Eucha Tough Road Race

I wasn't really sure what to expect going into this race. It's the first year to have a race in this location, and I'd heard all kinds of different information about the course. I guess once the race was all said and done, it wasn't too far off from what I imagined. The course was really fun to ride. Not much, if any, of the course was flat and straight. It's always a weird feeling  racing something when you have no idea what's over the next hill or around the next corner.

I knew the course had some big hills, and personally, my plan was to try to get in a move of some sort early so I wouldn't have to deal with possibly getting dropped on one of the hills. In hindsight, it probably would have been smarter to conserve and learn the course on the first lap, and race the second. The race started pretty fast. The first section was pretty crazy. Lots of uphill and downhill twisty road. I almost got popped on the first hill because I was a little winded from just attacking. I was at the front when we hit it, but dangling off the back once we got to the top.

The course was basically a long section of road with about a 4 mile loop on one end and a 10 mile loop on the other. The whole circuit was 34 miles and we did it twice. The first time we went through the dam section, I knew the race was going to be epic.  A 1 mile or so 50mph descent followed by a 1 mile climb. The first time through I thought I was going good. It didn't seem too hard. We dropped a few guys, and a few others seemed to be struggling. I tried to get into a few moves again going into the bigger loop, but nothing was working. Two riders were up the road, but only by a minute or so.

Up until this point I felt pretty good, but when we rode backwards up the big hill out of the dam back to the start/finish to complete our first lap, I got dropped a little.  I got into a 4 man chase group, and it took a few miles, but we made it back on. I started to realize how badly I'd timed my efforts, because I was starting to get that bottom of the matchbook feeling. Really, the point where I decided to get conservative was exactly the point when it could have paid off to make an aggressive move.

Anyway, on the last lap, I made it through the climbs on the first loop section, but as we started the first big climb into the second loop section, the best climbers attacked pretty hard and the field blew up pretty good. I got into a 3 man chase group with Chad Hodges and Jacob White, and we chased pretty hard to catch a 6 or 7 man group that Rob was in, but they eventually got way out of sight, so we more or less just cruised the last few miles in to the finish.

I really liked the race overall, and I hope the Tulsa guys do it again next year. I guess team wise, this was our   worst result of the year so far, but the best work out if you want to look at it that way. This was the first race that was harder from a normalized power standpoint than out hard Saturday group rides. I guess it's time to up the intensity another notch.

There's 2 races coming up this weekend that I'm looking forward to. The first of 3 in the OKC Velo TT series is on Saturday, and the NWA Classic is on Sunday in Arkansas. I should have some new race wheels any day now, and I'm REALLY hoping to have them this weekend.

Keeping the legs happy

My legs have been feeling a little tired lately. I guess I've kind of decided to go a little easy this week. I think this is the first time that's happened all season, but on a side note I've gotten in more miles, training stress, ETC. than ever before. Maybe it's due to the fact that it's been raining all week. It's hard to get motivated to ride when it's wet out. I'm pretty sure I've done enough rain riding/racing this year, and it's only been two race weekends so far.

I did get 1 pretty hard ride in this week. I figured it was time to start getting acclimated to the TT bike, so I went out to Hefner and did the Strava thing. I ended up getting the 2 records, but I bet they go down pretty soon. The Strava app is starting to get out of control. I'm predicting by this summer, it gets really crazy.
If you have an iPhone or a Garmin, there's really no reason not to use it.

Anyway, a few of us are going to a road race tomorrow in NE Oklahoma. As far as I know, it's the first year to have a race at this particular venue. I've heard different reports on how hilly the terrain is, but I guess we'll just have to hit it to find out. Looks like nice weather.

Lake Hefner Strava leaderboard

Race report part 2 - Tall Chief Road Race

 Although this story is about what went down on Sunday, I'm still trying to come to terms with what happened on Saturday. I guess I've pretty much decided after doing a ton of research, talking to people in the know, and doing as many 30 second, 1 minute, and 2 minute intervals as I could stand, that the issue is a dehydration problem. Hopefully it will not be an issue again.

Another top notch packing job. 4 bikes, extra wheels, and 4 dudes.

Anyway, on to Sunday. We chose to drive to and from the races both days. The latest weather forecast I had seen the day before was temps up to the mid 60's and rain all night but tapering off around sunrise. We left OKC about 5:45 AM, which actually felt like 4:45 because this was also the first day of daylight savings.
It rained on us most of the way to Skiatook, but when we got there, it had pretty much stopped and looked like it was going to clear up.

Clothing wise, I decided on shorts-no knee or leg warmers, a light base, wind vest under the jersey, arm warmers, my windstopper cap, and 2 pairs of light to medium temp gloves. I think the first 2/3's of the first lap, I felt fine. Somewhere after that it started raining. Then it started pouring and I'm pretty sure the temperature dropped some as well.

Before I get to all that, there was some race action going on. Around 20-30 minutes into the race, I'm not sure exactly what happened, but I guess some guys crossed wheels in the middle of the field and a bunch of guys went down. I had to slow way down to get through it and I noticed Rob got caught up in it. I thought about stopping to help him back to the group, but I thought it would be smarter to have at least 1 guy in the main group as Jeremy and Brian were behind the wreck as well. It was actually a little harder to bridge up to the main group than I thought it was going to be. There was a group of 4 strong riders and myself rotating for 10-15 minutes before we caught on.

