Bike the Bruce Time Trial

There's not much to write about for a Time Trial. You start, you go as fast as you can for 45 min, and you finish. But I did finish 3rd in my category so that's something to write about.

The Bike the Bruce TT was scheduled the week following the Road Provincials and since I had tapered for that race, I had to train through this race. That meant a 125 km ride the day prior to the event on top of an already hard week of training.

According to Google Maps, the travel time from Brampton to Wiarton, where the race was being held, was 3 1/2 hours which seemed a long drive for a 45 min race. But my folks live in Kincardine which is a more reasonable 1 hour 40 min drive from the race site. I was due for a visit with my folks anyway so I elected to spend the night in Kincardine and drive the 1 hour 40 min to the race site Sunday morning.

It was already quite hot when I arrived at the race site about 10:45 am. I parked the car, registered, put the wheels on my TT bike and took the bike through pre-check. Precheck at my previous TT race, the Mississippi Grand Prix, revealed that my handlebar extensions were about 5 cm too long so I had cut them back by 5 cm the Friday previous. To my delight, my bike passed pre-inspection. So, back to the car I went to climb into my skin suit.

After donning my skinsuit, I headed my bike towards the park entrance for a warmup ride. On the way, I ran into Stan so I waited for him and we did our warmup ride together. About 5 minutes before my scheduled start time, I took my bike back once again for the "official" inspection this time. To my horror, I was told that the disc cover on my rear wheel was illegal. Mercifully, the commissaries let this infraction go but warned that in future my disc cover, which amounts to a poor man's disc wheel, would not be allowed. So, instead of $100 for the cost of my real wheel disc cover, I'd be looking at $3000 for a Zipp disc with built in Powertap. I guess I'll be using my deep dish race wheels from now on.

My "race" started at 12:22 pm. I quickly built up speed and then settled into the wattage I thought I could maintain for the 45 min I expected it would take me to complete the 30 km course. The course was an out-and-back with a turn-around at the 15 km mark. With a tail wind plus a couple of downhills, one of which had an 8% gradient, I completed the first half of the course in 20 min and was able to maintain my target wattage. The return trip was somewhat less successful. I passed the rider who had started a minute ahead of me within a km of the turn-around but then hit about an 8 km section where I lost concentration or something because my average watts for this section of the course dropped between 20-25 watts from what I was able to maintain for the first half of the course. Add to that a head wind which seemed to come at me from different directions and a couple of hills, one of which had a nasty 8 % gradient, and the return section was definitely more challenging than the front section. Finally, upon cresting the final climb, I emptied the tank and powered over the final 1.5 km, covering the course in 45' 19". As I crossed the line, I heard the announcer say I had moved into 3rd place. With a few riders starting after me, I wasn't sure whether my 3rd place would hold up but indeed it did.

Staying out of the wind.

2012 Road Provincials

Through April and May of this year, my training had been centered around the many races dotting the calendar throughout that period, allowing few opportunities to build up any significant mileage. So, with fewer races on the calendar in June and July, I looked forward to getting in some long distance rides or "putting some money in the bank" so to speak. The Ontario Road Provincials, held on July 15, was to be my first race since June 3 (Mississippi Stage Race) .

The morning of July 15, I picked up Stan and we drove together to the race site. Normally, Stan would race much later in the day than I because he races in the M1 category whereas, as a newbie, I race in M3. But Provincial and National races use age based categories so Stan and I, being in the same age category, would be racing together. I was happy about this because it meant that Stan and I, being on the same team, would be afforded the opportunity to work together.

The Master C/D men's race consisted of 6 laps of the 12 km course for a total of 72 km. The course itself was a large rectangle of roughly 3 km per side. The "left" edge of the rectangle was characterized by a fairly long and fast downhill. The "top" edge of the rectangle was characterized but a longish but not overly challenging uphill. This was also the roughest part of the course in terms of road surface. The "right" edge of the rectangle was characterized by a 750 m climb with an average gradient of 8% but which was 12% in places. From our recon ride the week before, it was evident that this is where any selections would be made. The "bottom" rectangle of the course was flat and featured the start-finish line about 1 km from the "left" edge.



Because it was the Provincials, I treated this race as a 'B' race and used the preceding week to taper for the race. The effect of my taper became immediately apparent as the race started; there was power in my legs and I had little trouble staying near the front of the pack. As I had expected, Stan was also a prominent fixture of the front end of the pack. For the first few laps, I watched and took notes. Wheels of Bloor also had a couple of riders in the race, including ZbigniewAnuszkiewicz who I recognized as a strong rider from previous M3 races, but Team Zuck were the strongest looking team with 4 riders in the race including Don Zuck who had won the National Championship a few weeks previous. Clearly, this team was one to watch out for.

The first couple of laps were uneventful. One rider from the Newmarket Eagles went off the front of the pack and was "allowed" to stay out there but other than that, no serious break away attempts were made. On the third lap after the steep climb, I found myself in front of the pack along with peter Kofman from the 'Erase Cancer' team who I knew from our recon ride was a strong rider. He asked me something like "was I ready to go?" but I replied "too early"; Peter agreed and we rode tempo until the pack caught up. But by the start of the 4th lap, I found myself again in a break, this time with more riders. Looking around, it appeared that this break could work and I put in a half decent pull at the front when it was my turn but with some riders in the break not really committed, we were brought back by the bottom of the descent along Sideroad 5. Through the middle laps, Stan also tested the waters with several forays off the front but, unlike some of the other solo break away attempts, Stan's moves were always marked. He was given a short leash which I took to be a mark of respect for his abilities. In a similar vein, Don Zuck made a couple of threatening moves during these laps which I quickly marked, recognizing the strength in the Zuck team.

On lap 5, during the steep climb, my effort level for the climb increased noticeably with the effect that by the top of the climb a selection of 9 riders had been made. We quickly organized and were easily able to consolidate our advantage over the main pack. Looking around, it was clear that this was a strong group which included both Stan and me, Zbigniew from the Wheels of Bloor team, Peter Kofman of Erase Cancer, and three Zuck Team guys. Going into the last lap, we had a 20-25 second lead. Nobody did anything crazy and we worked together well leading up to the last climb up the steepest part of the course.

Approaching the final climb, we received updates from the motorcycle marshall that the main pack was eating into our lead such that, by the base of the climb, our advantage was reduced from 22 seconds to just 5 seconds. But, just as the original selection had been made on the steep part of the course, we were able to build on our advantage the final time up the climb. Zbigniew, in particular, did a fantastic job of leading the group up the hill. I stayed glued to his wheel and took my turn from the top of the hill until the final corner.

Leading the pack into the final turn.

The last couple of kilometres were into a slight headwind. Realizing that it was going to be a sprint finish and with Stan having the stronger sprint of the two of us, I stayed near the front doing what I could to give Stan the best chance I could. I looked back a couple of times, trying to get his attention and left a bit of a gap on my right side. As I was getting prepared to give Stan a leadout, a red blur shot by my right side. It was Stan and he was gone like a rocket. I stood on the pedals and moved a little to my right side to try and throw off the chasing riders. On both sides of me, the rest of the group raced by and sprinted for the finish. I tried to follow but, being the last one to go, the sprint was pretty much over for me before it began so I sat up and raised my arm in victory as Stan took the sprint for the win.

