Habitat Cabarrus Omnium

Lowe’s Motor Speedway Time Trial

Last year this race was eight laps around the famous speedway, but with 200 or more riders, this obviously got quite confusing and the results never did get sorted out properly. This year, the race organizers came up with a solution that was quite unique and challenging. They concocted a course outside the speedway that was the closest thing to a stage race prologue that many racers around here will ever see. I was really glad that I got to the race early enough to pre-ride the course because it was pretty technical, and had more climbing that one might have expected. The first mile was full of curves and chicanes, followed by a hard left on a downhill. In the middle of the course was a fast descent under a bridge with a steep short climb and a longer false flat after it. The turn around was at the top of a small hill, and had a sharp right turn afterward. Coming back down the hill and under the bridge was the trickiest bit – it looked like a gentle curve, but once you entered it you found that it was practically a hairpin turn. I figured that someone would t-bone the bridge abutment before the day’s end. Past the bridge was another short hard climb back up to the speedway service road and on to the finish line for 5.5 miles of fun.

I had my clip-on aero bars on, but I was only in them for half the course as I spent most of the time in the drops so I could turn or shift. Just before the first trip under the bridge, I could see my minute woman (or girl, she was only 12) up ahead and I mashed up the hill in my 53x19 to catch her. As I rounded the corner, I could see my 30 second woman just up ahead. I came close to her at the turn around, but she negotiated the turn quicker than I did, and it took me until just before the descent to the bridge to pass her. I slowed down a bit before the bridge, and she passed me back, taking the turn faster that I was comfortable with. She made it, and it took me a few seconds to catch her and pass again on the hill back to the speedway. She was passing her minute woman at the same time, and I had to pull my elbows in and squeeze between them to get through. I sprinted up to the line to take 3rd place with a time of 14:07. In retrospect, I could have taken all of the turns a lot quicker ( I should have done two laps in the pre-race ride), but I was really happy with the ride because I managed to beat our area's masters world road champion, Christina Underwood (Fuji), by just a few seconds! Grace Taylor (Serotta) won and her teammate Megan Morse took second.

Downtown Concord Criterium

The criterium course in Concord is a crazy, short 0.4 mile trip around the block. It’s great for spectators because there is hardly a second when the pack isn’t coming flying past. The course isn’t so fun for the racers, because if you ever find yourself on the back of the pack, it is nearly impossible to move up. Fortunately for us, there were only 15 women in our field because the category 4 women had their own race. My new coach, Saul Yeaton (www.t2r.org), told me to make the race hard from the gun to try and break up the field. Always eager to please, I took off from the start and put the hammer down, at least in my mind. There were some gaps forming near the back, and I kept the pressure on for a couple laps before sliding back. Unfortunately, I didn’t have much time to recover before Chris Underwood took off with Megan. Chris’ teammate, Lisa, jumped up to them and I stood up to try and do the same, but was forced back into the saddle by a profoundly painful cramp in my left hip. Grace and another rider (Marianne Holt maybe?) took off in pursuit of the breakaway, but weren’t making much headway and we reeled them in after a dozen laps or so.

After that, it was a fight to survive. Chris, Lisa and Megan stayed away and lapped the field. With 5 laps to go, I tried to make a move off the front, but was pulled back in. Suzi Hosman (Tricyclists) took off with 3 to go and got a pretty good gap. I tried to bridge up to her, but when I got there, the pack was not far behind. With one to go, I found myself on the front, and I hoped to be able to hold off as many racers as possible in the tight turns, but didn’t have the power to stay ahead on the straighaway before turn three, and was passed by just about everyone in the field. Most of the rest passed me before the finish since I couldn’t get out of the saddle to sprint with my aching hip. Chris took the sprint from Megan for the win. I rolled in for 12th, disappointed in myself for not being able to hold off more people at the end, but suitably exhausted.

Concord Road Race

I awoke to a hearty downpour on Sunday, several hours before the start time of 12:35. The masters men, pro 1,2 and cat 3 men were all racing in it – I felt bad for them, and prayed it would stop for the afternoon races. I really didn’t feel like wringing out my bottom bracket. By the time we arrived at the race venue the rain was letting up, and I started to feel more optimistic.

