Concord Crit, Julian Gent, Cat 4, Aug 5
The only NEBC riders were Darrell and I. According to Bikereg there were well over 70 riders with more registering as I was retrieving my number. The race didn’t start off very well. There was no opportunity to ride the course before the race started per usual as the organizers were trying to stick to the schedule. I know I was surprised by the number of turns having never done this race before. One unfortunate rider ended up against a telephone pole on lap one. No idea what happened as I was near the front I just saw the rider being attended to on lap two. The area where the rider went down ended up being a sort of yellow flag zone with flag men standing in the middle of the road. After that two fire engines ended up blocking half the road. Why they need any fire engines for a bicycle crash is beyond me, let alone two. I just hope the guy is ok.
Anyway, back to the race, there seem to be a lot of reasonably strong riders in the cat 4’s who have no idea how to handle their bikes. They seem to be mostly on collegiate teams which is probably why we didn’t see much of them in the early season. They also seem to concentrate on riding near the front. I know some of them disappeared from the front about half way through the race only to reappear when the race was neutralized due to the fire engines leaving the course. I’m seeing the same riders week after week ride as if they are the only ones on the road. Really a pretty sad state of affairs for Cat 4 racing.
The ‘race’. I found the first half of the race relatively easy other than the poor riding, I stayed near the front along with Darrell. There were a few typical break away attempts that went nowhere. We were neutralized about ½ way through for a couple of laps. My body didn’t seem to like that as it took me a few laps to find myself once we got going again. By this time I had been shuffled back to mid pack. My original plan was to go for a prime ½ way through the race to test my sprint and timing. I didn’t end up going for a prime until 5 laps to go, due to the race being neutral half way through and finding myself. Probably a bit late to go for a prime but I was glad I did. I won the prime which ended up being a really cool Michelin T-shirt and Michelin socks. I was happy with the socks as mine always seem to disappear in the wash. While I was sprinting I felt the rear brake rubbing badly. That surprised me as I run my brakes loose. While I was off the front from the Prime sprint I turned my rear brake barrel adjuster in so that there was no chance it would rub in the final sprint, the QR was already undone.
After the prime and bike adjustment I slipped back in the pack. Three to go came up pretty quickly and I started concentrating on moving back up to the front and Darrell’s rear wheel. With one and a half to go I moved off of Darrell’s wheel and into the top ten. With three fourths of a lap to go there was a nasty sounding crash pretty close behind me, at that moment I hoped Darrell wasn’t in it. Half a lap to go and I was third wheel with the people in front dying quickly not really where I wanted to be. A surge of riders came by on the left so I jumped onto them. Gary from Thursday night CRW rides was right there. Second to last corner yet another crash, from what I understand a rider just lost in the corner. Final corner and the sprint was on. Three riders went left, four went right, I went right. The three on the left took the top spots while I took fourth, Gary ended up fifth. Pretty much a photo finish so I’m a little disappointed but fourth isn’t too shabby either. More importantly Darrell didn’t go down. I’m really discouraged with the crash fests lately. I don’t recall the 4’s being this poor last year or earlier in the season. Not certain what else we can do about it, other than to keep yelling at them and informing the officials like we have been doing.
Sorry for the novel, hopefully we had better success at Bow.