Chad's spot for various thoughts, musings, poetry, ideas and whatnot

Tuesday, April 15, 2003

Raccoon Mountain

This was the race I wasn't going to do and then decided to. I was originally going to take a rest week off after the Pines MTB race but the thought of getting another mass start and getting one race closer to getting out of Cat V was too much to resist. The course was rumored to be hilly and a check of the course map proved those rumors to be true. That meant that the race might just go to the strong men rather than the sprinters. So I signed up and went up to Chattanooga to race.

Our field had over 70 in it. A Cat V field with 70 is a frightening thing. Everyone has limited race experience and jittery nerves. Crashes are endemic as egos override common sense and everyone tries to jockey for position. Even more frightening is that we were just the over 30 riders. The under 30 Cat V men had gone off 15 minutes before us. Still, though, sizing up the competition at the start line I felt pretty good. A lot of the guys were packing a lot of extra weight. They'd get around the course but the hills would take their toll.

Since the first couple of miles of the race course were pretty choppy they nuetralized us through that part. Neutralized means no racing but a good warm up. So when the race officials let us go we were off and running or riding as the case may be. One guy took off right off the bat. He reminded me of me but with less power. We let him get aout 100 yards off and then slowly pulled him back. For about 4 miles we let him fry on the front, right up to the first tough climb. The first climb was supposed to be a steep .5 mile jag with a fast decent. What we found was a steep .5 mile jag, followed by a short descent follwed by another less steep .5 mile climb. Everyone made it over the first bit but the second bit caused a lot of consternation in the middle of the pack. From what I was told, three or four guys blew up pretty bad. And then there was an accident. One guy, riding up the hill, rode over another guy. At 12 miles per hour. Going up hill. Now you see why I want to get out of Cat V so badly. I, having a bit of racing experience, was riding in the first 5 or 10 riders and missed all the fun. But when we got to the descent they promised, there were only about 25 guys left. Now this is more like it I thought.

Next up was a 2.4 mile, stairstep climb. That means you go up, it levels out and then you go up again. We did this seven times. I sat in at third wheel and just pedalled, watched my heart rate and tried not to get dropped. By the top I was in a very select group of six. Once we saw we had a gap we put the hammer down. For the next eight miles we held a rotating paceline at over 30 mph. US Postal we weren't but no one was going to catch us. So it was left to us on the final climb. I hung in as long as I could and only got popped off the back after a late surge in the front of the group. My heart rate was 190 at that point. According to all the literature, the max heart rate for a guy my age is 184. I like having the heart of a younger man. Nevertheless, the weeks of work without as much recovery as I needed finally cuaght up with me. Still, I managed to hang onto fifth place and record my best road race performance yet. Best of all, now I get to start my recovery week.

The Physicist   Link Me    |