Fall Fling Race Recap!

Day 1:

We line up at the line for our race, and there were 7 people total, including the 3 people from Tati, so it was a pretty tiny field. It started off pretty slow. I was in front for a bit, but I just hung out because we had things planned for later in the race. Then another girl, Axie (sp?), who's going to be riding for Northwestern pulled us around for a whole lap. About 1.2 laps in, Becky (Turin) attacked, Kenda followed, and Tati chased. Then Becky and Morgan (Kenda) pulled off, leaving Elena exposed, and we weren't sure at that point how good her long distance endurance was, so I pulled in front. Then followed the most annoying part of the race, which is that Katie and I pulled the entire field around for 3/4 a lap each. I mean, these are smart race tactics on everyone's parts (aside from myself and Katie, I suppose), since it was going to come down to a field sprint. I didn't do a good job leading Elena out, and Morgan wound up winning the road race.

It was a slightly disappointing start to the stage races for me, but it was mostly because I still needed to get out of Bike and Build mentality and switch back into race mode at that point.

Day 2:

They combined the Masters women, citizen women, and cat. 4 women altogether in one field, which made things really interesting. It was pretty fast from the start because Pascale (she's 40+ with 3 kids, and she's faster than all of us!) really pushed the pace. Elena basically planned to sit on Morgan's wheel the entire race, and I planned to just get in front of her if she was exposed. It worked out pretty well. Elena got first, Becky (?) got second, third (?), and Morgan got fourth.

The men's 4's race was spectacularly fun to watch. Dan and Jesse both took massive fliers off the front of the pack multiple times during the race, and although Liam didn't end up placing as well as we would have liked, we were all still pretty happy about it because we felt like we controlled the race.

Day 3:

So things weren't looking that great for me, and I thought perhaps I could make a sort of come back with the time trial since that's closer to what I did all summer. We didn't do that many time trial practices, but I focussed on trying to get a negative split on my time. Unfortunately, they shortened the course slightly, so I paced myself incorrectly, and I had leftover energy at the end of it, which really annoyed me (and Katie). My time was 26:38 though, not too bad, and I got third place! Oh, and one of the course marshalls also complimented my orange and brown striped socks, which always makes my day. Morgan, got first, and someone who I didn't know got second (she looks older, but she claims she does triathlons, go figure). Elena had pacing problems, but also her aerobars weren't securely on her bike. Liz did surprisingly well for someone who's been off the bike for about a month, Katie's leg cramped up. Brian Hague got something between 21 and 22 minutes (crazy triathletes!). And Bernard, the only person on our team who actually has a time trial bike, did not show up.

Day 4: FINAL CRIT.

Big day today, was it going to be Morgan standing first place? Elena? We raced a very tactical race today, and played a game of numbers. Elena needed to outsprint Morgan, and someone had to place between them in order to ensure that Elena actually got more points. Amongst the field, only Becky, Katie, Elena, Morgan, and myself were actually contending for omnium placings because everyone else did not race at least 3 races. Basically Morgan was the only one we cared about in terms of placings. Elena again decided to sit on Morgan's wheel, and I sat on Elena's wheel, ready to attack or take over pulls or whatever if necessary to ensure Elena was in good shape to sprint at the end. For the most part, Elena did an awesome job at her plan. At one point though, Marilyn from ABD (in the Masters race) wanted a draft, and actually took Elena's placing, so I did have to move up for a bit. Morgan was taking it pretty easy today too though, we learned later that she was hurting from the time trial yesterday (for good reason! she had an awesome time). When we were turning the final corner, everyone was fanning out a bit: it was Morgan, Becky, Elena all mostly in a line, so I moved around Elena to lead her out. I forgot that you're supposed to move off after leading out for a while, so Elena was yelling at me by the end, but the crazy thing is that Morgan didn't end up out sprinting me. Becky did, turns out. It was cool to actually be able to sprint well at the end of a race though. Thus, overall placings for women were: Elena, Morgan, Becky, myself, and Katie. Awesome job to all the ladies! It was definitely great to have Morgan and Becky in the field: it made Tati work harder for sure :)

AND THEN ... I didn't feel like I had actually gotten a workout during the race, and some people were talking about racing the cat. 4 men's race ... and I said Elena, let's race the cat. 4 men's race! Elena's like, what? are we allowed to? I'm like yea! Let's go! So we did. I got dropped after about 2 laps because it was so blazing off the line, but Elena, that hidden beast, actually hung on for the entire race! She's going to cat up soon, I bet. The funnier part of it, was that Brian Hague, our cat 5 racer, lapped the field, and got first in the 4's race too ..... crazy triathletes ..... People in the crowd were nice though, and most of them kept trying to help me out, like, jump on with the pack! They're coming up behind you! I just laughed inwardly by the time I got lapped 3 times. Whateves. Certainly got my workout. I definitely didn't have the sprints in me to keep up after the corners, which Elena certainly has. And I feel delirious and dead, which is awesome :)

And then tuna salad sandwiches from my mom!