Stan takes the win.

Stan Blazek: Ontario Provincial Champion.

Mississippi Mills Grand Prix 2012

I'm a big fan of the stage race. The Tour de France is the most obvious of stage races but more recently I've become aware of other stage races. So when I discovered that stage races were also run at the amateur level, it became my goal to do one. So when it was announced that the 4th O-Cup race of the year was to be a stage race, I circled the date on the calendar (so to speak - in actual fact, everything is done on Google these days, including my calendar) and awaited the date with anticipation.

The Mississippi Mills Grand Prix stage race is one of five races organized by the Ride With Rendall bike club. The format of the weekend's stage race for the M3/Elite4 category of which I was racing included:
- 18.5 km Time Trial on Sat morning
- 30 km Criterium on Sat afternoon
- 84.5 km Road Race on Sun morning

Heading into the weekend, it appeared that the race was going to be all about the rain. The forecast for the weekend was for heavy rain both Saturday and Sunday and judging by the 5 hour drive to the Ottawa area, it was not going to be a pleasant weekend.

My objectives heading into the weekend was 1) help Phil get upgrade points, and 2) finish high enough myself to be able to grab some O-Cup points. I was hopeful of achieving objective 2 as I felt the stage race format which included a time trial favoured my strengths of which time trialing was one. On the other hand, since Phil would be riding the time trial on a road bike, I wasn't too hopeful of him being in a position to challenge for a top 5 position. In truth, I felt he'd lose at least a minute and probably more with the disadvantage of no TT bike.

Stage 1 - 18.5 km Time Trial

I woke at 6:00 am with the alarm on Saturday morning with the same creaky body I've been getting accustomed to as the years wear on. The view from our 4th floor window didn't look good with dark, foreboding clouds as far as the eye could see. But my scheduled TT start time was 8:08:30 am so there was no time to ponder the view. By 6:40, we were on the road, driving the 40 km to Clayton where the TT was being held.

The heavens opened during the 40 km drive, dumping buckets of water on my windshield but by the time we arrived in Clayton, the rain had stopped. Registration went quickly and the three of us who were racing M3, Dave, Phil, and I, were were soon at the start of the TT course with plenty of time to get in a quick warm up as well as put our bike through the pre-check.

The UCI regulations regarding bike setup specifies:

The rider’s position for time trial on the road and for the pursuit, kilometre and 500 m time trials on the track is defined by two measurements of the bicycle: the position of the tip of the saddle behind the bottom bracket (- 5 cm minimum) and the advanced position using the extension (+ 75 cm maximum)... <snip> measured  from the vertical plane passing through the centre of the bottom bracket axle. 

I had measured my seat setback and aerobar extensions and was confident that my setup was within limits. So it was with some surprise that I received the news from the OCA commissaire that my bike did not meet the specs. He showed me. My seat and aerobar extension were both too far forward. Moving the seat back wasn't a problem and I was able to do that but there was no adjustment for moving the aerobar extensions backward. I went back to the commissaire and, mercifully, he gave me an excemption. But not before wrapping a piece of tape around the end of each extension. "If you grip any part of the extension beyond these pieces of tape," he told me, "you'll be disqualfied." I agreed profusely to adhere to this restriction and happily took my place in the start queue.

TT course profile showing a climb on the 'out' section and descent on the 'back'.

The18.5 km TT course was an out and back along smooth road and rolling hills. It really was quite a pretty course. The course profile showed the course with a long, but not steep, climb until the turn around with a corresponding descent from the turn around to the finish. I paced my effort over the front half of the course, holding a little something back for the expected climb. But the climb never materialized. Before I knew it, the turn around was just ahead and it was time to put on the brakes and make the return trip. The brakes, the brakes, THE BRAKES... With the turn around appearing at the bottom of a slight hill, the speed I was carrying, and the wet conditions, it took a bit further to slow down than I would have liked. Fortunately, I was provided some saving grace by a run off area between turn around and the road closure barriers and I was soon on the return trip with the rider who left ahead of me just ahead. I passed rider ahead and focused on the next one - three actually as the the rider to leave before the one I had just passed appeared to have caught and passed the two riders ahead of him. But I finished without passing any more riders.

I was pretty happy with my effort, especially considering I had done no training Thursday and Friday. I was afraid this might have left me flat but I actually had felt pretty good. And, indeed, I did have a pretty good TT, especially considering the rolling terrain. But what was surprising to me was Phil's time. While my time was good enough for 5th, Phil came in only 6 seconds behind me for 6th place. I was stunned. I had fully expected Phil to be way down in the standings given he rode the course on a road bike but here he was fully in contention for some upgrade points, possibly even a podium position. In fact, Stan and Andy also had good times with Andy bettering my time by 13 seconds and Stan beating my time by a full minute and 14 seconds, riding my own TT bike. All in all, we had a pretty good TT. Best of all, we didn't get rained on.

Results:

Elite 4 & Master 3 Men Results:

5  WESTWOOD, Richard
6  HODGKINSON, Phill
26 BERRY, David

Master 1 Men Results:
11 BLAZEK, Stanislav
25 D`ANGELO, Andy

Full Results:
http://www.ontariocycling.org/web_pages/results/20120603-183742-stage1bresults.htm

Dave starts the TT on his hand-crafted carbon road bike (He even  crafted the carbon frame himself).

Stage 2 - 31 km Criterium

The start time for the M3/E4 criterium was scheduled for 2:00 pm. It was 12:30 pm by the time we finished eating lunch in Almonte, giving me just enough time to drive back to Kanata to pickup my road bike for the afternoon Crit. It rained on the drive to the hotel, heavily at times, and also on the way back. I was skeptical of a dry race this afternoon and in fact harboured a certain amount of apprehension about racing the highly technical circuit in the wet. Riding the circuit to warmup prior to the race didn't do much to reassure me.

Almonte Crit circuit. Start-finish line was more to the right of the green balloon after the dog-leg right.

 

The Almonte Crit circuit had 8 corners, at least 2 of which were sketchy in the wet. The first of these was corner 4, a tight 70 degree right-hander with several large puddles dominating the riding line going into the corner. The second of the sketchy turns was really a series of turns comprising "corner 8". After corner 7 there was a 300-400 m descent followed by a dog-leg right hander into a parking lot. The trip through the parking lot included a short gravel patch, a bumpy concrete patch, another dog-leg right, another short gravel patch and then the final turn onto the start-finish stretch. It was the two gravel patches I was concerned about which I could see had the potential of being dangerous when taken at speed in a pack.

Phil, Dave, and me warming up for the Crit.

As Dave, Phil, and I warmed up together the start time came and went. At first we were kept in the dark regarding the delay but it eventually came to light that somebody had stolen the hay bales that were to be used to make the course safe. We were waiting for a new shipment to arrive. We continued doing laps of the Crit circuit to keep warm until it began to rain again. So, back to the Kurzawinski tent to keep dry. By the time the hay bales arrived and been dispersed around the course, the new start time was set for 3:30 pm. Fortuitously, the rain had stopped by the time 3:30 rolled around.

 

The strategy going into the Crit was fairly straightforward. After the TT, there were 8 riders within a minute and a half of first place on GC. And while time could potentially be gained during the Crit, for certain time could be lost. It was therefore important to not let any breaks get away without both Phil and I being in the break.

