Bailing Out

So what happened in my crit?

OK - I'm back home, back to work (thud) and still getting back to normal. So, some time to update what happened....

On Saturday afternoon I raced the National Masters Criterium championships, held in the town of Bacchus Marsh, Victoria (about 90 minutes drive North West from Melbourne). But before my race there were plenty of others, including Tanya's race in which she rode exceptionally well in a decent sized and quality field (which was good to see) and she finished up winning the Bronze medal. All that aerobic training paid off! That capped a great week for Tanya after her Gold medals at the track in the Derby and Scratch races and Silver in the 500m TT.

So my race was looming and as always I start right at the front of the field. These races can be all over red rover in the first lap if you are not attentive.

Here's a map of the circuit:

The orange shows the circuit used and arrows indicate direction. The double corner at the right (Grant St end) was the trickiest - not overly technical but with riders taking some interesting lines it made it a challenge. Certainly any race finishing in a bunch sprint would mean position exiting these corners would be critical.

I kind of figured that made the race a bit of a lottery, so I decided the best thing to do was what I normally do in these races and stay at the pointy end as much as possible, keeping in the top 10 riders and make sure I was going to be in any serious break. I pretty well managed to do that for most of the race.

Several riders attempted to force a break but there were enough willing workers to shut down any attempts (including one by yours truly) but no-one would keep an effort going. Lots of other shadow boxing along the way but nothing was sticking so it was going to end up in a bunch gallop, hence positioning was going to be critical.

With a lap and a bit to go, I was 6th wheel, pretty well perfect position to move up to 2nd or 3rd wheel before entering the final turn and to have a great shot at the sprint. I hit that double corner for the 2nd last time and, well, I left just enough space for someone to attempt an inside run (my mistake), got a bump and had to take evasive action, skipping up and over the side of a strategically placed bail of hay covering the street sign and gutter.

It was a pretty funky maneuver which entertained the crowd and would have made any MTBer proud but the end result was I was now about 15th wheel with a lap to go. Sod it!That's no man's land I'm afraid and by the time I got to exit that last corner the sprint was already well and truly on and 50 meters up the road.

Did I have the legs? Who knows? Nevermind.

Race stats are nothing to shout about - to be honest I didn't think it was all that hard a race.

Crit Nationals 31 March 2007:

CTL:_________80.2
TSB:________+23.8
Duration: ____42:38
Work: _______731 kJ
TSS: ________72.3 (intensity factor 1.009)
Norm Power: 313
VI: __________1.09
Distance: ___30.03 km

_________Min__Max__Avg
Power:____0__1190__286__ watts
Cadence:_23___128___95__ rpm (includes zeros)
Speed:___4.5__54.8__42.3_ kph

What now?

Well they say there's no rest for the wicked. Well since I'm not wicked, I get a couple of pretty easy weeks before it all starts to wind up again in prep for the Worlds in October!

A bit of time to do a season review, sort out the forward race calendar and fix all those things that need fixing. Including a PT track hub that's toast I think....