I warmed up for 30 minutes or so, but then we sat in the staging area for another 30 minutes which completely negated the warmup. This made the first lap, in which Grace and Megan took turns attacking, extremely painful. I was hanging on for dear life, and at one point after we pulled Grace back, I purposely blocked Megan in against the yellow line so she couldn’t get out to attack again – I needed to recover. The course was much hillier than had been described to me, and every lap the hills seemed steeper and longer. By the end of the first lap, I was definitely warmed up, and put in an attack of my own just before the start/finish in hopes that the GC contenders would let me get away. Not so.

During the second lap, it was more of the same with Grace pushing the pace on the hills and making everyone suffer, nd Chris covering every move. We were caught by a breakaway from another men’s field midway through the lap. The momentum translated through to our group causing the pace to be very high on the long climb, with Chris and Grace opening up a small gap. Marianne Holt (Team Charolotte), Jennette Williams (Go Mart), Christina Meyer (Outspokin') and I worked our way back up to them, and then I noticed that Megan and Lisa were gone. With a chance to move ahead of those two in the overall, I put the pressure on at every opportunity during the third lap to keep the six of us away.

Again, midway through the lap, we were caught by another field. I sat up to consume a Power Gel, and somehow through pilot error or poor packaging, managed to spill most of the contents all over my glove, bars and top tube – gross! I didn’t have enough water to spare to clean up at all, so I raced on getting stickier by the minute. To make things worse, a few miles later Megan and Lisa appeared out of nowhere and caught back on. On the climb I couldn’t hold the pace of Chris, Grace and Jenette and the three of them opened a fairly sizeable gap on the rest of us, all now gasping desperately. Fortunately, they must have been hurting as much as we were, because we caught them just before the start/finish. It looked as if the 8 survivors would stay together for the finish, and we took the beginning of the last lap fairly easy. Even Grace kept the tempo easy up the first few hills. Once again, midway through the lap we were passed by another field, this time the category 4 women (!). We let them ride off ahead, watching one another to see if anyone had anything left to attack. On the long slight downhill before the climb, Lisa Ferris rolled off the front, looked back and saw she had a gap and decided to make a go of it. Jennette jumped up to her and the two of them got a really nice gap. I had nothing left to chase with. Megan and Grace made some effort to close the gap before the climb, but everyone seemed to want to conserve as much as possible. The pace picked up once we hit the hills, and by the time we got to the end of the last hill we had the two in sight. Grace and Chris again led the way up the hill, and I prayed desperately for more legs. Looking at the melting power gel on my top tube I thought if I were more flexible I could bend low enough to lap it up, and wondered I did, would the energy reach my legs before the finish?

We reeled the break back in about a mile before the finish. The finishing straight was a long false flat, and the pace was still pretty slow with 1K to go. I moved up ahead of Marianne, Lisa, and Jennette, knowing that I would need every inch of an advantage in the sprint. I got onto Chris’ wheel, and we hit the 200m sign. The pace picked up slightly, but everyone was still waiting… then Jennette came from behind on the left and I tried to get out of the saddle to get onto her wheel, but my legs were one huge ball of hurt, and I couldn’t get any power standing out of the saddle. I dropped back onto the seat and struggled up to the line. I saw Lisa doing the same on my right, the two of us, crippled and pained, desperately pedaled – at 10m I still had a wheel’s length on her, but just before the line she managed to get the better of me and beat me by a tire. Chris got the win from Megan and Jennette took third, Lisa was fourth and I was fifth. Grace led out for Megan, and rolled in behind Marianne. I managed to hold onto 6th place in the overall and take home nearly enough cash to pay for the hotel! Hot damn.

All in all, it was a very satisfying weekend. The races were fun, hard, and although the field sizes were really small the racing was tactical and aggressive. I was really happy just to be able to hang on to finish with the likes of Chris and Grace, women who have dropped me like a rock in the past.