1 SNIDER, Derek                                

2 BUDGELL, Glen               36" 

3 WOODLEY, Jj         01' 04" 

4 KIIFFNER, Carl         01' 06" 

5 WESTWOOD, Richard 01' 07" 

6 HODGKINSON, Phil 01' 13" 

7 BUSBY, Colin                 01' 19" 

8 MAROIS, Gilbert         01' 32" 

With technical nature of course and wet conditions, it was clearly important to stay near the front. Phil set the tone right from the start, jumping out into a lead and quickly establishing a gap. I quickly bridged up to Phil and for a lap and a half, the two of us worked together to stay ahead of the peleton. We were eventually caught us but in doing so the peleton was split with 10 riders in the front break in which Phil and I found ourselves.

Phil quickly establishing a gap right from the start.

Despite the wet conditions, with the exception of corner 4 where things tended to slow down, the pace remained fairly high for the next few laps. My anxiety regarding the parking lot section dissipated once we had gone through that section a couple of times. Whereas I was concerned about navigating that tricky section in a pack, in actual fact, all the riders tended to go through that section single file, all following the same line and the pace remained surprisingly high through that section. 

Laps 5, 10, and 15 were primes which meant sprint points were up for grabs. I was in a good position going into the final corner of lap 5, just behind Derek Snider. I stayed glued to Derek's wheel while heading towards the finish line and was all set to pass him on the inside of the dog leg heading into the short climb to the start/finish line. I dove to the inside of the dog-leg just as Derek cut the corner and we came together briefly at over 40 kph. I was sure we were both about to hit pavement but we just kind of bounced off each other. I was a bit annoyed at the time but let it go and Derek, to his credit, apologized during the following lap. "No worries," I replied but during the de-brief with Coach following the race, I discovered, much to my chagrine, that I was the one at fault. "Never try to pass on the inside line," Coach admonished me. One more lesson learned but, thankfully, not learned the hard way.

The next few laps passed uneventfully. I alternated between doing strong pulls at the front, and languishing at the back of the break to recover. It was about lap 10 while languishing at the back of the break that a gap opened on the longest stretch of the course, the section between corners 3 and 4. After making the turn at corner 3, I saw there were 5 riders about 100 m ahead with JJ Woodley in between. I came quicly around the 3 stragglers and dug as deep as I could to catch the break ahead which included team mate, Phil Hodgkinson. I passed close by JJ along the way thinking he might be able to grab my wheel but unfortunately for JJ, he did not make the break. Strategically, I should have passed wide of JJ to make it hard for him to grab my wheel but JJ is a good guy and I felt bad for him not making the break. As it turned out, JJ not making the break was good for both Phil and I as it effectively moved us both up in the GC. What made the situation even better is that second place on GC, Glen Budgell who was in the original break of 10, also failed to bridge to the new break which moved both Phil and I up 2 places on GC. All we had to do was stay in the lead group of six. And this turned out to be the turning point of the weekend for mine and Phil's overall standing.

As we approached the end of the race, I had lost count of how many laps were remaining and yelled to Phil asking how many laps remaining. Phil held up 2 fingers indicating 2 laps were remaining so as we finished the lap we were on, I aggressively moved towards the front of the break for what I thought was the last lap. By halfway through the lap, I was at the front and driving hard. I made the turn at corner 6, raced down the hill and through the parking lot leading the break. As I made the turn onto the start-finish straight, I could see the remnants of the peleton just ahead. I sprinted hard up the left side of the peleton while another rider from the break, Carl Kiffner, sprinted up the right side. I thought I had it but Carl out-kicked me at the finish line for the sprint win. As it turned out, though, we had another lap to go. But apparently the second last lap was a prime worth $70 which meant I had just missed out on $70.

Carl Kiffner (front left) outkicks me (front right) for the prime on  lap 19.

I eased up as we crossed the finish line, thinking the race was done. It didn't take long to realize the race was not yet over and now I had to dig deep again just to stay in contact with the break. This left me at the back of the break and there I stayed for the rest of the lap, crossing the finish line last of my breakaway companions, good for 6th place. On the plus side, my team mate, Phil, took second place. 

We spent the rest of the afternoon watching the other races, enjoying the festivities, and consuming various baked goods from Baker Bob's. And, we didn't get rained on.

Coach organizes an impromptu race for the kids as part of the Crit festivities.

Coach Kryz  making blender drinks as part of the Crit festivities.

Results:

Elite 4 & Master 3 Men Results:

2 HODGKINSON, Phil

6 WESTWOOD, Richard

26 BERRY, David

Master 1 Men Results:

2 BLAZEK, Stanislav

15 D`ANGELO, Andy

Full Results here:

http://www.ontariocycling.org/web_pages/results/20120603-183800-stage2results.htm

Stage 3 - 85.5 km Road Race

The forecast for the Sunday showed rain in the morning and showers in the afternoon. But the skies did not look particularly threatening as we made the drive to Pakenham for the start of the road race. We arrived fairly early for the race which gave Coach time to find and setup the Team Kurzawinski tent. All of the other teams had set up their tents in the baseball field adjacent to the community centre where registration was being handled but Coach wanted something closer to the start-finish line. So we ended up putting up the tent in the driveway of some nice lady's house who Coach befriended, right next to the start-finish line.

Our race started on time and at 8:30 am. about 30 riders from the M3/E4 categories headed South along Hwy 15. From the start, I felt sluggish, as I knew I would. It typically takes me about an hour to get my cycling legs, especially after a hard ride the day before. I tried to hide from the wind as much as I could and spent much of the first 10 km or so near the back. For the most part, this was ok as most of the peleton seemed content with letting the pace develop of its own accord, the exception being when Derek Snider took a turn off the front. Then the pace would pickup dramatically and I'd find myself having to dig deep to compensate from the accordion effect.

After about 10 km, the road became hillier and, as I knew we were approaching the gravel section, I began to work my way towards the front. It was tough slogging I had the recurring thought that, at 55 years of age, maybe I was too old for this cycle racing stuff. But I also knew that as I was suffering, probably most others were similarly suffering and it was shortly after that I over heard Phil telling someone he'd "burnt a few too many matches yesterday" thus confirming that hypothesis.

The gravel section, when we hit it, was looser than I expected. Fortunately, I had moved up closer to the front by the time we hit this section so, when Snider did another monstrous pull off the front to shake things up, I was ready for it. The section through the gravel was hard. We lost at least a couple of riders from the peleton including, unfortunately, our team mate, Dave, so I was somewhat relieved when we hit the pavement at the other end.

Once we hit the pavement, the pace seemed to pick up with the front 10 or so riders forming an echelon and the rest of the peleton just hanging on. After a couple of turns through the echelon, I noticed the distinct absence of Carl Kiffner who I had been marking due to his status of second in GC. I was pretty sure Carl was back there conserving energy for later in the race so I let a gap open up to the rotating echelon ahead and sure enough several riders came around me, including Carl. Thereafter, I kept a closer eye on Carl, leaving gaps a couple more times until he seemed to get tired of having to bridge to the front group and thereafter maintained his place in the rotation.

The pace of the pelton slowed dramatically once we made the turn onto Waba Road and into a headwind. The pace remained slow through town, past the start-finish line, and all the way until the second pass through the gravel section. Paradoxically, it was during this part of the race that I started to feel my racing legs come back and, sensing that something would happen during the gravel section, I went off the front about a km before the start of the gravel section.

