Tuesday Night Twilights #6: Ah, Youth

24 May 2011

Tuesday Night Criterium #6

Elite Race

Ah, Youth

Cooler temps prevailed on Tuesday as a great competitive group descended on the Fairgrounds to contest this twilight criterium. Notables on the start were a bunch of young elite kids, nervous and twitchy while Frank Ammirata made his abbreviated announcements: Two Firefighter's cycling U-23 espoirs (Goessling and one other kid), Livestrong's Ryan Eastman, and a Cal Giant rider showed up to join our competitive crew of Red Pelotonistas, Pistacchio, Boba and Echelon riders.

Once again (and I'm starting to expect this now) the pace exploded from the start, with the kids just killing it for the first couple laps. Like it was some kind of Olympic Sprint. I was afraid to look behind for fear of being the last guy as the pace was super high. 

Finally a lull in the baggare by the cycling youth brigade and immediately Sterling hits the gas at the front to try to snap the rubber band which is what is left of the peloton. At this point I think each of us remaining were busy dialing the combinations of our hurt lockers.

I think bicycle racing is a unique sport as so many things have to work pretty well all at the same time to get a good result: Tactics, mechanics, preparation, psychology. A little luck. Personally for me it seems like as soon as I have one thing nailed down some other floorboard warps up to screw things up. This is why I employ the "three excuses deep" philosophy. It's a great insulator against poor performance. Here, follow along with me, it's easy:

1. Overcaffeinated! I had just repaired my misbehaving espresso machine the night before. So of course Tuesday then would be a day dedicated to espresso-celebration, of course! A couple double cappuccini in the morning. Then right before leaving, ah why not have one more. A fourth doppio in the afternoon pretty much sealed my doom. I was a twitching, nervous human spasm throughout the race. Only today am I getting back to my "normal" level of nervousness.

2. Mechanical Idiocy! Although I'm pretty proud that I didn't screw up la macchina the night before, I did install some new Time cleats on Monday and forgot to grease the threads and torque on them really really well. As such the cleats held nicely during easy commuting, but come race night both sides loosened up nicely and whenever I needed to really punch it first the right shoe then both shoes slipped forward then backward under load. Now I'm not in software marketing and as such can't turn this bug into a feature. It honestly really screwed up my whole race.

3. Who needs a third excuse when your first two excuses are so damned solid?

Sometime in the center of the race I did find myself off the front with a firefighter and big John of Echelon fame and the break felt pretty good, but only a lap of freedom was allowed us on the windy course. We came back quickly.

Late in the race I think the Cal Giant rider and the remarkably-improving Alex Brookhouse (Echelon) went on a late raid and all it took was a half-lap of the best riders looking for the others to commit to pull them back, and that was all the freedom they needed. I think Sterling won the sprint for third. I tried sprinting with my new Vario-Dynamic™ Fore-Aft Randomizing™ Cleat System® but was unable to make much of a dent in what was left of the field and placed ninth or thereabouts.

Notes: A bunch of us "noodled" over to the Riviera where racers and fans get 50% off their pasta dishes on Tuesday nights. Enough montepulciano won as primes helped lubricate the evening (Thanks, Andy!). Also a Levi and Odessa sighting in what Matt Everson calls Sonoma County's cycling batcave. The night over, I tightened down my cleats and swerved home, Wes Montgomery, Eduardo Falú and Iva Bittova led the way past feral cats and rabbits.