Double - Double

Basketball pretty much has a lock on the term "Double-Double" - ya know, when you get into double figures for any two of the following: pts, rebounds, or assists in a single game. Then again, those of us in SoCal might have a bit of a different take on the term:

http://www.in-n-out.com/menu.asp

mmmmm.... Cheeseburgers taste good!

Well, I managed to create my own flavor of a double-double this holiday weekend. Having gotten over my health issues of the past couple of weeks, I set out to do two races per day on two consecutive days - wow, that's pretty clever, huh 2x2 = double-double... ;-)

Anyway, totally cool race on Saturday up in Dana Point - it was a pretty tight figure 8 deal complete with an alley way and some slight changes in elevation. Not your typical industrial park crit! As I was warming up, the ol' SRM battery went kaput! ha! hey, that'll learn me for not checking the battery status before leaving home, eh? Anyway, this scenario brings to light the power-geek conundrum: "if you don't have a power file from the effort, does the effort truly exist?".

heck-yeah it does! ;-)

Since the course was really tight, I made a concerted effort to stay up front and out of trouble during the 60 minute long 3's race. The race felt pretty easy and maintaining position was not a problem. With 6 to go (laps started counting down with 5 to go, but I saw Mr. Official getting real antsy at the lap cards - and since I didn't have anything to keep track of time, the lap cards were all I had to go on!) I slotted up into the mix of things. Wound up top 15 in the final sprint.

The Dana Point M35+ race was a different story - holy crap - there was some horsepower out there! For the first 20 minutes of that race I had to take what was given to me - started on the front row, but quickly found myself tailgunning the field. It was pretty much single file, even after a break of 6 got away. Chris Walker and Co missed the break (which included Dirk Copeland - former US National team member who I remember doing rides with here in SoCal back in the mid 90's - in particular one long ass ride in the rain where it was basically just me and him...) Anyway, you could definitely tell when Walker would go to the front as I was pressed a few times in my tailgunner position. Yikes.

The break of six stayed away, and Copeland won it. There was two or three guys that scooted off the front of the main field (Walker included) in the last lap or so and they finished just in front of the main group. I mixed things up in the field sprint - pretty comical as I crossed the line, I looke left and right and was surrounded by the stereotypical "sprinter" morphology types! I felt a bit out of place being a scrawny-ass spindly sucker who's size M skinsuit flaps in the wind! Wound up top 20 on the day - that crit, FWIW, was kinda hard - I was not comfortable for the first half of that sucker, that's for sure!

Sunday was a long drive up through Hollywood and ultimately winding up in Woodland Hills for the Barry Wolfe Grand Prix. I had signed up for the M35+ race and also the Pro 1,2,3 race (the first time I would be racing with some pro's since the Cascade Classic in 1999-ish - wound up DFL that year...

Anyway, the 60 minute M35+ race was first and compared to the Dana Point race the previous day, this sucker was pie. Flat, four corners, wide open "vacuum cleaner" racing (ya know, you can hang out and just get sucked along). Knowing that I was going to have the screws turned on me later in the day in the main event, I just followed wheels and basically tailgunned the race. Slotted into the mix of things in the last few laps and wound up top 15 on a sprint where my max Watts (hey, I recharged the SRM and didn't forget it this time! :-) ) topped 1050W -> which means I was pretty rested prior to that effort - it's not very often where I can top 1000W in a race situation. Saw Eddie Monnier (whose team was helping sponsor the event) just before and several times during the race, he was sporting his SRM as well.

Rolled back to the truck and actually took a little nap as it was a couple hours between the M35+ race and the P,1,2,3 race. I really didn't know what to expect in this race - I just prepared myself to gut it out for 90 minutes...

The first twenty minutes were interesting - took awhile for things to sort themselves out at the back - lots of brake usage! Pretty uneventful from my perspective until the last 20-25 minutes when a couple guys blew and I had to close things up. That hurt a bit!

Not a super exciting race - actually tried to move up in the last 5 laps or so - managed to see the top 20, but that was about it. The last lap and a half were fast, and it felt pretty good to get a field finish when pro's were involved (granted, not that many pro's were there, but hey, it counts! :-) ) - I can't claim a whole lot of those field finishes when Pro's are involved...

I think I did like 110km on that four corner course that's a lot of laps! Here's the Chung Plot from the P,1,2,3 race (lots of little spikey-spikes out of the corners,eh?):



So, that's a wrap on the Memorial Day Weekend Double-Double. Maybe next year I'll pop off a triple-double! Oooh, that's a lot of jumping out of corners, on second thought, maybe the double-double is good enough...