots of shots of them in the race - digital cameras
are great: 2x 128MB smart media cards gives me roughly 260 pictures! I got
a few good ones which will make their way onto the webpages.
The cold is worse today as a result of yesterday's efforts.
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What Tim saw:
Category: 1/2/3
Result: Puncture
For me it was an EZ, restful race (average heart rate was 147!). I honestly
wasn't sure if I was going to do it as I had done 190 miles (including 3
crits and a medium effort time trial) in the previous seven days and I was
pretty tired. I don't think Fuentes or Larry were there and there was no
sidewind, so it really wasn't bad at all. I hung more in the middle this
time for about the first hour or so. Then I moved up and played in the top
10 or so and felt real good. I had my strategy all worked out and then
everyone else woke up and I got caught up in traffic and it became a
free-for-all. So I backed off, good thing, my front tire was going flat.
That course just doesn't like sew-ups. Fortunately they are $20 each as
opposed to the $50 ones I used to wreck there. Typically I will not get
another flat in the entire year in actual races. Oh well... Also, Bob did
real good in the pack sprint. How did the rest of everybody do? I saw Brad,
Iwan, Scott and Pritpaul there.
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What Iwan saw:
Category: 4/5+
Result: Mid-pack
The 4/5 race had a large turnout. 87 riders according to VeloPromo. For the
race, I stayed near the tail end for the first 3/4ths of the race trying a
"peloton surfing" technique to save energy. This technique involves
maintaining a steady speed through the corners and then not jumping as hard
as everyone else to maintain position but rather drifting back with the
assumption that field will bunch up before the next corner at which point
lost position can be easily re-gained. Rinse and repeat. Seemed to work, but
I'm not sure if I saved that much energy.
For the last quarter of the race, I decided to slowly move up front through
the middle, trying not to hit the wind. It took me about 3 laps to find my
way up there. By the time I got near the front, there were only four laps to
go. I was able to maintain position on the closing laps and on the last lap
I was in the top fifteen or so and thought I had a good chance of finishing
well. Alas, it was not meant to be. The sprint was very late and heavily
contested. The leading group was engulfed by an amoeba of riders with
tendrils of thrashing sprinters reaching around us. I got up to sprint
through a gap but was blocked and had to hit the brakes to avoid getting
squeezed. By the time I had a clear shot I was too far back with too little
left in my legs so I sat up and cruised in.
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