My intention ahead of the second pass through the gravel was to pick up the pace ahead of the gravel section but a quick look back following my jump showed I had about a 30 second gap on the peleton. It seemed nobody was interested in giving chase. This suited me fine. I maintained a low threshold effort through this section, enjoying the luxury of having the entire width of the road to negotiate the gravel and also not having to worry about other riders. About 1 km from the pavement, I was joined by Snider who asked how I was feeling. "Pretty good," I replied to which he said "Let's go!" and I hopped on his wheel. Our break didn't last long as some of those in the peleton sensed a threat with both Derek and I working together and a bridge was made just as we hit the pavement. It turned out that our break had caused a split in the pelton with 9 of us in a break away.

An echelon quickly formed with 8 of the 9 riders smoothly moving through a rotation. A quick scan of the riders present showed that this was pretty much the same group who had been part of yesterday's break so I was pretty confident of the break sticking. Indeed, the rotation went very smoothly and it was nice to be part of a group of riders all who knew how to echelon properly. After a few rotations, I motioned for the 9th rider to take his turn in the rotation but he yelled back that he was just hanging on and that he wasn't going for the sprint. This was good enough for me and I resumed my place in the rotation.

Things started to heat up as we approached the town for the second time. The first attack was made with about 1.5 km to go as Derek Snider did another of his monstrous pulls. But it was more of a strong pull than an attack and pretty much everyone in the group was still together as we made the turn towards town. Once in town, I knew from the first lap that the final corner heading into the long start-finish straight would be critical. This corner was quite tricky to negotiate, the way the barriers had been setup, and being at the front would be important. I moved to the front of the group but Phil was already ahead of me along with Colin Busby, the winner of the previous day's Crit. We were 1-2-3, heading toward that final turn when it occurred to me that Kiffner and Snider, the current leaders on GC, were both behind me. I purposely slowed more than I needed to ahead of the corner, hoping to give Phil some breathing room for the final 500 m sprint but Kiffner came around me before we reached the corner. Snider was just behind me and passed me as we exited the corner. It was a long sprint to the finish and, to his credit, Kiffner caught and passed Phil for second place while I crossed the line behind Snider for 5th place but good enough for 3rd place overall on final general classification.

The rest of the day was spent hanging out in front of the Kurzawinski tent, enjoying ice cream from the local ice cream shop, and just enjoying the day in general, made all the more enjoyable by virtue of us not getting rained on... again!

Hanging out in front of the Kurzawinksi tent. Right to left: Carl Kiffner, Derek Snider, Richard Westwood,  JJ Woodley,  and Phil Hodgkinson. 

All in all, the weekend was a smashing success. Phil needed a 1st, 2nd, or 3rd to get the upgrade points he needed to move up to M2. Though Phil came 4th overall on GC, he was 3rd of the M3's in the race and so earned his upgrade points. This put me second of the M3's giving me 20 O-Cup points. Stan and Andy also had good races with Stan taking 3rd in the M1 race and Andy coming in 10th. Most of all, it didn't rain during any of the races despite it raining, heavily at times, in the surrounding areas.

Results:

Elite 4 & Master 3 Men Results:

3 HODGKINSON, Phil

5 WESTWOOD, Richard

Master 1 Men Results:

3 BLAZEK, Stanislav

10 D`ANGELO, Andy

Full Results here:

http://www.ontariocycling.org/web_pages/results/20120603-224150-stage3results.htm

Final General Classification Results:

Elite 4 & Master 3 Men Results:

3 WESTWOOD, Richard

4 HODGKINSON, Phil

Master 1 Men Results:

10 BLAZEK, Stanislav

17 D`ANGELO, Andy

Full Results here:

http://www.ontariocycling.org/web_pages/results/20120603-224134-finalgc.htm

Niagara Classic 2012

Phil and I thought we had lined up at the front but as more and more cyclists spread across the full width of the start line, it appeared less and less a favourable start position... until I looked back. Behind us, 100 plus cyclists  occupied as much of the road as I could see. Eventually, they would split the pack into two groups, the Elite 4 group and the Masters 3 group, but the glance back made me thankful for my place on the starting grid. There were 5 of us in this race so, with such a strong presence, we were hoping to use our numbers to our advantage wherever the opportunity presented itself.

The Kurzawinski M3 crew: from left, Dave Berry, Martin Davis, Larry Bradley, Richard Westwood, Phil Hodginkson.

My main objective going into this race was to work for Phil and help him to get the 3 points he needed to be able to upgrade to Master 2. That meant, a 1st, 2nd, or 3rd place and he would earn the necessary upgrade points to be promoted. Despite admonishens from the OCA about registering in M2 with the requisite upgrade points, most of the new Masters 2 riders had not earned their right to be there. But Phil was adamant about earning his upgrade and for this I have the greatest respect. Which made my decision to work for him in this race an easy one.

As with every race this year, I went into this race with a game plan in mind. Larry was also able to work this race into his calendar and so with Larry's excellent time trialing abilities and my climbing abilities my thinking went along these lines. Larry would control things from the front for the first 10.3 km of each lap whereupon I would move to the front to control the pace up the 2 km climb, allowing Phil to save his legs for the final climb. As I write this report, I'm even now confounded as to how I could be so naive regarding my game plan when all previous cycle race game plans went out the window as soon as the starting horn started. And so it was with this race.

When the starting horn went off, as per usual, I spent the first several seconds getting clipped in wherein a dozen or more riders went around me. But once I'd gotten clipped in, I moved over to the right shoulder where I could see the rest of my team ahead of me. With some aggressive riding, I was able to move up the right side and was soon up beside Phil and could see Larry and Martin up near the front. We made the turn at corner 1 and Martin and Larry took over the front and kept the pace reasonably high most the way to corner 2. Once we made the turn at corner 2, I became more aggressive about moving up towards the front. Coach had stressed the importance about being at the front going into corner 3 and especially negotiating the double S-bend just prior to corner 3 so I was extra vigilant about making sure I was in the top 5 through this section. In fact, once we made the turn at corner 3, I accelerated and found myself at the front of the pack. A quick look back showed Phil on my wheel so I kept the pace high for the 1.6 km until the base of the climb, intending to maintain a steady pace all the way up the climb where Phil could stay on my wheel and conserve his energy. Apparently, the other 80-10 riders who flew by me at the base of the climb had not subscribed to my game plan. By the time I crossed the start-finish line at the top of the hill, a small gap had formed to the group of 10 or so riders who had made it more quickly to the top of the climb. I closed the distance between myself and that group and humbly settled myself in behind, taking in huge gulps of air as I attempted to recover from the brutal assault on my system that was climb 1 of 5. As I started on lap 2 of 5, I took stock of my situation. It was time to re-evaluate my game plan.

My new and improved game plan for lap 2 had me conserving energy, not just on the 1.6 km stretch prior to the climb but also the 10.3 km before that as well as the 400 m climb itself. But I still wanted to help Phil so when I saw a lone ride break away and gap the peleton with Phil at the front, I rode up beside Phil and asked him if he wanted me to close the gap. Phil didn't seem concerned: "Nah, let him hang out there for awhile," was his response. So, I did but not before taking a decent pull on the front to relieve Phil. But once we made the turn at corner 3, I went back into energy conservation mode.

