Madera Stage Race, Continued

Our Saturday night consisted of the 4 of us gals lying in the hotel room with our legs up against the walls, bellies full of Mexican food, trying to figure out a decent strategy for the road race on Sunday. We came up with some important points/questions:

-- there's an uber-bumpy section, creating some serious ouch potential in some...ahhh...certain areas. Any solutions? (None that were feasible).

-- the temperature is supposed to drop by 1 or 2 degrees, bringing it down to an almost bearable 95 degrees. (heat stroke potential = still high)

-- what are the chances of there being neutral feeds? (we decided chances were slim to excellent, with a large margin of error)

-- how much time will we actually be able to gain (or lose) in the GC on a fairly flat road race? (probably not much - so go for the time bonuses for first, second, and third!)

Sunday, we woke up, thanks to Vera's cell phone alarm - the power had gone out during the night and the alarm clock was blinking. We made it to the race without mishap, and set up our trainers in the barn to do some warm-up. Everyone was plenty warm when our race started, and as we headed on our neutral way to the official start, someone yelled to us - "It's hotter than you think, drink lots!" Awesome. I had brought two bottles on my bike and one in my jersey, and was hoping for the feeds too. Janelle was sitting 5th and I was 4th in the GC, behind Kelli, Olivia, and Alicat. Goal #1 was to hold our places, goal #2 was to try to move up a spot, as I was only 17 seconds out of 3rd place.

The 17-mile course was fairly flat, with a LOOOOONG section of intensely bumpy road. The finishing stretch had some really fun rollers, and the feed zone was on a little hill right after the finish line. We were going for 4 laps. I think everyone was feeling the heat, and racing pretty conservatively. There weren't ever any serious breaks or even attacking. There were a lot of mishaps though:

- Jessica and Breego both got flats in the bumps. I'm sure there were many others!
- There was a bit of nervousness when the road narrowed at a bridge, causing a crash that took out both Janelle and I. I believe everyone was OK though.
- Alicat probably had the most mishap-wrought race though - she's got a report on it. A flat (phantom!) and a stubbornly dropped chain weren't enough to keep her from finishing with the pack though - amazing job!
- On the second time through the feed zone, one of the angels that was giving us waterbottles was taken out - I'm not sure what happened, as I was way behind it, but I think all's well.

There was quite a bottleneck in the feedzone, as half the field tried to grab their water from the 2 people that were giving neutral feeds. So on the last lap, I decided I wouldn't take a feed, but would just try to get by on one bottle, so as to not get caught in the mess.

I rode on past the neutral feeds at the bottom, and as I neared the top of the hill, out of the chaos, I heard, "Karla, do you want a bottle?" I thought it was a voice in my head, like a mirage, how people see water in the dessert. But no, it was real. Olaf hooked me up with an ice cold tall water-bottle. Never have I appreciated cold water like I did then.

The last lap was pretty slow, so I sipped my water and thought about the finish. It was going to hurt. Finally, we hit the beginning of the rollers. Virginia launched a huge attack over the top of the first one, and a couple Promans marked her, along with 2 other cat 1/2 girls. I jumped on their wheels, and off we went. Then Olivia (cat 3) lit it up along the left and got a huge gap. I just hung onto the wheel in front of me through the rollers and then hit the final finishing one as hard as I could. Olivia took the overall win (AMAZING!) and I took second in the cat 3s. I didn't realize it, but the 7 of us had a bit a gap on the rest of the field by the end, so I had gained some time as well as getting the time bonus for 2nd.

So, in the end, I was 3rd in the GC. Of course I'm psyched for that, but Ali had the worst of luck, and I feel like I didn't earn the 3rd so much as get bumped into it. In other news, Virginia got 5th for the 1/2 RR - that girl is STRONG! Janelle got fifth in the RR, and held onto her fifth overall. And Vera, Breego, and Jessica finished out the race even with their mishaps. Nice job to all!

What a weekend! And I'm already looking forward to this coming weekend, when I'll go up to Cool, CA to do a 24-hour team MTB race with some sweet dudes.