Criterium Nationals!
A week ago, I decided to go to Crit nationals in Downers Grove. Last weekend, I raced the Carrera de San Rafael on Saturday, and then the Howell Mountain Challenge on Sunday, and then at work on Monday, my brain started scheming about trying to go to Crit Nats. I checked in with my teammate, Mary Ellen, to see if I could share host housing with her, booked my ticket to Chicago, and got myself registered. We flew out on Thursday to give ourselves a day to spin around before the "warm-up" race on Saturday - the national championship race is on Sunday, but they are on the same course and most of the women do both races.
Two years ago, I did the Saturday warm-up race as a cat 3, and hung in for about half the race before getting shelled. The course is in Downers Grove, a Chicago suburb, and it's a blast - a figure 8 shape with a false flat on the finish, a nice little riser on the back side, and then an awesome sweeping downhill into the final critical two corners. Many people have said that it's a sprint to the second to last corner on this course - it's hard to make up much ground after that, because of the way the curb comes out into the road, blocking a wide outside line, and then it's only 150 meters from the final corner to the finish.
Of course, I was a tad nervous before Saturday’s race, and my nervousness was intensified by the fact that girls were pretty aggressively pursuing a spot on the line. As soon as the men’s race before ours was over, everyone rolled right to the start line and stopped, creating an impenetrable mob of bikes and wheels and girls. The officials had managed to keep one side of the course clear to get the car through, but they wanted the whole road clear, as our race wasn’t starting for another 10 minutes. Two of them were standing there literally yelling at this clump of girls that wouldn’t budge. One official actually posited the question of whether or not we were all completely deaf. Finally I decided to heed their instructions and took a lap on the course, and when I came around, they had started lining us up at the 50-meter line, which meant they made the rest of the eager field actually turn around and get back there.
Meanwhile, I was like, hello? I thought this was a warm-up race? But, yeah, I guess everyone wanted to be in that early break. So they started us off, about 80 girls, and I still wasn’t sure whether I should expect to be dropped within 5 laps or whether I would be fine. I was fine. I rode near the front, in the top ten, and went with a couple moves that didn’t go anywhere. When the break went, it was one Advil-Chapstick, one Aaron’s, one Colavita, and one Tibco. I was a few wheels back, unfortunately, behind a couple Aaron’s and Colavita riders. I made a half-hearted attack, but since we were on the downhill part of the course, it was hard to get a gap and Aarons and Colavita got on my wheel. They sat there, of course, and there was no one else coming through at that moment to help. So I soon decided that, as a piddly super-amateur type critter, I wasn’t going to ride around on the front anymore, and I settled back into the pack. The pack pretty much lost interest in chasing, (I think most people were saving their legs for Sunday), so we diddled around for another 30 minutes, and then all of a sudden it was 3 to go. Shites! The pace picked up a bit, but not enough to avoid some tricky mushrooming action at the front. In the last lap, all the sprinters made their way up to the front, and I just tried to hang out with them and not get involved in any dicey situations. It was all good, and I got 10th in the field sprint for 14th overall. Mary Ellen hung out safely in the pack for the whole race and rolled through with a solid finish – 28th out of 62 finishers.
Post-race, we went and got some take-out Indian food and a DVD and watched it in our super-sweet one-block-from-the-course host apartment. After a restless sleep, we hit up the Caribou Coffee first thing in the morning and picked up our numbers, before heading back to the AC of the apartment to set up our trainers. Nice.
The Championship race started at 11:00am with 86 girls. We were to do 31 laps of the course, 50K. Again, I moved to the front at the start of the race, followed some moves ambitiously, and then had to remind myself not to do more work than necessary. I didn't expect any breaks to stick in this race, since all the teams have super sprinters that would duke it out in the field sprint. So I hung out for the most of the race, sitting in the top 20 most of the time. It was definitely faster than Saturday, and a pretty aggressive race, but I felt good and didn't have any trouble until 6 laps to go. The field slowed coming into turn one, and we took the corner about 8 wide. In the straight stretch after the corner, a couple girls right in front of me bumped each other and weren't able to stay upright. For a split second I considered trying to bunny hop them, but before I could complete that thought, I was on the ground too. And then a couple more girls landed on top of me. I got up quickly, remembering that we'd had 6 to go, and could take a free lap up until 5 to go. I checked my wheels, put my chain back on, and jumped on my bike to head to the pit, only to discover that the left side of my handle bars had snapped, and was hanging there uselessly by a carbon thread. (Note to self - replace those with aluminum bars)
So I run into the pit, thoughts running through my head:
"Dammit, I felt fine, and now I'm not going to be able to finish this stupid bike race. This is why I came here! I didn't fly halfway across the country to break my handlebars in a crash and not finish. Especially when I'm not even hurt except a little blood on my knee. What the hell. I don't want to see the results posted on cyclingnews.com without my name in them. And my mother is here watching! Put me on one of those yellow neutral bikes."
