Back to Bike Racing: Carl Dolan 3/4

Carl Dolan 3/4

Too. Many. People.

I have new respect for the pro peloton. Either that or I just raced in the worst roller-derby-on-bikes ever. 98 riders were pre-registered, and at least 87 started. That's a lot of people for an amateur event with mixed-caliber riders, and it's forcing me to consider changing my focus to Masters races, where everybody realizes the critical importance of getting to work on Monday after the race.

It was fast at 26.2 mph average over 13 2-mile laps. The layout is glorious, with no real turns and enough space that centerline shouldn't really matter. The only real "elements" on the course are a downhill wide open turn that can easily be handled at 30 mph, and a 3/10 mile long 5% grade that levels out 300m before the finish. Oh and a bunch of choppy pavement marked with a ton of spraypaint.

That pavement ate some wheels. Almost every lap we were treated to the sound of crunching carbon & pinging spokes, but I only saw one flat during the race.

But the real issue was the group itself. A mass of riders that large produces enough draft that anybody could sit in all race long. And sitting in meant rolling around somewhere between 60th and 80th, making it hard to move around in the clump, and really hard to move forward significantly when the group stretched out. Basically the race was setting up very similarly to RIR last year, and I had no interest in repeating my exit from that one.

Lap by lap I worked my way to the outside and forward, and by the end of the 5th lap I was in the lead. For 3 laps I stayed in the top 5, working with the District Taco and NCVC guys to hold a decent pace. I figured if an attack were going to happen, it would be one of those teams at about the halfway point. But when I backed off just a hair to see if they would go, they did too. Nobody wanted to make anything happen, and I needed to cool my heart down a bit, so I rolled back into the group.

Though it worked from an energy-management perspective (heart-rate dropped from 180 to 155 almost instantly), I'd forgotten how sketchy the group was. I spent 2 laps pinned to the inside, then slowly worked my way backward and across to the outside again.

Almost as soon as I got there, I got wrecked. Some jackass who'd been cheating the centerline rule kept making moves on my outside, trying to move up into a space that didn't exist. When we got to a physical barrier to his progress, he jumped up and slammed his ass into my bars, pushing me over onto the guy on my right. Fortunately for me and EVERYONE ELSE IN THE DAMNED PELOTON, the guy to my right was much bigger and was able to support me while I got the bike back under me. Frankly it was absolutely amazing that I didn't hit the deck and wipe out the whole group, and then it was hard on the brakes for a turn that should never require brakes.

I lost a lot of positions through that maneuver, and it took until the penultimate lap to get back near the front. As we came through start/finish and down through a really wide relaxed bend, suddenly there's a dude track-left rolling easily 10 mph slower than the group. I got around him on the left as a turn-lane opened, but about 30 seconds later I heard a big ripping crunch sound behind me. I understand about 10 riders went down. No idea if it was because of the slower rider, but I imagine it was a factor.

Coming into the final downhill turn, the group got super dense. We exited the turn and I was out of gears. 53/11 and spinning over 110rpm. HOLY CRAP FAST: 42 mph. The group was onto the hill and riders were flinging themselves at it, but I'd been told to watch carefully for guys blowing up before the ground leveled out, so I worked a steady pace up, found a line, and rolled on power. The sprint was compromised with traffic, but sure enough: dudes were moving backwards en masse.

I kept it steady @ 400W until I saw a gap, then goosed it to 560 in a seated effort to keep a clean line between 2 other riders. The guy on the right, with less than 50' to the line, jumped out of the saddle and yawed into me as I passed between them, ripping my rear derailleur apart and shredding his wheel. We both stayed up to finish right around the 25% mark of finishers, but obviously it wasn't the kind of finish either of us wanted.

Looking back at data, the 3 laps that I sat on the front were among the fastest of the race. I need to either figure out how to make a break happen (tough to do without team support) or get more aggressive about getting back to the front for the final sprint. I think I was too patient going around the back side of the course on the final lap. There seems to be a general consensus that centerline rules go out the window at the end.