Menlo Park Grand Prix 4/11/2010

I raced twice at the Hippstar Menlo Park Grand Prix yesterday, and it was hard. The course was about 1.4 miles long, in the shape of a tall L. There were two lefts fairly close together, then a very long back straightaway, then another left, a sweeping left, then something of a straightaway followed by one last left with an immediate right into the finishing stretch. The final straightaway was pretty long, probably 500 or 600 meters.

Category: W3
Field Size: 23
Length: 40 minutes
Teammates: Josie
Place: 4th

I wasn't racing smart, and I also thought I didn't have much energy left in me. I felt tired to due slight lack of sleep, but apparently my legs had a lot left. I hung in the very back the whole race, though in retrospect I realized that I should have tried to be more in the middle to get a better draft. I tried to move up during the last lap, but with a bit of a crosswind on the back straightaway I found myself out in the wind just wasting energy, so I dropped back to a more sheltered position. Josie attacked halfway down the back stretch, but she didn't achieve separation so she got stuck pulling the pack for a bit. I moved up a bit then but the last three corners felt a little unsafe so I dropped back again, since I'd rather not crash, especially on the last lap. I was the very last rider to come around the last corner, but since the finishing stretch was so long it was perfect for me. People spread out so I had to wait a moment for an opening, but I was able to use a bit of someone else's move to spring forward and then really let loose. I was too late to catch the leaders, but I did pass almost everyone to get 4th.

My PowerTap tells me that over 24 seconds of that sprint, I averaged 728W, which is a new record for me. I hadn't previously had a chance to have a nice long sprint like that. A couple of people told me afterward that I need to race on the track, because my sprint is ideal for it. As I've previously mentioned, that is indeed one of my goals this season, to do a bit of track racing and see how it goes. I was kicking myself for being in a bad position at the end though, because if I had done that same effort from the front of the pack, I might have won. Ah well, I guess I need more practice.

Category: W1/2/3
Field Size: 39
Length: 60 minutes
Teammates: ME, Sam, Kelly
Places: 7th (ME), 16th (Sam), 24th (me), 31st (Kelly)

This race was actually super exciting, all because of an unfortunate crash. It had been raining for almost an hour when we started, and we were warned by Brian Heneghan (from LGBRC, he had just finished his race) that the inside of the second turn was very slippery. Unfortunately, that warning didn't prevent disaster. After a very fast start and first turn, two riders went down on the second turn, completely shattering the field, since they were in the first 1/3 of the pack, and one was on the very inside and another was a little further out. I was caught at the very back of the pack and was one of the ones who had to nearly stop to avoid bodies and bikes (and bottles!) on the road before starting to chase. I chased hard and made my way towards the larger group I could see up the road, staying with a couple of stragglers for a few moments to catch my breath before continuing to chase hard. Soon I ended up chasing with one other rider (I looked her up later, her name is Julie Bellerose, winner of the 2008 Collegiate National Crit) and we took turns pulling for about 2 laps, before we finally caught the group. Well, that wasn't the end of it because the group that we'd caught was apparently the 2nd chase group. There were maybe 10 of us together trying to catch of to the 1st chase group, which probably had 10-15 riders, and which I found out later was chasing the winning 5-person breakaway. My group had Sam in it, and I had passed Kelly when I was chasing, but I knew that Mary-Ellen was somewhere up the road. Given that, I figured that helping catch the group in front of us wasn't a great idea for the team, since it would bring 10 more strong ladies to compete against Mary-Ellen. So we sort of held our position at 30 seconds back from the first chase group for a couple of laps (they kept announcing it as we went by). But then Mary-Ellen got dropped from the 1st chase group, and I knew it was time to hammer, since with all 3 remaining LGBRC people in the second chase group we had no chance at anything unless we could get ME to the main pack. ME had to recover a bit before trying to lead the chase, and then I got up front and took some hard pulls, which I think helped motivate the group to work together better because then we stopped losing time on the group ahead of us. With 5 laps to go, they called a prime for our group (since we were like half the pack), and I don't if that was what did it, or the fact that we now only had 5 laps to go (which to be fair was still about 10-15 minutes because they were long laps), but in one lap we somehow managed to go from 27 seconds back to catching the rest of the pack. After that, the chase was really on, and people from my group went and led the chase to try to chase down the lead breakaway. They weren't successful though, and the pack ended up sprinting for 6th place and lower. By the time we caught the pack, I was really suffering, having had to chase for a long time and then chase again. I was pretty much hanging on for dear life and hoping I could hang on until the end as I watched the lap cards count down, but I finally got dropped on the second corner of the last lap. I was completely bonking and feeling awful, and the person in front of me let a gap open up and got dropped herself so I just had no chance of getting up enough energy to bridge even two bikelengths to stay with the group. I still finished, but I was probably 30-60 seconds behind the pack by that time.

Anyway, I was pretty pleased that I had finished, because it was a really hard race AND it was my 4th of the weekend. I rolled back to the car and laid down in the back because my head was starting to spin, I was so exhausted. I was also freezing once I stopped moving, having been soaked through for an hour. When I was racing, I didn't notice the chill or even the fact that I was constantly being sprayed in the face with dirty water from other peoples' wheels. When I stopped, I suddenly realized just how miserable I felt and just how thoroughly I had exhausted myself. I actually recovered surprisingly fast, though it took me a while to get warm (I did change into dry clothes immediately).

I was a little disappointed that I hadn't managed to finish with the pack, but I still feel like I did pretty well. I was happy that my contributions helped the team, because ME got 2nd in the field sprint (7th overall), so even though I burned up all of my energy helping my chase group catch the pack, I helped a teammate do well, and that's what teamwork is all about! Also it was a really strong field, including a number of TIBCO ladies, a few other fast ladies I'm less familiar with, and even Shelley Evans (formerly Olds), whose most famous recent victory was at the Tour of New Zealand this year, as well as winning this race. So I guess I feel pretty okay about being dropped by such fast women.