Which I vocalized simply as: "I need a bike, I need a bike!"
The Mavic guys were great. They asked what size bike I needed, plucked it out of the rack, calmly took the pedals off my bike, and transfered them over to the size 52 yellow neutral bike. Then they pulled out their tape measure and got my seat height adjusted, checked the brakes, etc. Meanwhile, I was there practically jumping out of my skin, trying to help them (HAHA), since I only had one lap to get back in. The pace car came by with 5 to go before the bike was ready, so I looked at the official, and asked if I could get in the other side, even though that would technically be at 4.5 laps to go. (Since the course passed the pit on each side, you could rejoin the race at either point). She nodded, and I got set up and ready to go, and only then noticed that I would be using SRAM shifting for the first time. OH, WHAT FUN!
I've been wanting to try out the SRAM doubletap shifting for a while, but during the last 4 laps of the national championship criterium was not the timing I had envisioned. But there was nothing I could do. The mavic guy pushed me back into the peloton and I spent the next 3.5 laps trying to get used to the shifting and handling of the bike. I never really got my head back in the game, and I wasn't comfortable enough on the new bike to corner confidently, so in the last lap, I just wanted to hold my position and stay safe. I did, and rolled across the line in 25th place. Only 52 of the 86 starters finished the race, so I was right about midway through the finishing group. Mary Ellen also had a great race and finished in 41st after just barely managing to avoid a nasty crash in the last corner.
All things considered I was pretty happy with the whole experience, and I can't wait to race at Downers again. Next time, I hope I'll have a whole team to work with - it was pretty impressive to watch the way the larger teams were working together.
In the end, Brooke Miller took the win, with Teresa Clif-Ryan, Jen McRae, Kat Carroll, and Lara Kroepsch filling out the top five. Nice job, Brooke!
Two years ago, I did the Saturday warm-up race as a cat 3, and hung in for about half the race before getting shelled. The course is in Downers Grove, a Chicago suburb, and it's a blast - a figure 8 shape with a false flat on the finish, a nice little riser on the back side, and then an awesome sweeping downhill into the final critical two corners. Many people have said that it's a sprint to the second to last corner on this course - it's hard to make up much ground after that, because of the way the curb comes out into the road, blocking a wide outside line, and then it's only 150 meters from the final corner to the finish.
Of course, I was a tad nervous before Saturday’s race, and my nervousness was intensified by the fact that girls were pretty aggressively pursuing a spot on the line. As soon as the men’s race before ours was over, everyone rolled right to the start line and stopped, creating an impenetrable mob of bikes and wheels and girls. The officials had managed to keep one side of the course clear to get the car through, but they wanted the whole road clear, as our race wasn’t starting for another 10 minutes. Two of them were standing there literally yelling at this clump of girls that wouldn’t budge. One official actually posited the question of whether or not we were all completely deaf. Finally I decided to heed their instructions and took a lap on the course, and when I came around, they had started lining us up at the 50-meter line, which meant they made the rest of the eager field actually turn around and get back there.
Meanwhile, I was like, hello? I thought this was a warm-up race? But, yeah, I guess everyone wanted to be in that early break. So they started us off, about 80 girls, and I still wasn’t sure whether I should expect to be dropped within 5 laps or whether I would be fine. I was fine. I rode near the front, in the top ten, and went with a couple moves that didn’t go anywhere. When the break went, it was one Advil-Chapstick, one Aaron’s, one Colavita, and one Tibco. I was a few wheels back, unfortunately, behind a couple Aaron’s and Colavita riders. I made a half-hearted attack, but since we were on the downhill part of the course, it was hard to get a gap and Aarons and Colavita got on my wheel. They sat there, of course, and there was no one else coming through at that moment to help. So I soon decided that, as a piddly super-amateur type critter, I wasn’t going to ride around on the front anymore, and I settled back into the pack. The pack pretty much lost interest in chasing, (I think most people were saving their legs for Sunday), so we diddled around for another 30 minutes, and then all of a sudden it was 3 to go. Shites! The pace picked up a bit, but not enough to avoid some tricky mushrooming action at the front. In the last lap, all the sprinters made their way up to the front, and I just tried to hang out with them and not get involved in any dicey situations. It was all good, and I got 10th in the field sprint for 14th overall. Mary Ellen hung out safely in the pack for the whole race and rolled through with a solid finish – 28th out of 62 finishers.
