Take Sunday, for example. It was the first race of the Ohio Valley Racing spring series. 5 laps of 10 miles around Hueston Woods State park loop. 45 degrees and rainy.
I know what you're thinking: "where can I sign up for that?". I hear ya. We're weird.
We started out with 40 guys in category 3. A relatively small field for the first race of the year. I'm sure that had something to do with the cold and rain.
Before the race, my team meets to discuss strategy. We decided we would try to alternate sending people off in breakaways hoping something would stick.
Breakaway - [breyk-uh-wey] - Noun - When one or more riders ride fast ahead of the pack in hopes of permanently getting away from the rest of the field. In order to accomplish this, you must ride harder than a hoochie-mamma.
When you attempt to break away, you have to ride much harder than the rest of the bunch because you don't have as many riders (or any) blocking the wind for you. Usually, you can only ride this way for a short period of time. So, the element of surprise is vital.
If you find yourself in a break and you have smart teammates who like you in the larger group behind, they will do subtle things to slow the group down so you won't get caught. Usually, they will get to the front of the group and slow down a mile per hour or so. This is called "blocking".
I have smart teammates who like me.
At least they act like they like me because they block for me.
Are you still reading? Thanks. That means a lot to me. I know this might not be very interesting to you. But, it is to me and you're almost to the part with the picture.
Back to yesterday. To make a long story short, the group was whittled down from 40 riders to about 20 as it was very windy and the course has some hills on it. Many riders were falling away from the group because they suffered from a condition we cyclists call "being out of shape". As we marched on, I saw that many breakaway attempts were easily caught, people were not eating or drinking much and I listened to a lot of people complaining about the cold .
So, I decided, my personal strategy would be to sit at the back of the group, be lazy and wait until everybody tires out a bit more. They call this "wheelsucking".
Here's a picture of me demonstrating proper wheelsucking technique:
I suck good wheel.
Why doesn't everybody do this? Because you'll miss the winning breakaway attempt.
And, people are just not very patient. Especially after sitting on their dupas all winter.
Fast forward to the less boring part of this blog:
5 miles to go. Two of who appeared to be the strongest riders take off about 200 meters from the main group. These two guys also have teammates who will block. Everybody seems tired and demoralized because it's raining. There's a hill coming.
It's my time to go. I take off like a hoochie mamma and try to bridge the gap. I catch them.
The stronger of the two guys is a big tall guy so he's a good draft. He and I alternate turns of a about a minute at the front of our group. I pull aside and wait for the third guy to take his turn. He doesn't come around. I assertively tell him (that means yell) for him to come around. He doesn't. He says his legs are cooked and I assertively tell him that's he's fooping up our rythym. Except, I didn't say "fooping".
Foop - [verb] - A word I made up so I wouldn't have to say something naughty.
So, me and the big guy trade turns, but it's too much for two guys to stay away from 17. We get caught right near the finish.
With what I have left in my lactic acid saturated limbs. I bang elbows in a bunch sprint for 13th.
Yay...13th = no prize money.
So, everything seemed great and I made a good move. But who would have thought that the third guy wouldn't work with us? If I'd have known that, I wouldn't have tried.
Maybe next time.
Foop.
No comments:
Post a Comment