I am paying for the sins on my youth. Actually, if I want to blame things on my genetic makeup, I could say I am paying for things I had no control over. But if we start going there, then I will start whining about not being a natural athlete and will just sound pathetic. So I shall just say that I am paying for things I could control in my youth. One of which was spending many, MANY days at southern California beaches trying to get a tan. I was a red head and I got burned hundreds if not thousands of times and maybe got that elusive tan once. And I used to be a research chemist, playing with many nasty chemicals. So now I am on the frequent flier program with my skin doc. And last Friday had a little scoop of flesh taken out on my forehead. And of course, the doc said "no strenuous activities and keep the stitches dry for a couple days". I laughed (actually, I think I snorted). I told her I was signed up for a race and the best I could promise was that I would behave "responsibly" - if things did not feel right, I would back down or not race. Of course, I also told here that since she had just gotten married, there was no point in my getting more melanoma just to see her. I do not think she believed me on either count.
So a few hours later, Nick and I are driving down to Hillsboro, IL to do the Hillsboro Roubaix to get a good night's sleep the night before the race. I slept well till the thunder started booming. We woke up to a downpour - wonderful! Earlier forecasts had been more promising. But it was not cold and I had my thermal knicks and long sleeve jersey so no worries. And we did not drive almost 5 hours (in Nick's case) to NOT race. But on the way down to head to the race the other teammates who were to be in the 50+ race with me were still drinking coffee and gave us a look like "where are you going?". I later found out that they had in fact driven home a little while later to do a ride up in Madison. So when I rolled up to the starting line (and it had pretty much stopped seriously raining an hour earlier) and fellow racers were wondering out loud if this was as big as the field was going to be (40 out of the 75 pre-registered), I announced that my whole team had left AND that I was racing against doctor's orders and what did that say about me. I will not go into what it says about me but I will say that there was definitely a feel of camaraderie at the start line. Now, I did think about my wound and went to get some waterproof tape applied prior to the race, but that was as close as I came to considering whether this was the smartest thing I ever did. As it turned out, for as wet as it was, it was not bad. My thermal kit was exactly the right level. The sole issue was I forgot I had cork brake pads and aluminum wheels - whoops! No brakes! So instead of gluing on wheels going into corners or weaving thru the field on descents, I was VERY conservative. Fortunately, I had the strength to spare. The race was a war of attrition. The winds were strong enough that once you fell off the back on a climb or in a cross wind, you were gone. And while I did not think the corners were slick except on the cobbles in town, some forgot to take off their tree or hay bale magnets. A few breaks were tried but they were reeled in by the end and a group of 20 were together coming into town. I was not feeling bad and positioned myself for the final climb but got caught behind someone who threw a chain or something and called it a race. I was not willing to try to regain contact with the leaders thru the last 3 slick corners to get into maybe 10th and finished 15th. And of my teammates who had signed up, I was by far the weakest. Could have been a different race. Meanwhile, Nick had a strong day but got two flats (lots of potholes in bad places!), one after the wheel car had passed.
Next day, the first of the Great Dane races. Would it rain? I was certainly going to be windy. I lined up for the M3/4 field and was surrounded by teammates - very cool! And they got aggressive early on with Mike M going with an early break and Greg F bridging up alone a little while later. I was feeling much better than I expected after racing 60 miles in the rain and rolled up to the front to help block, only to find I had nothing to do! One of the other teams who had a man in the break was controlling the front so I just had to make sure I was in a good place to go if someone else tried to bridge. We were not well organized at the end and did not set up anything but the break stayed and so Greg and Mike were 2nd and 4th. I brought Jarred up the side on the last lap and he finished towards the front in the pack sprint but I did not have enough power to hold my place and slid back - hi ho. My perkiness faded in the M1/2/3 race, however and perhaps I could have stuck it out till the end but used some energy to bring teammates to the front a few times early when it seemed like the right time and ran out of gas. Still, I felt like it was a good start to the season. And so I say a fond farewell to racing the Madone 5.5. Bring on this year's 6 series bike!
No comments:
Post a Comment