Post-race, we went and got some take-out Indian food and a DVD and watched it in our super-sweet one-block-from-the-course host apartment. After a restless sleep, we hit up the Caribou Coffee first thing in the morning and picked up our numbers, before heading back to the AC of the apartment to set up our trainers. Nice.
The Championship race started at 11:00am with 86 girls. We were to do 31 laps of the course, 50K. Again, I moved to the front at the start of the race, followed some moves ambitiously, and then had to remind myself not to do more work than necessary. I didn't expect any breaks to stick in this race, since all the teams have super sprinters that would duke it out in the field sprint. So I hung out for the most of the race, sitting in the top 20 most of the time. It was definitely faster than Saturday, and a pretty aggressive race, but I felt good and didn't have any trouble until 6 laps to go. The field slowed coming into turn one, and we took the corner about 8 wide. In the straight stretch after the corner, a couple girls right in front of me bumped each other and weren't able to stay upright. For a split second I considered trying to bunny hop them, but before I could complete that thought, I was on the ground too. And then a couple more girls landed on top of me. I got up quickly, remembering that we'd had 6 to go, and could take a free lap up until 5 to go. I checked my wheels, put my chain back on, and jumped on my bike to head to the pit, only to discover that the left side of my handle bars had snapped, and was hanging there uselessly by a carbon thread. (Note to self - replace those with aluminum bars)
So I run into the pit, thoughts running through my head:
"Dammit, I felt fine, and now I'm not going to be able to finish this stupid bike race. This is why I came here! I didn't fly halfway across the country to break my handlebars in a crash and not finish. Especially when I'm not even hurt except a little blood on my knee. What the hell. I don't want to see the results posted on cyclingnews.com without my name in them. And my mother is here watching! Put me on one of those yellow neutral bikes."
Which I vocalized simply as: "I need a bike, I need a bike!"
The Mavic guys were great. They asked what size bike I needed, plucked it out of the rack, calmly took the pedals off my bike, and transfered them over to the size 52 yellow neutral bike. Then they pulled out their tape measure and got my seat height adjusted, checked the brakes, etc. Meanwhile, I was there practically jumping out of my skin, trying to help them (HAHA), since I only had one lap to get back in. The pace car came by with 5 to go before the bike was ready, so I looked at the official, and asked if I could get in the other side, even though that would technically be at 4.5 laps to go. (Since the course passed the pit on each side, you could rejoin the race at either point). She nodded, and I got set up and ready to go, and only then noticed that I would be using SRAM shifting for the first time. OH, WHAT FUN!
I've been wanting to try out the SRAM doubletap shifting for a while, but during the last 4 laps of the national championship criterium was not the timing I had envisioned. But there was nothing I could do. The mavic guy pushed me back into the peloton and I spent the next 3.5 laps trying to get used to the shifting and handling of the bike. I never really got my head back in the game, and I wasn't comfortable enough on the new bike to corner confidently, so in the last lap, I just wanted to hold my position and stay safe. I did, and rolled across the line in 25th place. Only 52 of the 86 starters finished the race, so I was right about midway through the finishing group. Mary Ellen also had a great race and finished in 41st after just barely managing to avoid a nasty crash in the last corner.
All things considered I was pretty happy with the whole experience, and I can't wait to race at Downers again. Next time, I hope I'll have a whole team to work with - it was pretty impressive to watch the way the larger teams were working together.
In the end, Brooke Miller took the win, with Teresa Clif-Ryan, Jen McRae, Kat Carroll, and Lara Kroepsch filling out the top five. Nice job, Brooke!
posted by karla at 3:31 PM
5 Comments:
Way to go, Karla! I have no doubt you're gonna kick even more butt in the future!
...but where's the review of the SRAM shifting? ;)
Ok, now that sh*t's just crazy
By which I mean, nice job, Karla !
:-)
Way to go Karla, glad life is treating you well.
Julia
Karla- this story is awesome...
hayle-yes.
the adventures continue...
Post a Comment
<< Home