Slotting In

SRM screenshot of Ontario Racing (M35+ and Pro 1,2,3)

It was a fun weekend of bike racing here in socal. Toed the line in the finale of the DelMar Crit series in the M35+ field on Saturday, then did a couple more crits up in Ontario on Sunday -> M35+ followed by a 90 min drag race in the Pro 1,2,3 race.

Del Mar was a crazy one. Our race was delayed for over an hour, as the M45+ race had a bad crash, where a guy hit the barricades hard after turn 1 and from what I hear, almost didn’t make it after receiving 100+ stitches in his head. All I know is that when they carted him off in the ambulance, the pavement looked pretty bad – I don’t think I’ve ever seen that much blood before. They had to bring out a zambonie looking street cleaner to help clean up the mess.
I sure hope the fella makes a full recovery. In those moments shortly after seeing the aftermath, I felt a wee bit uncomfortable – I tend to overthink at times, and seeing that made me think about all the near misses I’ve had racing my bike over the years. It shook me a bit…

Anyway, the race finally got going, and it was a barn burner. Lots of guys makin’ a go of it, and I tried to keep an eye on the three guys that finished ahead of me in the first del mar crit – just for the heck of it. About 15 minutes from the end, I seized an opportunity to try and sneak up the road, as Mark Scott, Brett Clare, Joel Stangeland, and the SDBC guys were working each other over. SDBC had just about reeled in a break that had Scott, Stangeland, and Clare when I hit it hard. Just so happened that another guy had the same idea, and we were in business.
A group of 5 quickly formed, and I struggled to contribute much. I had to miss some pulls, and over the course of 10 minutes or so, I finally detonated and basically gapped myself off of the winning break… That pretty much sucked to be in the winning move, and then ride like an idiot…

Ontario was almost a repeat performance of Saturday. Really easy racin’ until Karl Bordine and Chris Demarchi of the 5 star crew (new full on green kit for them this year – cool!) went hard just before a series points prime. They kept on drillin’ it and soon enough we were probably a group of 8 – Chris Daggs made the group as well. Not everyone was contributing, and I did my best to keep it going. Problem was that in the “rotation” it seemed that as soon as I would come off the front, Bordine and DeMarchi would just kill it. Uggh, that was a painful experience…

The break and the main field basically came back together (I say basically, simply because I think the back of the break merged with the front of the field but never fully bunched up) and Bordine, whose wheel I was on opened up a gap. I’m a weak ass dude in general, and had no intentions of closing that gap in that situation, so I sat up and that gap grew and grew… Meanwhile, Demarchi was drillin’ it at the front of the break…

A half lap later with maybe a lap and a half to go, Bordine bolts from the field, and I could not follow. I kind of figured the Schroeder Iron guys (who were not represented in the break, and who had like 8 guys in the race) would at least try to bring it all back together – but they lacked the horsepower. Bordine eventually won the thing, and I recovered while sitting in the field before slotting in to have a go at the field sprint. I think I was second in that sprint, but 12th on the day – but damn, it was a bike race!

Pro 1,2,3 race was pie – total vacuum cleaner on that course, and was sucked along at 45kph on about a 160 watt average. I didn’t know what to expect, and my real goal was to just burn some KJ’s, but felt good enough to try and duke it out with the fast guys in the sprint. With a couple laps to go I weaseled my way into probably the first 20-30 guys, just in time to see Hilton Clarke start pushin’ on some guy that moved over on him – these pros take this job seriously!!

Anyway, I slotted myself into the top 30 on the last lap and basically stayed there to the finish – rolled to the line and dodged a few guys that had sat up. Turns out I wound up 17th on the day – I think the last time I was top 20 in any kind of a pro 1,2 race was 10 years ago.

Hopefully, this weekend of slotting into the winning moves will stretch over to the San Dimas Stage Race in a couple days. It’s going to be a tough field up there, though – lots of skinny climber doodz that will put a hurtin’ on me.

Hope to see you out there!