Monday, March 12, 2018

2018 early racing season

I finished last year by submitting and being approved for a Cat 3 racing upgrade. I spent the winter commuting and racing on Zwift, mixing up formats and going after short- to medium- distance races. I felt pretty good about my efforts, my training, and my equipment.

But Zwift racing isn't quite the same animal as outdoor racing. Zwift rewards a crushing effort at the start and the ability to suffer at FTP for the duration, with a sprint at the end. It's really tough, but it's stable. Jumps are infrequent, but you can't coast. You can't hear the guy next to you gasping like a fish out of water, and there's never any risk of touching wheels.

Nonetheless, I went into the first race of 2018 in late January with very high hopes. The Snowcone crit is a 1-hour training race that's maybe just a hair too long to really call a crit, with just two divisions that roughly break down to 1/2/3/4 and 4/5. I had no teammates and would be facing some stiff competition, including the guy who rode off to a solo win in last year's 4/5 race. Oh and a 15 - 20 mph wind.

The race was my first real exposure to serious team strategy, as 4 Nissan RVA guys worked together like a well-oiled machine. One guy glued himself to the front of the pack and reeled back any breakaway efforts for the entire race, while their hot-shoe waited until half-way to launch a crushing attack that put him well clear of the pack. When all was said & done, their guy had over a minute on the group. In the closing laps I watched all the rest of their guys get towed to the front as others launched spurious ill-fated attacks.

Coming into the last turn-complex, my legs were about done, and I started to get consumed by the group. But entering the final straight, one of the lead riders had a devastating crash just as the sprinters were jumping, and half of them sat up, unwilling to risk the season in January. It might have been a dick move, but once I realized the crashing bike wasn't going to hit me, I jumped and clawed my way up to 6th place right at the line. It was a good result, but it didn't feel like an honest one.

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Fast-forward to the Tidewater Winter Classic, my first Cat 3 road race. This one was a combined field of Pro/1/2/3 over 60 miles of mostly rolling terrain, with a single climb that's just a quick punch followed by a false-flat. Since Snowcone, I'd gone back to Zwift and actually won a couple of races, so I still felt like I had legs for something big.

This time, though, I felt like I was in trouble from the end of the roll-out. I never get used to that surge, but I managed to hold on to the pack, working my way around and getting up near the front of the group after a couple of laps.

We'd been cautioned that there had been a wreck in every single race of the day, all in roughly the same spot: the downhill run to the base of the climb. Sure enough, in the 4th lap came the familiar and horrible sound of crunching carbon fiber. Unlike in my previous Cat 4 & 5 races, though, the pack worked seamlessly to find the safe way around, leaving just a few of us hard on the brakes. Also unlike those other races, the group chose not to attack in the next mile, allowing us to catch back on. I like racing with the elite riders!

Somehow I managed to always time my efforts to coincide with other riders' attacks, so I stayed pretty close to the front until the end. Once we made the final turn, though, all bets were off. We were now racing 1.5 miles at a slightly downhill to a sharp uphill finish with a slight jig to the right.

I was chasing the wheel of one of the favorites when he told his lead-out to move left into a thick clot of other riders. Seeing a gap, I moved left onto a short line with lots of space. At the base of the final little climb, the leader of that line sat up, the guy behind him hit the brakes, and I hit his wheel. I managed to keep it upright, gathered it up, and restarted my sprint. As we came through the jig, I looked up to see 2 cars sitting on the finish line. Not moving. What. The. Fuck.

Once more onto the brakes, once more into an abortive sprint. I lost at least 5 positions each time I had to give up my sprint, and ended up 19th overall. Once again I got a result I just couldn't feel proud of, even though I'd been there right up until the end.

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Saturday Alastair and I drove down to Virginia Beach for our 2nd foray into the Shamrock crit. He was facing a field of 3, which he utterly destroyed (no surprise--he's been winning races on Zwift, too!). I had signed up for 2 races: Masters and 3/4. It was a mistake, and one I knew I'd make. I can't not chase a bunny, and there were plenty of bunnies to chase.

My goal had been to give about 80% to the Masters race and save for the later 3/4 race. That plan met with utter failure, as the Masters had a hugely successful breakaway that nearly caught & lapped us. I ended up finishing 10th in that race, 4th in the bunch sprint, but knew I'd over-spent for the 3/4.

In the 2nd race, I actually held on pretty well, pulled the group for a bit, and worked harder than I should have, but there was no breakaway. I felt pretty good--I even won the first prime. I glued myself to the wheel of a teammate to ensure he'd have room to work the corners. But with 1.5 laps to go, my calves and thighs seized, and I went from 4th to 21st. Coming through the last turn, it was all I could do to turn the pedals.

Apparently I cannot do 80 minutes of crit intensity, and I did not properly manage my pedaling time.

And that's what's been missing from my training regimen. I hate hate hate doing intervals, and power drop-outs on Zwift do nothing to improve my opinion on the matter. But while Zwift racing allows me to just basically hold 285W for an hour and throw a sprint at the end, crits are bursts of 500 - 750W at almost every turn, every lap. Shamrock had 4 turns and 27 laps. That's a lot of 5-second bursts, and I hadn't trained for it.

Now there's a great big hole on the schedule, with no crits in the area until May. I'd built my racing plans for the year around crits, and so far the only halfway decent results I've managed have been capitalizing on others' mistakes. So it's not all roses and sunshine for me right now. Alastair's off to a perfect start to defending his state champ jersey, but my start has been crap. Gotta find something affirming and crush it.