Toe Clips

I'm having a damn migraine right now. The beginning is always weird with some crazy ass auras that are like floaters on LSD.

Two excedrin and a cup of coffee will hopefully do the trick. But I can't see very well until these auras disappear.

Presently, they are getting bigger.

Oh well.

Yesterday was a bit of fun. I got out on the Tarmac for the first time in a race (Tuesday night training criterium).

I was told that the B race was cat 4/5 and A race was 1/2/3. They told me that I could do both if I wanted but would rather that I do one and corner guard for the other. Figuring that it had been 2+ weeks since I'd raced, I said "Okay, that sounds good."

So I signed up for the B crit and volunteered to corner guard for the A crit.

Racing again felt pretty good. The new bike performed well. And my old friend and house mate ZW came out for his racing debut.

United again in the B's race, we were.

Turned out the B race housed an enormous spread of experience levels--ranging from folks who'd never raced before to junior women (I mean, there was a 12 year old girl in the race) to strong guys in their 3rd season of racing on the verge of a Cat 3 upgrade. So the B race was a little sandbagged

I guess that's just the breaks for a local, grassroots practice race. They really only have time and resources to put on two races. They should probably have a juniors/citizen/Cat 5 race...and then make everyone who has a couple seasons under their belt race the A crit. But they leave it up to the discretion of the rider and people love to sandbag...so there you go.

As it was a few strong cats drilled it from the get go. Since it was a practice crit in which you could drop out of the pack and rejoin at any time (outside of the final 3 laps), people were riding pretty gutsy just to see what they could get away with.

Frank Chemotti (whom I haven't seen since cross season and is always impressively strong) and Jon Heile (one of my UW teammates) were riding strong, constantly drilling it and trying to get off the front. I found trying to bridge to them 3-4 times and bringing the rest of the pack with me each time.

When they tried to get away another time I said "screw it, let them go. Let someone else chase."

And so I drifted back through the pack. I dozed for a second and found myself 40 feet off of the back after a fast turn. I started to bury it to try to bridge back up and then said "Practice crit. Sit up and wait."

So I did. Eventually they came around again and I jumped back into the field (which was about 10 people at this point) with about 5 laps to go.

I sat in for a lap and then with 3 to go, I drilled it hard up the final climb for no reason in particular. Heile, Chemotti, and a guy from Brazen Dropouts (my summer team) pulled around me at the top and I latched on. They continued to drill it.

Coming up the final climb on the last lap, it was only the four of us remaining. The BD guy gapped Jon pretty hard. I was third wheel and didn't have enough juice to come around Jon to catch him. Frank was just behind me.

We took the final turn with the BD guy out front about 30 feet. He held the gap the final 300 meters to the line. Heile looked like he was hurting but managed to ride me off of his wheel during the sprint. I rolled across "3rd" with Frank behind me.

I say "3rd" because I was down a lap, but it being a practice crit, I was able to just get back in and mix it up.

Next week, I'll mix it up in the A's crit. I saw a few guys that race 3/4's hanging in there, so I figure it's an appropriate place for me to train.

Again, a big shout out to ZW for rolling up to the line yesterday. He's been wanting to give bike racing a shot for quite awhile now and I'm glad he made it out yesterday. There are so many people who talk about riding, talk about racing, own nice bikes, but never get out and do it.

I know how scary it is to line up and how much harder "racing" is than "riding." Pat on the back for walking the walk.

Also, props to Frank Chemotti who was riding hard enough to make me drool chasing him down on an old school steel bike with toe clips. I gave him props on the toe clips after the race, but I think he thought I was being condescending. I wasn't. I actually really like his style.

Oh yeah. I have a moustache right now.