Last saturday marked my return to road racing. I have stayed away from road racing for awhile now, mostly because it's hard to fit into my schedule. And also because it scares me a little - the first road race I ever entered ended with me in a 5 person pile up. One of the seat stays on my road bike got bent (fortunately it's a steel bike and was easily repaired), my rear wheel needed to be rebuilt and my handlebars and cables needed to be replaced. I was barely able to walk for two days due to a sprained hip and was off the bike for a week. It took me over a month to fully recover (I had also sprained my wrist and bruised my ribs).
The next two road races I did didn't go so well either - the first post-crash rash was only three weeks after the crash and I still hadn't fully recovered. The next race was difficult for me mentally - I had trouble staying in the pack - especially on the downhills - due to the fear of crashing again.
After that I pretty much stopped road racing. It was a pretty demoralizing experience and when you combine that with a 6:30am starting time (meaning I'd have to wake up around 4:30am) it was very easy to miss races.
But that all changed last weekend. The Kissena Cycling club organizes races in Prospect Park during the summer months and I decided to sign up. I prepaid online to make sure I'd go. I woke up at 4:30, had some breakfast and headed to the park. The guy at the registration desk recognized me from the track and I'm sure he wondered why I was in the Cat 5 field. He handed me my number and I wandered around to say hello to my friends who were also racing.
It came time to line up and I noticed that Alex "Thunder Thighs" was in the Cat 5 field. Surprising, to say the least, as he is a Cat 4 track racer who rides in the A group and often places. But he was pretty much in the same boat that I was - neither of us did much road racing and so we had to work our way up.
The race started off easily enough - the pace was pretty comfortable and I spent most of the time near the front of the pack, mostly as a precautionary measure in case there was a crash. Alex was also at the front of the pack, and decided to attack. I responded and got on his wheel but we only got a gap of a maybe a hundred meters and the pack quickly caught us.
And that was pretty much how the rest of the race would go. Alex would attack, I would respond but we would fail to make a break. We must have attacked three or four times. Alex is an incredible sprinter but it seems that breaking away is his weakness.
On the final lap there was a crash. Fortunately it was on the uphill and also fortunately, it was behind me. I heard the unmistakeable sound of metal twisting and bodies hitting the ground. I took a quick look backwards but then thought better of it and just continued forward. Immediately after the crash this one guy at the front launched an attack. I told Alex to let him go, figuring that we would catch him later. However after almost half a lap he had gained an impressive lead and Alex sprinted to catch up to him. When the pack reached the downhill I started picking up the pace to catch the two of them. I ended up pulling the pack up to them and losing all my energy in the process. Alex and I ended up finishing towards the back of the pack.
Despite my overall poor performance at the finish of the race I had a lot of fun. I don't take Cat 5 races that seriously and I don't take road racing that seriously either. It was nice to break up the monotony of pack riding with some (failed) attacks. Next time I'll probably just sit in the pack until the end, but I don't regret the strategy that Alex and I employed.
Saturday, June 30, 2007
RASH
In an effort to deliver more content to you, the consumer, I figured now would be a good time to post the short film RASH, which I co-directed and starred in. It is a parody of the trailer for the film MASH, made in San Francisco about fixed-gear culture.
While making this film with my friend Lee we discovered the sub-sub-sub culture of roller riding/racing. While we were aware of it before hand, having experience with GoldSprints and seen videos/pictures of Dave's roller racing machine, it had never occured to us that there was a real "culture" behind it all. I hope to further document it in a less tongue-in-cheek manner in the future.
Rollers are and will continue to be an important part of my training.
While making this film with my friend Lee we discovered the sub-sub-sub culture of roller riding/racing. While we were aware of it before hand, having experience with GoldSprints and seen videos/pictures of Dave's roller racing machine, it had never occured to us that there was a real "culture" behind it all. I hope to further document it in a less tongue-in-cheek manner in the future.
Rollers are and will continue to be an important part of my training.
Friday, June 29, 2007
Thursday morning River Road
The past three Thursday the usual Thursday morning group ride has consisted of riding along River Road and then taking 9W back to the GWB. This has turned out to be much preferable to our previous rides to Piermont in the morning. True, we don't get to stop for breakfast halfway through the ride but the scenery is nicer, the hills are more intense and the route is much shorter. I end up getting back home between 8 and 8:30am which gives me plenty of time to shower, eat and take a nap before work.
Last week Dave showed up on his uncle's Pogliaghi track bike. Kurt and I were both on road bikes. As soon as we got to River Road it basically became a solo ride - Dave zoomed ahead as usual while Kurt and I struggled to catch up. Kurt is a pretty cautious descender however, so I dropped him on one of the longer downhills.
