From Sterling to Sweden...

The Sterling Road Race was one that I had been looking forward to for weeks. A short steep climb, followed by a big ring grind, followed by about 4 miles of narrow twisty, turny descending, with a couple more miles on wide open 2 lane highway. 6 laps, 48 miles. I was confident going into this one. Not that I would win it, but that I would be competitive with the group and finish strong without getting shelled off the back... Forecast called for thunderstorms with temps in the 40's at race time. This was a problem. I still have trouble preparing for this. In cyclocross you just stand at the line wearing next to nothing, freezing your ass off knowing that regardless of the weather you're about to crush yourself for 45 minutes and the heat generated by the effort should be enough to protect you from going hypothermic, except for your extremities which are pretty much fk'd if it's cold and wet. But in a road race, it's different. You're out for 2+ hours and the efforts are sporadic depending on terrain. There is absolutely no way to stay warm on a 40+ mph descent, and if you're wet.... well, you just better hope you get to the bottom of the hill fast and start working hard again in a hurry to warm up. In retrospect, I should have worn a rain jacket.. But I didn't, and I paid for it.

77 lined up at the start. It was mild showers at the time and it was cold. We started out neutral for about 3 miles and it was cold, but it was going to be manageable. I wore a cycling cap under my helmet this time around and the visor did wonders for keeping rain out of the inside of my glasses so I was pretty psyched about that. We hit the hill and the racing was still neutral until we hit the top of the first incline.. I say neutral, but I'm looking at my power meter and it's at 428W and I'm thinking "if this is neutral, I can't wait to see what the real racing is going to be like".. Once we're live the pace picks up and we're flying. We're descending down these narrow twisty roads that I've never been on. 30-40mph and wet, the cold is starting to set in.. But as long as the rain stays like this I'll be fine. We finish the first lap and hit the climb. It's a massive effort to stay with the group but I'm right there at the end of the climb. My confidence is good that I can stay with these guys today. And then the rain started to pick up... And then the skies went black... And then the thunder came and the skies opened up... It was one of those downpours where you have to pull your car over because the wipers can't keep your windshield clear. We're descending through the narrow, twisting roads and I can't see a damn thing. But that's OK.. Nobody can. You just hope the guys at the front of the field stay on the road. Any hole, crack, or bump on the road has become invisible. My brakes became ornamental. All I can do is try to follow the brightly colored shapes in front of me and not go down. If anybody goes down, everybody is going down. And then the cold really starts to set in. Wearing a short sleeve underlayer, a racing jersey, a pair of arm warmers and my shorts, I might as well have been naked. The first thing that happened was the shaking. Then the mental acuity starts to fade. I got sluggish. In a road race when you're at high speeds in tight groups there is probably nothing more important than your ability to stay mentally sharp. Throw in the type of conditions we were in and the importance multiplies. I'm trying to put in efforts to warmup but we're spending too much time going downhill and I just get colder and colder. The shaking is barely controllable and I start to feel like I'm going to crash. I hear a crash behind me.. About a minute later, another rider goes down in front of me and I barely miss getting caught up in it. There was nothing apparent in the road that could have caused the crash. I think his wheels came out from under him on the wet painted lines which turn to ice in these conditions. The field accelerates and I stand up to match the acceleration but the shaking makes the bike uncontrollable and I have to sit back down and power myself back into the group.. Then my chest starts to tighten and I'm having trouble breathing. I come around the corner off RT 12 and we start into the climb for the 3rd time. I stand up and there's nothing in my legs and my upper body won't stop shaking, I'm struggling to get air in my lungs. I see Michele (actually I can only make out the red and black umbrella with Michele's voice coming from underneath it).. She's screaming encouragement but it's over. I'm hypothermic and my body is shutting down. I pull to the side. My race is over. As it turned out, only 36 of the original 77 finished. I need to figure out how to dress for these conditions. I'm thinking rain jacket with the arms cut off, or maybe wrap my upper body in plastic wrap.. Or maybe I stay in my pajamas, drink coffee and read the paper next time. Road racing in those conditions is retarded if you're only doing it for "fun". Stewing in a hot bath a few hours later to get my core temperature back to something less reptilian I wondered why I put myself through this.

Sunday was supposed to be a "recovery ride" but since I only had a 52 minute race effort on Saturday, I decided I needed something a little more intense.. So I headed down to Wells Ave for the "A" race. I was wondering what kind of impact 40mph wind gusts would have on a crit, but as it turned out, it wasn't so bad. A field of about 40-50 with a couple local pros turned up. There was also a guy with a disc wheel, a tri-spoke front wheel, and an aero TT helmet. Everybody's first take on this guy was "WTF?".. Their second take was "i need to make sure I'm not next to him in the crosswind when the 40mph gust grabs his disc wheel". This was a fun, fast race. I spent more time than I expected to on the front taking pulls and bridging gaps. I finished with the main group and got in the type of intense effort I had hoped to get in Sterling.

My buddy Ryan had to stop at Ikea on the way home from the race, it was only about 15 minutes from where we were and he had to pick up some stuff. In the 40 minutes it took for them to find Ryan's stuff in inventory I came to have a better understanding of why people go on shooting sprees. I suspect the "Ikea experience" is much like the "Walmart experience", except the shoppers' focus being cheaply constructed furniture instead of cheaply constructed everything-else and without the smiley face bouncing around the store slashing prices. I wondered what we ever did to Sweden to deserve Ikea and made it a point to root avidly against them in the next Winter Olympics.