I ended up doing two crits today, a club within an hour of me has what they call spring training crits, they still count towards your license, but knowing the turnout won't be huge they have a C (cat 4/5), B (cat 3,4), A (cat 1,2,3). They have been allowing 5s to race in the B race provided that think they have the ability. So, being able to get in 2 races for $25, I went away from my plan of having a race free week and headed up to race both the C and B race. The weather today sucked, it was 40s with 30-40mph winds!! The longest stretch was uphill into a strong head/cross wind, so these races were hard.
The C race started out hard, my team mate who was having his 1st cat race took an early flyer off of the front and got the pace going. Another guy, a really strong cyclist, maybe the strongest I have came up against so far (for this story we will call him the "blue guy"), followed my team mate's attack up with a hard attack of his own. Me, another guy, and my team mate were able to bridge up and make it a 4 man break, but the blue guy had no interest of working together and seemed to attack every chance he got. The continuous attacks worked and he dropped my team mate, plus got away from me and the other guy with me. I talked the other guy into working together to catch the blue guy and we slowly pulled him back in. Well throughout that process the other guy with me cracked, so it was just me and the blue guy. Suddenly my team mate was somehow able to come back from the dead, I still have no idea how he did it, but he did. So the rest of the race was spent by the 2 of us trying to contain the blue guy, and holding onto him was like trying to hold onto a greased pig, he was literally just attack after attack, honestly had he saved up for 1 big attack he would have got away. I managed to hang on to him throughout the race, but it I had to do a ton of work and was pretty tired towards the end, given that he was continuously attacking I worked hard at trying not to help his cause when I was in the front, by ridding in the gutter in the crosswind sections. When the 3 lap bell sounded the 3 of us actually had lapped the main field. It went down to a final sprint, my team mate cracked so it was just me an the blue guy, some lapped riders actually almost got in my way and I had to go around them, but I managed to take him at the line for the win.
The B race was a bit more difficult, as everyone in the group was in pretty good fitness, plus an hour before I had been pushed to my limits to win the C race, most of the B guys were just there to do the B race. I still was a pretty predominant force, spending lots of time at the front and going with a couple breaks that I thought had a chance, problem is I seemed to lack the kick to prevent pulling others back up. Finally a pretty strong break was formed with a guy or two bridging up. I would have tried to bridge, but based on previous efforts I knew that I could not go out hard enough without pulling the whole group up, so I decided to wait and see if I could catch another person trying to bridge and get out with them. A couple attempts were made, but I just kept closing the gap for the group. Finally with 3 laps to go, my legs just completely gave out, it was all I could do to not get spit out of the back, but I managed to pull the little strength I had for a mid-pack finish (still not sure where I placed, they have not posted results).
All and all I am happy, I know I could have done things a bit differently in the B race, but it is really hard to compare myself with the field, given the effort I had previously put out in the 1st race. So I guess realistically I only had the strength to do well in one of the races, I took it when I could and paid the price in the latter race.
The C race started out hard, my team mate who was having his 1st cat race took an early flyer off of the front and got the pace going. Another guy, a really strong cyclist, maybe the strongest I have came up against so far (for this story we will call him the "blue guy"), followed my team mate's attack up with a hard attack of his own. Me, another guy, and my team mate were able to bridge up and make it a 4 man break, but the blue guy had no interest of working together and seemed to attack every chance he got. The continuous attacks worked and he dropped my team mate, plus got away from me and the other guy with me. I talked the other guy into working together to catch the blue guy and we slowly pulled him back in. Well throughout that process the other guy with me cracked, so it was just me and the blue guy. Suddenly my team mate was somehow able to come back from the dead, I still have no idea how he did it, but he did. So the rest of the race was spent by the 2 of us trying to contain the blue guy, and holding onto him was like trying to hold onto a greased pig, he was literally just attack after attack, honestly had he saved up for 1 big attack he would have got away. I managed to hang on to him throughout the race, but it I had to do a ton of work and was pretty tired towards the end, given that he was continuously attacking I worked hard at trying not to help his cause when I was in the front, by ridding in the gutter in the crosswind sections. When the 3 lap bell sounded the 3 of us actually had lapped the main field. It went down to a final sprint, my team mate cracked so it was just me an the blue guy, some lapped riders actually almost got in my way and I had to go around them, but I managed to take him at the line for the win.
The B race was a bit more difficult, as everyone in the group was in pretty good fitness, plus an hour before I had been pushed to my limits to win the C race, most of the B guys were just there to do the B race. I still was a pretty predominant force, spending lots of time at the front and going with a couple breaks that I thought had a chance, problem is I seemed to lack the kick to prevent pulling others back up. Finally a pretty strong break was formed with a guy or two bridging up. I would have tried to bridge, but based on previous efforts I knew that I could not go out hard enough without pulling the whole group up, so I decided to wait and see if I could catch another person trying to bridge and get out with them. A couple attempts were made, but I just kept closing the gap for the group. Finally with 3 laps to go, my legs just completely gave out, it was all I could do to not get spit out of the back, but I managed to pull the little strength I had for a mid-pack finish (still not sure where I placed, they have not posted results).
All and all I am happy, I know I could have done things a bit differently in the B race, but it is really hard to compare myself with the field, given the effort I had previously put out in the 1st race. So I guess realistically I only had the strength to do well in one of the races, I took it when I could and paid the price in the latter race.