Eventually I caught up to Dave. He had stopped to wait for us by the little cabin on the 180 degree bend of Alpine Road. Dave went down to the bottom of Alpine Road while Kurt and I headed to the top. Kurt and I wondered aloud how long it would take before Dave passed us. Kurt and I made it to the Court house at the top of Alpine Road and waited for Dave. Once we were all together again we got on 9W to head home. Dave took a bunch of photos that can be found here.
Yesterday, of course, was another morning group ride. This time Dave didn't show up and Kurt is on vacation in Mexico. However Lee was back and he met up with me in Brooklyn. We both had decided to take our track bikes. We headed up to the GWB while I attempted to get in touch with Drew. Drew wasn't answering his phone so I thought it would just be the two of us until we got two blocks from the bridge and Drew called me. Unfortunately I had never communicated to Drew that we were on track bikes so he showed up on his roadie.
We all made our way to River Road. Without Dave it wasn't a hammerfest so we stayed together for the most part. I would often end up a few hundred meters behind on the descents as I was the only one riding brakeless and the ground was still wet from the thunderstorms the night before.
We got to Alpine Road and decided to head down to the bottom. We took it easy going up but it was still painful. Alpine road is about a mile and a quarter and averages about a 7% grade. I was in my track gearing (48x15, 84") so I spent most of it out of the saddle.
After the ride I had breakfast with Lee and then headed to work. I felt surprisingly good - usually after the Thursday morning ride I'm really tired and a little bit sore. At first I wondered if perhaps riding my track bike had anything to do with it. Does it fit better? Do I recover better mashing up hills instead of spinning? Then it hit - the races on Wednesday night were cancelled!
Last week Dave showed up on his uncle's Pogliaghi track bike. Kurt and I were both on road bikes. As soon as we got to River Road it basically became a solo ride - Dave zoomed ahead as usual while Kurt and I struggled to catch up. Kurt is a pretty cautious descender however, so I dropped him on one of the longer downhills.
Eventually I caught up to Dave. He had stopped to wait for us by the little cabin on the 180 degree bend of Alpine Road. Dave went down to the bottom of Alpine Road while Kurt and I headed to the top. Kurt and I wondered aloud how long it would take before Dave passed us. Kurt and I made it to the Court house at the top of Alpine Road and waited for Dave. Once we were all together again we got on 9W to head home. Dave took a bunch of photos that can be found here.
Yesterday, of course, was another morning group ride. This time Dave didn't show up and Kurt is on vacation in Mexico. However Lee was back and he met up with me in Brooklyn. We both had decided to take our track bikes. We headed up to the GWB while I attempted to get in touch with Drew. Drew wasn't answering his phone so I thought it would just be the two of us until we got two blocks from the bridge and Drew called me. Unfortunately I had never communicated to Drew that we were on track bikes so he showed up on his roadie.
We all made our way to River Road. Without Dave it wasn't a hammerfest so we stayed together for the most part. I would often end up a few hundred meters behind on the descents as I was the only one riding brakeless and the ground was still wet from the thunderstorms the night before.
We got to Alpine Road and decided to head down to the bottom. We took it easy going up but it was still painful. Alpine road is about a mile and a quarter and averages about a 7% grade. I was in my track gearing (48x15, 84") so I spent most of it out of the saddle.
After the ride I had breakfast with Lee and then headed to work. I felt surprisingly good - usually after the Thursday morning ride I'm really tired and a little bit sore. At first I wondered if perhaps riding my track bike had anything to do with it. Does it fit better? Do I recover better mashing up hills instead of spinning? Then it hit - the races on Wednesday night were cancelled!
Thursday, June 28, 2007
Has it really been three weeks?
It's been awhile since my last post on this blog. I've been really busy at work, but that is NO EXCUSE. There should be nothing more important in my life RIGHT NOW than my blog...err...my hour record attempt.
Rather than try to document what has happened in the last three weeks with regards to my training and racing, I'm just going to pick up from last nights track race. Or lack thereof.
It was extremely hot and humid out yesterday, 91F with close to 100% humid. Threats of thunderstorms in the late afternoon. I decided to err on the side of hope and bring my track bike to work. After a somewhat productive day of work, 5 o'clock was quickly approaching so I headed out. I stopped at Conrad's bike shop in Tudor city to pick up a tubular tire as I have run out of spares (I ride this bike once a week and have flatted more in two months than I have on my other two bikes in six months). Unfortunately Conrad's only had Conti sprinters in stock which are $70 - more cash than I had on me at the time. The guy at the shop recommended a can of sealant instead so I bought a can of fast air.
From Conrad's I started heading towards the Queensboro Bridge where I was to meet up with a few other races. I ran into Ken on Third Ave. and we headed uptown together. And then it started raining. We both looked at each other but kept going. By the time we got to the bridge (about 5 minutes later) it had stopped raining. We met up with Luke and Todd and started riding.