I continued my strategy of energy management on laps 3 and 4 and the pattern was much the same. For the first 10.3 km, my energy output was very low. It tended to increase significantly for the 1.6 km section leading up to the climb and then became high but sustainable for the 400 m climb itself, aided somewhat by being able to latch onto the steady wheel of JJ Woodley each lap. I did feel somewhat ineffectual as a team mate to Phil but my revised game plan was to "keep my powder dry" until the final lap where I fully expected to be able to devote my full potential in working for Phil. The fact that Larry was spending a lot of time at the front bolstered my decision to save my energy.

Energy expenditure (in Watts) for the first 10.3 km section of each lap, the 1.6 km section leading up to the climb and the 400 m climb itself.

Lap	First 10.3 km	1.6 km leadup	400 m climb
1	177	338	459
2	172	253	443
3	110	276	435
4	116	288	446
5	132	353	462

The table above details my energy expenditure for each lap of the race. A few patterns emerge. Clearly, for the first 10.3 km, the peleton were out for a Sunday ride, for the most part. Apart, from the first two laps where I took a couple of pulls, my energy expenditure during this 10.3 km section was in the low Zone 1 range. My average wattage is typically higher for an easy recovery ride. Things changed once we made the turn at  corner 3. Thereafter, the pace jumps up into high Tempo to Threshold range until the climb where there is a maximal effort well above supra-threshold level. It was my 338 Watt effort during the 1.6 km leadup to the climb, followed by a 459 Watt effort up the climb itself that caused me to revise my race strategy at the start of lap 2; there was no way I could keep that effort up on every lap. And in fact, as you can see from the table, my effort leading up to the climb was much more reasonable on laps 2-4, enabling me to save something for the climb itself. My effort on the last lap over this section is another story.

Going into the last lap, I was fairly pleased with my revised game plan. Larry had done a pretty good job of controlling things at the front where ever he could, thus relieving Phil of some of the burden of that task, so I hadn't been missed there. Furthermore, I had saved a lot of energy by hiding in the pack for much of the race. I was still reasonably close to the front of the peleton and felt confident in my capacity to be able to help Phil on that final lead up to the climb. Leading up to corner 1, the pace quickened somewhat which was to be expected on the final lap. We made the turn at corner 1 and I accelerated in order to defend my position. The pace of the peleton slowed predictably after 400 m or so and quite suddenly a half dozen riders went by me. This wasn't good. I looked for a means of moving back up but I was against the invisible yellow line and for me it was not an option to cheat my way towards the front. We made the turn at corner 2 and again another 6-10 riders raced by me. "No worries," I thought, "I should be able to move up once the peleton strings out approaching the double S-bend." But as we approached the double S-bend, the peleton remained all grouped together; there was no thinning out until the bends itself. I thought a couple of times of taking a risk to move up: once while riding alongside the shoulder, I had a thought to move up along the shoulder itself and during the S-bends I could have risked moving up but both moves would have risked not just my own safety but the safety of others so I held my position and as we exited the second S-bend, I glimpsed Phil up ahead, already making the turn at corner 3. By the time I saw him again, he was already in a small group that had gapped the rest of the peleton. So much for my revised game plan.

From corner 3 until the finish line, it became a strategy of minimizing my losses. Not much of a strategy really as it entailed basically riding as hard as I could to the finish. I thought in the back of my mind that I still might be able to gain a lot of positions back as I had been conserving my energy up until now. But apparently, some of the other riders had been doing that as well. Indeed, the table above shows that I saved my best until last both on the 1.6 km leadup to the climb where I average 353 watts and the 400m climb itself where I averaged 462 watts. For my efforts I was rewarded with a 10th place finish which is not bad I guess but once I had crossed the line, Coach made me feel like I had won the whole thing.

Huge effort at the finish line.

Regarding my objectives for the race, I flopped completely. Chalk it up once again to in-experience. I am learning something every race and I know for next race what to do differently: stay at the front for the whole of the last lap. It is one thing to conserve energy where ever possible but I'm thinking the last lap is the place to use that energy. For the team as a whole, however, we had a pretty decent showing. Phil just missed out on a top-five finish, placing 6th place, but he did take second in the King of the Mountain points. And his girlfriend Jen, took 3rd place of the Elite 3 women. So two podium finishers. In the new sportif category, Marek placed 4th with Wes coming in 9th. I don't know what happened to Stan and Andy in the Masters 1 race. I'll have to get the story some time during the week.

Jen takes 3rd in Women's Elite 3.

Phil takes 2nd in KOM points at Niagara.

Here are the results of the day:

Sportif Men Results - 24.6 km - Average Speed 33.7 km/h

4

205

12099

KRZTON, Marek

9

214

12098

ERENBERG, Wieslaw

Master 3 Men Results - 61.5 km - Average Speed 36.0 km/h

6

34

74360

HODGKINSON, Phill

10

35

74633

WESTWOOD, Richard

24

32

75252

BRADLEY, Larry

55

31

74639

BERRY, David

58

33

74517

DAVIS, Martin

Master 3 Men - KOM Results

2

34

HODGKINSON, Phill

Elite 3 Women Results - 49.2 km - Average Speed 32.5 km/h

3

207

75432

FAWCETTE, Jennifer

Master 1 Men Results - 98.4 km - Average Speed 37.9 km/h

PUL

118

74390

BLAZEK, Stanislav

PUL

119

74412

D`ANGELO, Andy

Springbank Crit 2012

Five O'Clock in the morning was early to have to be up for a race. I've certainly been up that early before for running races and especially triathlons but it had been awhile. It was probably harder on Jon as he often doesn't even get to sleep until much before then. Shortly after 5:30 we had the bikes loaded on the back of the Hyundai and were on our way to London, with a brief stop at Tim's along the way for breakfast and a coffee.

By 7:30 AM, we were at Springbank Park in London, picking up our race numbers with enough time for a few laps around the 2.2 km course to warm up. Martin and Phil had arrived earlier and were already on the course warming up when we arrived. We did our final warm up lap together with Martin and I couldn't help but note that, judging by the sheen on his face, Martin appeared to have been working very hard during his warm up.

My goals going into this race were pretty much the same as for Tour of Bronte: gain more race experience, ride aggressively, help team mates where feasible, and finish with the pack. A fifth goal was to get some good training in. I had done a solid 100k ride with my FMCT buddies the day before, with plenty of Tempo riding, so I was treating this as a training race of sorts with no expectations of a top placing.

