Another ECCC race weekend under the belt! This weekend we headed to Yale to race in the Bulldog's Lux et Velocitas race weekend. It wasn't tanning weather, but it was certainly a lot warmer and nicer this weekend than it has been in some time. The neat thing about these races is that they all happened within the East Rock Park in New Haven, CT. Everything had a very Euro feel.
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| Europe...in CT. This is almost the top of the climb where the finish is. |
Saturday we woke up at the crack of dawn to take a little 5am rendezvous in the van to preview the TT and circuit race course (the meat of both courses was the steepest climb in the park!). The TT course meandered below the access road to the climb before dumping us out at the gated entrance. Even in driving the climb, it felt fast – except for a nasty hairpin turn which surly would be a big watt burner. The finish was at the highest point in the park and overlooked the city of New Haven. It was calm and beautiful. The sun burned through the morning dew and there was still a slight chill in the air...but let's be honest here folks – it wasn't going to be that calm once the racing started up later that morning. After all, the slum lords of Killington were in town!
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A perspective of the hairpin turn! Photo courtesy of Nick Wimer (Dartmouth Cyclist).
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| Before the descent...with my newly acquainted MIT friend/enemy! She was strong and I'm glad I had the chance to work with her. |
Anyways, we remembered the trainers this weekend (hallelujah!), so I was able to get in a great warm-up. I blasted out of the start and my legs felt pretty lame the first five minutes of the race. It must have been my tongue dragging along beside me on the road as I attempted to take in more oxygen. I climbed the hill as hard as I could and managed to catch a few girls right before the line. I got 5th in the race – that's 5 up from my last ECCC race at Princeton, so I was most definitly pleased.
The afternoon's circuit race consisted of many ~4mi laps of pain. Just like the TT course, we rode the same climb then descended off the backside of the park on some gnarly hairpin turns that were blazin' fast. Once we hit the climb on the first lap, attacks flew left and right. I found that I was able to match them, and as the pack slowly broke apart I was up front in the breakaway with 3 other women. Heading into the climb on the third lap, one of them upped the pace on the climb before the hairpin turn and boom... in my attempt to match the acceleration I mis-shifted and my chain fell completely off. Just my luck!
My lactic-acid-brain struggled to comprehend this bizarre scene: the break which I had killed myself to be a part of now rode away in what seemed like slow motion, and here I was bent over my bike cursing and fumbling to put my chain back on. One other rider passed me before I got things running again. The moment I hopped back on my bike an MIT rider rode by, so I got on her wheel hoping we could bridge up to the now 4 man break. Unlucky for me, she refused to work with me because her teammate was in that break. I realized right then and there I wouldn't be seeing that lead group until after the race! Eventually though, she gave in and we worked together knocking off lap after lap, although I was still pulling her around for most of the race. I tell you what, that headwind was tough...
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| On the climb. I feel like I ascended that thing at least 100 times that day. Not too shabby, eh? Photo courtesy of Nick Wimer (Dartmouth Cyclist) |
Anyways, on the final lap I played it lame on the climb up until the last bend, then whipped out a sprint to get 5th. No way jose was I settling for 6th after pulling her around all day! That's bike racin' for ya.
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| The most fashionable cyclist award goes to these two McGill riders. |
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| The weekend of racing ended with a scooter, roller-blade, skate-board and longboard race. I think most of the boys on my team were out there on something with wheels other than a bike! Unfortunately, the UNH roller-blade duo won the 1 lap race... |
Sunday rolled around and I wasn't able to race in the crit because I had gotten tangled up in a crash descending off of the course after my road race on Saturday. I luckily walked away from the crash, but I was frustrated and in a lot of pain and just wasn't ready to head to Anaerobic-Ville the next morning in the crit. I'm not easily bummed, but I found that it was hard to watch my race on Sunday from the sidewalk when I wanted to be in there takin' names and ripping off legs.
Anyways, the next race is Battenkill (boomboomboom!!) on 4/12 followed by
the ECCC West Point race on 4/15.
Here's to road rash!
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