When we got to Flushing it started pouring. We stopped under and awning and waited it out. The rain tapered off pretty quickly - about ten minutes later. At that point we were all pretty sure the races were going to be cancelled and that we would be the only people at the velodrome but since we were so close we decided to soldier on anyway.
Upon arriving at the track Ken through his hands up in the air as if he had just won a race. There were people at the track! A few racers and the officials were huddled in the storage container seeking shelter from the rain that had just passed. Ultimately Alan decided to cancel the races. I took a few laps on the track anyway where I was amazed to see a pheasant walking around turn two. When I got close he/she flew away.
We were all waiting around at the track hoping it would dry up enough to do some unofficial racing, however every five to ten minutes it would rain and then stop. Eventually people started leaving so a group of us - Ken, Luke, Kym, Dan and myself - left to go home. And that's when it started to rain. And I mean rain. Lightning flashed and thunder cracked. And then Dan got a flat. Kym and I stopped to wait while he fixed it as the lightning creeped ever closer.
Kym started getting freaked out by the lightning as it was only 2-3 kilometers away (2-3 seconds inbetween lightning and thunder). At one point she suggested we hitchhike, to which Dan replied, "Come on, we're hardcore bike messengers and computer programmers!" Thanks for remembering me Dan!
I made it home soaked and feeling great.
Rather than try to document what has happened in the last three weeks with regards to my training and racing, I'm just going to pick up from last nights track race. Or lack thereof.
It was extremely hot and humid out yesterday, 91F with close to 100% humid. Threats of thunderstorms in the late afternoon. I decided to err on the side of hope and bring my track bike to work. After a somewhat productive day of work, 5 o'clock was quickly approaching so I headed out. I stopped at Conrad's bike shop in Tudor city to pick up a tubular tire as I have run out of spares (I ride this bike once a week and have flatted more in two months than I have on my other two bikes in six months). Unfortunately Conrad's only had Conti sprinters in stock which are $70 - more cash than I had on me at the time. The guy at the shop recommended a can of sealant instead so I bought a can of fast air.
From Conrad's I started heading towards the Queensboro Bridge where I was to meet up with a few other races. I ran into Ken on Third Ave. and we headed uptown together. And then it started raining. We both looked at each other but kept going. By the time we got to the bridge (about 5 minutes later) it had stopped raining. We met up with Luke and Todd and started riding.
When we got to Flushing it started pouring. We stopped under and awning and waited it out. The rain tapered off pretty quickly - about ten minutes later. At that point we were all pretty sure the races were going to be cancelled and that we would be the only people at the velodrome but since we were so close we decided to soldier on anyway.
Upon arriving at the track Ken through his hands up in the air as if he had just won a race. There were people at the track! A few racers and the officials were huddled in the storage container seeking shelter from the rain that had just passed. Ultimately Alan decided to cancel the races. I took a few laps on the track anyway where I was amazed to see a pheasant walking around turn two. When I got close he/she flew away.
We were all waiting around at the track hoping it would dry up enough to do some unofficial racing, however every five to ten minutes it would rain and then stop. Eventually people started leaving so a group of us - Ken, Luke, Kym, Dan and myself - left to go home. And that's when it started to rain. And I mean rain. Lightning flashed and thunder cracked. And then Dan got a flat. Kym and I stopped to wait while he fixed it as the lightning creeped ever closer.
Kym started getting freaked out by the lightning as it was only 2-3 kilometers away (2-3 seconds inbetween lightning and thunder). At one point she suggested we hitchhike, to which Dan replied, "Come on, we're hardcore bike messengers and computer programmers!" Thanks for remembering me Dan!
I made it home soaked and feeling great.
Friday, June 1, 2007
More training, more track racing
Last monday I attempted to start training twice a day. I was able to pull it off on monday, but on tuesday I had to work late and wanted to get to be early to make sure I got to work on time on Wednesday. I'm racing every Wednesday night of course, so I don't do any training on Wednesday. Thursday morning was the usual group ride to piermont and by the time I got home from work on Thursday I was dead tired. It is now Friday and I spent this morning doing laundry as all my bike shorts/bibs needed washing. To make matters worse I got doored on the way to work this morning and while I'm relatively okay, I'm probably not going to be able to train tonight.
But enough excuses, on to the reports:
On my way to the track on Wednesday, when I was about a mile or two from the velodrome, I flatted. More specifically, I flatted a tubular. I rode the flat the rest of the way and set about changing tires. It took me awhile to pull the old tire off as the glue had really set but I eventually got it off. I pulled out a tube of track rim cement and started smearing a layer on my wheel, getting my hands nice and sticky in the process. I got out my spare tire and started putting it on the rim. In the process I managed to get a ton of dandelion seeds stuck to my rim and had to pull them off as best I could and reapply the glue. At this point some of the guys who hang out at the track saw me struggling with the tire and gave me some help/suggestions and soon enough I had the tire on.