Martin and I lined up along the front row of the start line (just below and slightly to the left of the 'A' balloon in the map above) with Jon just behind me. Phil was also on the front of the start line but further to the right. The "gun" went off, and as is becoming a habit, I didn't get clipped in right away during which time at least half the field passed me... again. The same thing happened at Tour of Bronte but there I was able to get back to the front without too much difficulty.  At this race, not so much. There are 2 corners on this course that were tricky. The tight left-hander at corner 1 was one of them and I had to brake going into the first turn, braking hard enough that my rear wheel slid sideways which apparently unnerved Jon a bit. I think he found somebody else's wheel to follow after that. This slow down was followed by a brutal acceleration as the peleton raced onto the fastest part of the course, a sweeping left-hander that descended towards the river. Here, I had to dig extra hard due to the accordion effect which tends to exaggerate deccellerations and accelerations for riders at the back, I thought to myself "this is not where I want to be". With speeds close to 60 kph, this section of the course is very fast but also narrow, making it hard to move up along this section. As if the downhill wasn't enough for pushing up the speed, we had a tail wind all along the section which made the top speed even faster. There was little chance of moving up along the section by the river; the speeds were just too fast and the course too narrow. The uphill at the end of this section was one place where it might be possible to move up but everyone was digging deep at this point so you'd have to burn a lot of matches to try and move up there. The steep uphill is followed by the second tricky corner on the course, a sharp, narrow dog-leg that turns away from the river and begins the return trip towards the start-finish line. From here until the start-finish straight, the course sweeps left, uphill and again I found myself having to dig deep following the predictable slow down at the dog-leg. Just before the start-finish straight is a chicane which is the third tricky place on the course as 50+ riders vied for the best line through the chicane and. again, I was subjected to accordion effect. I managed to get through the chicane successfully but still near the back.

Lap 2 was more of the same. I was at the back and working hard because of it but experience told me that things would begin to settle down in a few laps after which time I should be able to move up. By lap 3, my patience was beginning to run thin and I began to actively look for places to move up. As we sped down the fast, narrow part of the course, I did manage to move up a few and was positioning myself to move up around the sweeping left hander when suddenly the pack slowed quite dramatically. A rider in front and to my left swerved across my line, forcing me to change and just like that I was heading for the curb. Maybe I panicked a little but I have been in enough motor cycle crashes to know that if you're going to fall it's better to do it on your own terms. I braked hard just before the curb, practically dove over the handlebars, and did a rolling Judo roll onto the soft grass, bringing my bike safely along with me and managed to come out of the incident completely unscathed. In hindsight, I could have tried to jump the curve, which I'm sure is something Stan or Coach would have done, but I didn't think that fast and my bike handling skills aren't yet at that level. As I righted my bike at the side of the road, the peleton rode away without me.

For the next lap and a half, I chased the peleton and it wasn't long before I began to pickup some stragglers. The first guy I picked up was a Reynolds Cycle rider and the two of us began to work together. We picked up another couple of riders in short order and about a lap later, I saw Jon who had been dropped from the peleton somewhere before the chicane. I yelled at Jon to jump on as we went by and then we were five. I figured with 5 riders, we should be able to get a decent rotation going and actually entertained some ridiculous illusion of catching back onto the peleton. But our rotation wasn't very organized. Two of the riders had clearly been dropped from the peleton for a reason: they were weak riders and they frequently abstained from taking their turn at the front. This tended to affect the rhythm of our rotation. To make things worse, the Reynolds rider, though strong, wasn't very experienced in echeloning and would frequently pull to hard when it was his turn at the front, instead of easing up, causing the rest of us to have to dig deep to catch on. The end result that, as a group, we disorganized and not really moving that fast. It wasn't long before we were caught and lapped by the peleton. I tried a few more times to get our group organized but in the end determined that I was better off just taking long pulls at the front. After a few such long pulls, there were three of us left: Jon, the Reynolds rider, and me.

With 5 laps to go, I'd had enough with the futile attempts at echeloning and just stayed at the front, put my head down, and went into time trial mode. It wasn't long before I was alone, having lost my 2 remaining companions, including, unfortunately, my son, Jon. I covered the last 5 laps pushing 288 watts at an average of 37.2 kph. Compared to the 41.5 kph at 270 watts I output while with the peleton, I was fighting a losing battle but I'd signed up for a race and was determined to put in a race effort. I finished 6:19 behind the peleton. As it turned out, Jon had slipped off my wheel because of a gap left open by the Reynolds rider but he continued to work hard and finished only a minute or so behind me. I kind of wish now that I'd sat up and waited for him. But one thing I've learned about cycling is you do a lot of second guessing yourself after the fact.

Phil accepts his 4th place prize.

Phil and Martin both each had a good race with Phil taking 4th place of the M3's and Martin coming in 8th spot. After the race, the four of us, Martin, Phil, Jon, and I, compared notes. I expressed my frustration at once again having difficulty during the early laps of the race and received some helpful advice from both Phil and Martin. Martin's advice was to get in a really good warmup. I thought back to the sheen on Martin's face prior to the race and realized that this was advice he himself heeded. And it seemed to be working for him. Phil's advice was to practice clipping in. This definitely is one source of my poor starts and something I'll consider going forward. Phil also mentioned using Speedplay pedals which he finds easier to clip in and this may be something to consider going forward also. There are so many things to learn in cycle racing. Every race is different and many factors can affect one's race outcome.

I didn't do so well at meeting my objectives at this race. I didn't finish with the pack but I did ride aggressively. I didn't exactly help out my team mates though I did help Jon for awhile until dropping him with 5 laps left to go; that part wasn't much help, I'm sure. I did gain more race experience, to be sure and I definitely did get in some good training. Next race is the Niagara Classic, the third O-Cup race in the series where, once again, it will be back to the drawing board.

2012 Tour Of Bronte

Ok, so because Larry's race report pretty much covered what happened during the intermediate race at the Tour of Bronte, I wasn't going to bother finishing mine. But then, Wes had taken to many great photos, I felt I just had to get a few of them in.

I have to confess, I was ambivalent about signing up for this race, especially with much of the course being on gravel, but I signed up anyway realizing I could use the race experience. My objectives going into the race were: finish with the pack, trust in my fitness and ride strong, be a good team mate where ever the opportunity presents itself, and just get more race experience

Originally, this race was to have all the usual categories so I should have been riding in the M3 category but due to low registration, the organizers eliminated the usual categories and instead hosted only 3 categories, a beginner, intermediate, and open race, with the aim of increasing the field size for each race.

I had originally intended to buy some wider 25C tires to ride with a little lower tire pressure than usual to improve traction and handling on the gravel but, as with so many things these days, I never got around to it and so ended up racing on my skinnier 23C tire with the usual 110 psi.

The race didn't start until 12:30, as opposed to the more usual 8:30/9:00 AM start times I've gotten accustomed to, so there was lots of time to get ready. I picked up Larry about 10:15 and we drove down to the west end of Oakville together, found a place to park not too far from the park (I parked offsite to avoid the $16 park entrance fee ), and rode into the park carrying most of our gear on our backs. We arrived at the race site before 11:00, in time to see Coach and Wes setting up the Team Kurzawinski tent. Gotta like having your own tent at the race.

Larry, Coach, and me chilling in front of the Kurzawinski tent, prior to race start.

With plenty of time until the race start, Larry and I registered then went out on the start-finish stretch to warm up. I had learned from last race, Calabogie, the importance of warming up before and not during the race. After the warmup, I lined up along the front with Phil, feeling relaxed and ready to start the race until Phil pointed out that I still had my jacket on. It was too warm a day to be racing with a jacket. "Oh crap," I thought and rode back towards the car to ditch my jacket. Halfway to the car, I ran into Coach and was able to dump the jacket with him. By the time I got back to the start line, pretty much everyone else were lined up and I was stuck at the back. When Coach saw me lined up at the back, he coaxed me into weaseling my way up to the front, on the grass but just off the pavement. I felt a bit cheesy for doing that but at least I was lined up at the start.