I kept looking back to see if Rob and his group was back there, but I never saw them. There was a pretty good climb around the halfway point of each lap that I was struggling with a little. I got gaped off the main group for a bit, but caught back on without too much effort. I think we lost a few a few guys each time we hit that hill. It was tough because there was a tailwind as soon as you got to the top, so if you were winded, it was tough to recover with minimal draftability.

Somehow a few miles later Rob managed to catch back on with a couple of other guys. He was bleeding pretty good from a nasty cut on his knuckle, and decided to just sit on for a while as he had burned a ton of matches getting back on. I remember last year the big hill climbing up the dam at the start of each lap seemed to break up the field quite a bit, but due to the wind direction, it wasn't much of an issue this year. The hill at the far south end around the 10 mile point seemed to be much more of a field splitting obstacle.

As we got into the 2nd lap of 3, I started to really get cold. I tried to ride harder and get into a couple of moves here and there mainly just to try to get warm. You would start to feel ok at the tops of the climbs, but there were long sections of fast downhills that would freeze you back down. When we were getting close to finishing our 2nd lap, I was seriously starting to think about quitting. I was looking for Rob to see if he was thinking the same thing when I noticed the field had gotten pretty small. Maybe 17 guys or so.

Also ex-team mate and current rival team rider Brady Schmiedeberg rolled off the front and had quietly established quite a time gap. There was pretty much no way I was going to quit at this point, but I must admit, That last lap was one of the most miserable 1 hours I've ever spent on a bike. I can only think of 1 other time that I was that cold. As we were getting close to the hill that was giving me issues, I thought it would be a good idea to try to establish a little time over the field so I wouldn't get dropped, but it didn't really work out like I wanted. Steve Tilford drilled it pretty hard and the group got pretty strung out. I wasn't going too bad, but my fingers were so cold I couldn't shift.

Basically I got dropped and chased the rest of the way. The group caught Brady with 3 miles to go and Rob ended up pulling out a 4th. He thought he could have won it, but his fingers weren't working either. I guess this was a common problem that day. Jacob White rode pretty smart and ended up winning both days.

All in all, a pretty disappointing weekend for me, but I felt pretty good and I think overall the team is going ok, At least a lot better than last year at this time.

Power file from the last 5 minutes of Saturday's race.

This is my power file from Saturday. It makes it more disappointing watching my video of the last 15 minutes of the race because this is a good effort, but less that what I'm capable of.

Water intake tracker.

I'm trying to drink at least 4-20 oz bottles of water daily at work. I take one of these decals off to keep track of where I'm at. It's tough to drink at work because I get so busy I just forget. I've been pretty consistent all week, and I'm not sure if it's a placebo effect or what, but it seems to be making a difference.

Salt Creek crit and Tall Chief road race part 1

Something kind of funny when you pre-register for a USA cycling event is the performance predictor. It's basically a program that predicts how you will finish in a race based on your rankings and the quality of the field. Of the 30 something guys that were registered, I think I was predicted to finish 18th on Saturday and 20th on Sunday.

Anyway, the weekend was definitely a tale of 2 totally different races. At least weather wise. Originally it looked like a chance of rain for the weekend. Then a high chance on Sat., but clear on Sunday. Then it reversed. In the end Saturday couldn't have been nicer. Kinda cool at the start, but getting up to the upper 70's by the finish.

The racing on Saturday went mostly how I thought it would. The Tulsa Tough guys had 8 or 9 guys, so I knew they would try to get a break a way with a bunch of their guys established early. Matt Ankney took off a couple of laps in and stayed away solo most of the race, but I think in general, their team was marked by just about everybody in the race, so in the end it came down to a field sprint.

Rob and I both had our cameras on. Rob's was rear facing and you can see the 1 1/2 hour race from his veiw point Here

My video is in 2 segments. The video quality is kind of trippy. I'm not sure if it was due to my cable smacking up against the camera, or the SD card may be messed up. Anyway, the first 45 minutes of the race from my camera is Here

This is the last 15 minutes from my camera:

It's still pretty hard for me to watch this. I couldn't have been in a more perfect position going into the last 300 meters. I'm not sure what my problem is. I think it may be a combination of dehydration and allergies, but at the 200 meter mark when I should have punched it and sling shot up into a top 3 or 4 spot, but instead I quit pedaling because I had some flem or gel residue or something caught in my throat. I tried to rinse it down the last couple of laps with water and clear my throat/spit, but none of it worked. Meanwhile, I was in an epic battle trying to get a good position to sprint. My legs felt great and I wasn't too winded, junk was clogging up my throat and I just couldn't breathe once we started going really hard.

I've talked to a few people about it. Possibly a sports induced athsma issue? I'm going to try a few things differently as far as eating before a race as well as drinking more water before and during.

So basically, I gave up a pretty for sure top 5 for a 14th place finish.

Sunday was a totally different animal.  I will post that story ASAP

Ready to go racing again

Well, the second race weekend of the season, with many more to follow, goes off tomorrow. The annual Salt creek crit is on Sat and the Tall Chief road race is on Sunday. We've got a full squad of cat 2's going so I'm pretty stoked about that.
The only downfall I can think of is that there is a good chance of rain both days. I kind of like actually racing in the rain, but it seems really hard on the drive train department. You tend to pick up all kinds of noises on your bike after it dries out after a good rain ride.

Everybody on the team seems to be going pretty good right now. I'm not going to go into too much detail, but our weekly training rides have progressively gotten pretty hard. I'm pretty interested to see how we go against all the best guys from around here. Anyhow, I'm going to try to race with my camera on if the weather is not too wet.

I'll post a race report hopefully with video footage ASAP