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ziabub
VB Team Member
| Joined: | Wed Jan 3rd, 2007 |
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| Posts: | 22 |
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Posted: Mon May 7th, 2007 02:07 am |
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The second weekend of racing in central PA took me to the Turkey Day road race on saturday and a TT near Harrisburg on sunday. After a lackluster performance at last week's Tour d'Ephrata, I was looking to redeem myself.
Turkey Day - nice 40Km race with lots of rollers and a 3-part set of little power climbs. There were more than 30 cat 3/4 women on the start line, including a good representation of junior women - aiming to be the next big thing for women's racing. Lap 1 was pretty sedate until the 3-part climb when two women attacked over the top and built a decent gap. Unfortunately, no one was willing to chase to bring them back. Finally with some encouragement from me and another woman, a few upped the pace, but there was no organized effort. As it turned out, the headwinds and the rollers did what the group was unwilling to do and before the 3-part climb we were back groupo compacto. I was feeling pretty good on the climb, and after realizing I could ride it in my big ring, I punched it hard on the last riser, bringing a small group with me. Yes ! Just what I wanted. Alas, even though we had a 15 second gap and a fair amount of horse power, we lacked commitment, and the gap was closed. Sigh. Lap 4, I decided, I would try to same move, and having figured out the finish was about 3 minutes from the top of the climb, I decided I would attack for all I was worth, and try to hold it to the line. My advantage was being strong on that climb, not at the sprint. Alas. Just as we reached the bottom of the first riser, the cat 5 guys came by, and we were neutralized for the entire length of the climb, so that instead of being able to attack hard, I could only ride tempo, since the moto was right in front of us, holding his arm out to the side. Not a good idea to blow by the race official. So instead of flying off the front, I quickly had to find a plan B, which was to hang on and look for opportunities to at least contest the sprint. I was too far back in the group flying towards the finish, although I followed good wheels, by the time I worked my way up in the bunch, it was too late and I came in 12th or so. Still, I was happy to have tried that attack - and it showed that all my work on strength training this winter paid off. And those juniors - they were the top 3 finishers.
Sunday's TT. This was the first time for this race, a 40KM out and back run along the Susquehanna River, on a somewhat busy road with decent wide shoulders. The course had a lot of rollers and a couple of bumps, but nothing that required a shift into the small ring. The legs were feeling a bit flat after yesterday, and I could have used more time to be awake and warmed up, but with an 8:57:30 start time, there wasn't much I could do. The biggest factor was the wind. And I mean *wind.* It was blowing 15 mph with gusts between 20 and 25 mph out of the NE. The course ran S/SE so I figured a tail/cross wind on the way out with a head/cross on the way back, which by itself made for a challenge. As it turned out, it was the cross winds that were the difficulty. It was my first time with a disc in cross winds - and the first time I felt the wind push me sideways was quite a jolt. There were a few times I thought for sure I was going to get blown into the ditch -- and at least once I got out of my aero bars to try and stabilize myself. What with the wind and working to stay upright, it was impossible to focus on just getting a rhythm going. The wind seemed to come out of all directions and the gusts really made it dicey. With all that extra work and yesterday's race, my legs were dead and it was all I could do to get up the last little riser to the finish. I was convinced I was in the basement of all the W 3/4s after I saw my time: 1:08 and change. I was prepared to cool down, change, pack my stuff in the car and head home but decided to be a good sport and check results, congratulate the winners and chat with friends. Well, what do you know - I ended up winning the W 3/4s and had the third fastest time for all women. HA ! I would say I was redeemed.
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vbgirloffroad
VB Team Member
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Posted: Tue May 8th, 2007 03:16 am |
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Way to go Ziabub!!
Hopefully there was still free Turkey Hill ice-cream left after your race.
Attachment: turkeyhill.JPG (Downloaded 13 times)
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