Larry and me at the back end of the pack for the start of the race.

When the gun went off, I was slow getting clipped in, and with the fast pace typical of the start of these race, I dropped quickly back through the pack and was soon hanging near the back. But such was the nearly 2 km length of the start stretch that I was able to get reasonably close to the front again before the first turn

Tour Of Bronte Race Course

Our race had between 50 and 60 riders and consisted of 8 laps of the 8 km course for a total of 64 km. The first part of the race course is a nearly 2 km stretch of mostly good pavement. The first turn marks the transition from pavement to gravel so it's one place to watch out for. The next 3 turns on gravel are close together and are tight and slow. Corner 2, in particular, we were warned about as a potentially incident-prone corner. After the first 4 turns, the course is fairly fast, even for gravel until just past the registration area where there is a rather tight left-hand turn with plenty of gravel. My first time through, I took this turn on the inside and ended up bumping elbows with at least one rider. And judging by the verbalizations, a few people were having trouble with traction.. Thereafter, I chose to take this turn more towards the outside where the gravel wasn't as loose. Once past the registration area, there were a couple of tight left handers before the course went back to ashphalt just before the park entrance. The asphalt part of the course mostly consisted of a long out and back from the park entrance down one side of a divided roadway and up the other side until the turn back onto gravel at turn 1.

In front of the registration area, approaching the tight left-hander.

As is becoming a pattern, I struggled the first lap, mostly hanging off the back of the pack. But once my metabolism had gotten up to speed I began to ride more aggressively and closer to the front. By midway through the second lap, I had made my way to the front and was there when Phil made it into a break of four. I eased my pace a little to give the break a chance as did the rider on my right who must also have had a team mate in the break and it was probably a good couple of hundred meters before anyone behind us caught on. By the time other riders began to come around us, the break had a decent enough gap that they were able to stay away.

Having a team mate in the break meant that Larry and I weren't expected to take a turn at the front and for the next 3 or 4 laps, we really didn't have to work that hard. A team Novo rider who was taking turns joked about having to "bump me off". I laughed and just enjoyed my free ride while it lasted.

About lap 5, our free ride ended as came up behind Phil. At the time, I didn't know whether he had fallen off the back of the break or had an incident but it turned out that he had crashed on turn 2 with one other rider in the break and wasn't able to catch back on. Unfortunate because now it meant we had to do some work up front.

Phil trying to catch back onto the break away after crashing in turn 2.

For laps 6 and 7, in an effort to try and close the gap to the break, the peleton was able to get organized, thanks to a couple of more vocal riders, and we got an echelon going along the paved section and we began to make good time. Not everyone took part in the echelon but Larry, Phil, and I all contributed. The problem is that this organization only lasted for the paved section. Once we got to the gravel section, the organization fell apart and the pace slowed considerably. I tried to get something going but just ended up off the front by myself. Clearly, we weren't going to catch the break away group.

I think it was probably midway through lap 7, just after passing the registration area that Phil told me we'd lost Larry. That was unfortunate; he'd been riding strong up until that point and it would have been nice to have him for the run-in to the finish. Towards the end of lap 7, with one lap to go, I rode beside Phil and told him I'd try and "lead him out" for the finish. He replied that we could try that. I made sure to stay up at the front for that last lap and as we came onto the paved section I was in a prime position. I had taken note of a few of the stronger riders in the group and fully expected someone to jump at some point along the finish stretch. The jump came a bit earlier than I expected but I was ready for it. With about maybe 500 meters to go, a Vinybilt rider jumped. I was on his wheel right awa with Phil behind my wheel, both of us perfectly positioned for the sprint finish. Unfortunately, somewhere along the way, I swerved for some reason which caused Phil behind me to also swerv and he ended up on the grass, losing his momentum for the sprint. So much for team tactics (sorry Phil!). With about 250 meters to go, a Peterborough Cycling club rider jumped strong but this time I wasn't ready. I tried to get on his wheel but his kick was too strong. ut I didn't give up and kept pushing, gradually closing the gap. Unfortunately, I ran out of road and wasn't able to close in time. I was beaten to the line by a wheel.

Just missed taking 3rd spot but also fortunate to hang onto 4th.

Stan was in the parking lot as I rode in and he asked me how I did. "Fourth place," I said. "No wayyyyyyyyyy," he replied. I didn't think 4th place was a good result as it wasn't a podium position but it turns out prizes were awarded 8-deep for this race so I did end up on the podium after all. Cool!

After the race, Larry and I hung around to watch part of Stan's open race. I thought, our race was fast. Those guys were even faster... and their race was longer. I've got to hand it to those Elite 1/2 and M1 guys, they race at a pretty high level.

Stan, second from left, lined up for the start of the open race.

We stayed for about half of the open race, enjoying the warm spring day and then it was time to leave. All in all, a pretty successful race for me. I finished with the pack, got some valuable race experience, rode aggressively, and was even able to help my team mate get into the break. Maybe there's hope for me yet!

A little clowning around time with my team mate, Larry Bradley.

Calabogie Race Report

Calabogie is a tiny resort town about one hour north-west of Perth, ON. Located on the shores of Calabogie Lake, it boasts some modest downhill ski facilities, a year-round resort, and a race track. Given that the town is  situated in the middle of no-where, I suppose it's a good place to put a race track what with the noise and all. The noise wasn't at all that bad though for the second of eight OCA O-Cup races. A year ago, this was Phil's very first road race so I had heard a lot of good things about the race.

It's about a six hour drive and 420 km from Brampton to Calabogie. Jon and I were up at sunrise, packed, and out of the house by 8:00 AM for the drive to Markham to meet up with the rest of the Kurzawinski crew for a 50k tune-up ride starting at 9:00 AM. It was only 55k but I found the ride to Musselman's Lake, tougher than it should have been. I averaged only 157 watts, which is indeed indicative of a recovery ride effort but, for whatever reason, it was an uncomfortable effort for me. Nevertheless, I got through the ride and by 1:30, following "breakfast" at MacDonald's, we were on our way to Calabogie. By 9:00 PM, after a stop in Belleville for groceries, we arrived at Jockos Beach Resort in Calabogie.

Phil had booked two chalets at the resort. One of the chalets served purely as a sleeping area while the other chalet served also as the communal kitchen, dining, and bicycle cleaning and repair area. Though dinner was served on the late side, it was good. Coach made a salad and some chopped steak, Andy fried some salmon steaks, I made spaghetti with homemade tomato sauce and Jen made herself generally useful with just about everything. Phil brought out some of his Mom's home baked cookies. It was a good team effort. After dinner, Coach made us clean our bikes.

I had some last minute brake pad replacement to do and Jon's rear derailleur needed adjusting so now was a good time to do this. While Coach helped me to change my brake pads, Stan helped Jon with his derailleur adjustment. What should have been simple maintenance tasks quickly turned into a maintenance headache. Testing of my brakes following  pad replacement revealed a frayed rear brake cable. Coach had Stan take a look. The interesting thing about Stan is that, though he undoubtedly knows some really choice Czech curse words, he prefers to curse in English. So there was no mistaking the frustrating Stan was going through as he worked on repairing my brake cable. But eventually he got it working well before turning his full attention to Jon's bike. More cursing. Jon's bike derailleur was just not behaving as it should. "What the ..." Stan was getting frustrated again. And then the source of the problem revealed itself as the rear derailleur cable broke. It had been frayed and close to breaking which was the source of Stan's frustration at being unable to properly adjust it. The next problem was trying to remove the end of the frayed cable from the shifter. It was really jammed in there. More cursing! Eventually, Stan hit on the idea to loosen the rear brake cable and this allowed him access to the frayed cable end. Problem solved, new cable installed and Jon was back in business. I definitely owe Stan a huge thank you for the work he did the night before our race.