By the time I got the wheel back on my bike the officials were already having the Men's B group lining up along the rail. I pinned the number to my jersey as quickly as I could and threw my jersey on. Of course I had pinned the number too tight and it ripped out of two of the pins. I managed to re-pin it and get on the rail just before the race started (and thanks in part to Sam telling Alan to wait for me).
The first race was a point-a-lap race. Will from the DC team made a break rather early. I decided to chase him. I caught up but was unable to pass him and we eventually got caught by the pack.
A scratch race was next and after an uneventful 8 or 9 laps I ended up boxed in just before the sprint and came out in 6th place.
The Men's B feature race was a points race with 4 sprints. Will and I decided to try the break-after-the-first-sprint strategy. It kind of worked. Really all we accomplished was splitting up the field into a five person break and everybody else. Of course the three people who responded to our break ended up taking most of the points on the next two sprints. Right before the bell lap I decided that enough was enough. I wanted to at least get some points during this race so I started sprint right out of turn 4. No on caught on to my attack. I managed to keep the intensity high for the next 500 meters and easy formed a large gap between myself and the other 4 people in the break. I won the final sprint but ended up in third (I think) overall.
Thursday morning meant another group training ride to Piermont. The landslide that had closed River road had finally been cleared so we took the more scenic, hillier route. Dave and I decided to TT up Alpine road. There was an article on NY VeloCity about this road and how the time it takes you to get up it correlate to how many watts/kilogram you can output. Dave finished in 5:22 and I finished it about 40 seconds later. According to that article that means Dave can output about 5 w/kg while I can output about 4.5 w/kg.
While on the way home from Piermont there were four of us left (down from about eight) so we tried a double paceline. We managed to keep it pretty well organized for a good amount of time and effortlessly maintained a 27/28 mph pace.
I was planning on racing in the Empire State Games qualifying race tomorrow however due to my injuries from getting doored (some bad bruises) and the fact that most of my friends have decided not to race, I think I'm just going to sleep in and hopefully do some training later in the day.
But enough excuses, on to the reports:
On my way to the track on Wednesday, when I was about a mile or two from the velodrome, I flatted. More specifically, I flatted a tubular. I rode the flat the rest of the way and set about changing tires. It took me awhile to pull the old tire off as the glue had really set but I eventually got it off. I pulled out a tube of track rim cement and started smearing a layer on my wheel, getting my hands nice and sticky in the process. I got out my spare tire and started putting it on the rim. In the process I managed to get a ton of dandelion seeds stuck to my rim and had to pull them off as best I could and reapply the glue. At this point some of the guys who hang out at the track saw me struggling with the tire and gave me some help/suggestions and soon enough I had the tire on.
By the time I got the wheel back on my bike the officials were already having the Men's B group lining up along the rail. I pinned the number to my jersey as quickly as I could and threw my jersey on. Of course I had pinned the number too tight and it ripped out of two of the pins. I managed to re-pin it and get on the rail just before the race started (and thanks in part to Sam telling Alan to wait for me).
The first race was a point-a-lap race. Will from the DC team made a break rather early. I decided to chase him. I caught up but was unable to pass him and we eventually got caught by the pack.
A scratch race was next and after an uneventful 8 or 9 laps I ended up boxed in just before the sprint and came out in 6th place.
The Men's B feature race was a points race with 4 sprints. Will and I decided to try the break-after-the-first-sprint strategy. It kind of worked. Really all we accomplished was splitting up the field into a five person break and everybody else. Of course the three people who responded to our break ended up taking most of the points on the next two sprints. Right before the bell lap I decided that enough was enough. I wanted to at least get some points during this race so I started sprint right out of turn 4. No on caught on to my attack. I managed to keep the intensity high for the next 500 meters and easy formed a large gap between myself and the other 4 people in the break. I won the final sprint but ended up in third (I think) overall.
Thursday morning meant another group training ride to Piermont. The landslide that had closed River road had finally been cleared so we took the more scenic, hillier route. Dave and I decided to TT up Alpine road. There was an article on NY VeloCity about this road and how the time it takes you to get up it correlate to how many watts/kilogram you can output. Dave finished in 5:22 and I finished it about 40 seconds later. According to that article that means Dave can output about 5 w/kg while I can output about 4.5 w/kg.
While on the way home from Piermont there were four of us left (down from about eight) so we tried a double paceline. We managed to keep it pretty well organized for a good amount of time and effortlessly maintained a 27/28 mph pace.
I was planning on racing in the Empire State Games qualifying race tomorrow however due to my injuries from getting doored (some bad bruises) and the fact that most of my friends have decided not to race, I think I'm just going to sleep in and hopefully do some training later in the day.
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