The alarm went off far too early on Sunday morning after what turned out to be a rather late Sat night. I got up and stumbled my way over to the next chalet in order to start breakfast going. I entered the "communal" kitchen to find Jen already up and making coffee. Trying not to get too much in her way, I gathered the things I needed to start breakfast and proceeded to make the pancakes and eggs. It wasn't long before Coach arrived to cook the bacon and make sandwiches and after wolfing down some breakfast and coffee, Phil, Jen, Dave, Martin, Jon and I headed over to pickup our numbers for the early race.

Registration went fairly quickly and we were soon on our bikes "warming up" in the parking lot. It became readily apparent that the North by North-West wind was going to be a factor in the race. The wind also made the cold a lot worse than it would have been. After only 2 laps around the parking lot, I went back to the car to keep warm reasoning that I could use the early laps of the race to "warm up". A big influence on my reasoning was my experience from the Good Friday Road Race, two weeks earlier, where I found the pace to be agonizingly slow. Mistake #1.

My experience from the Good Friday Road Race had influenced me more than I realized as it had given me the false impression that I was stronger than I really was. So in the days leading up to race #2, I began to think about how I could use that strength, along with Phil's strength, to forge a "break" from the main peleton. If you think about something long enough, it can seem like reality even if unproven. Such was my mind set going into this race. And, in part at least, it influenced my race decisions. Instead of my focus being on "hiding" from the wind and "keeping my powder dry" so to speak, I rode more aggressively, even testing the waters periodically with a few faux attacks. As it turned out, the dynamics of this race were completely different from that of race #1 and I made a number of mistakes.



Whereas, the race course of Good Friday RR was rectangular and hiding from the wind was easy, this race course was a highly technical 20-turn race course where hiding from the wind would prove to be elusive for all but the most experienced racers. Another major difference was the absence of the yellow line rule. At the Good Friday race, the yellow line rule had the effect of making the road very narrow and not easy to move up. Whereas this course, with its wide open road allowed riders to "move up" almost at will. This made keeping one's place in the peleton extremely difficult. A third major difference was the speed of the peleton in this race vs race #1. In the first race, the average speed was 36.2 kph compared to an average of 39.3 kph for this race. This race was much faster and it felt like it.

Mistake #2 was not making more of an effort to hide from the wind was due in part to the nature of the course, as described above. In part it was due to my being somewhat "gun shy" about merging with the peleton due to my crash during the 1st race. And in part it was due to my being overly aggressive during the early part of the race. Whereas the wind in race #1 wasn't really much of a factor, for this race we had a 25 kph N wind. And because of the many turns throughout the race, you'd have the wind coming from the left at one point and a few hundred meters later it could be coming from the right. Switching from one side to the other wasn't an option at the speeds we were travelling unless one was fortunate enough to be hanging off the back of the peleton (more on this later). This meant that, to hide from the wind, one had to ride in the middle of the peleton, sheltered on both side by other riders. I was not comfortable doing this instead preferring the comparitive safety of one side or the other. But this cost me in terms of not hiding well from the wind. I mentioned how the more experienced riders were able to find shelter even on this difficult course; several times throughout the race I noticed Martin staying up near the front seemingly effortlessly obviously sheltered from the wind. I would have done well to stay on his wheel.

Mistake #3 was being too aggressive from the start. In part this was due to the effort required to stay near the front and "out of trouble". As discussed, the pace was much higher at this race than the 1st. Also, you had riders taking advantage of the wide open road to freely "move up" at will and I found myself frequently having to go into the "red zone" in an effort to stay ahead of these other riders. On top of this, unlike race #1, there were several attempts during this race by other teams in the race to launch a break. On such occasions, the peleton would pick up the pace in order to "shut down" the break, once again requiring an intense effort to stay at the front. And finally, I my mind set of thinking I was stronger than I really am caused me to try a few efforts of my own to test the peleton's resolve and this too wasted precious energy as I took a few forays off the front. Such was the case that by the end of lap 6 of 11, I was feeling like this was turning into a really hard race and there were still 5 laps to go.

It was somewhere around corner 6 of lap 7 that I found myself at the back of the peleton. I had intended merely to take a bit of a breather but found myself quickly at the back. I wasn't in any hurry to work my way back to the front and decided to see what it was like back here. It turned out to be quite a nice place to be. For one thing, it was quite easy to hide from the wind. If the wind was a headwind, I had the whole peleton ahead of me to hide behind, If the wind was from the left, I simply moved to the right corner. If the wind switched to coming from the right, I simply moved over to the left corner. There was a lot of flexibility in hiding from the wind at the back of the peleton. I rode the rest of the lap at the back and conserved my energy. By the end of the lap, I started to feel like some strength was returning but still knew that this was one of those days where I just didn't have the legs. As we rode past the start-finish line though, I thought I heard Coach yelling at me to get moving and I cringed at what he must be thinking with me sitting at the very back.

For the next 3 laps, I sat at the back and had a free ride around the race course. It wasn't until the beginning of the last lap that I began to think about where I might move up for the sprint finish. On previous laps, I'd observed that the long stretch from corner 15 to 17 (see map above) would open up as the peleton tended to cut the corner at 16. This afforded a wide open space on the right where I was confident of being able to muscle my way to the pointy end of the peleton. While it would require burning some energy, I had been conserving energy for the last several laps and felt I had some energy to burn. About halfway through the last lap, I began to plan my attack, moving over to the right hand side of the course inching forward in preparation for my move. I was perhaps a third of the way from the back of the peleton when, just before corner 12, my plan came to a sudden stop. A couple of riders came together and at least one went down on the right hand side of the road directly in front of me. I put on the brakes (which thanks to Stan worked well) and came to a stop just before reaching the downed riders. I was able to stay on my bike, move onto the grass to get around the downed rider, and get going again but, being stuck in 53/12, it took me awhile to get going again and by this time the peleton was well up the road. I gave it a valiant attempt to catch back on, putting out close to 500 watts for over a minute, but it soon became clear that my race was over. In the end, I crossed the line with Dave (who had also got derailled by the crash) in 37th place.

As we crossed the line together, I saw Coach on the ride side just past the finish line. I was feeling pretty dejected, half expecting to get scolded but instead Coach was jumping up and down, excitedly screaming "We won, we won... Phil won!". I couldn't believe it. The winner of the Good Friday Road Race for the past 3 races was in this race and seemed really strong so anyone able to beat him had to be on his game. But Phil had done it. "This almost makes up for my terrible race," I thought. That thought quickly dissipated. No, it was still a terrible race performance. But Phil had won and that made me feel good. Congrats Phil!

Phil times it perfectly for the win.

So, it's back to the school of hard knocks next Sunday for the Tour of Bronte.

Phil accepting his well deserved win.