Turtle Pond Elite Women’s - 4-25-09
Our first official team race started another season off with a bang!
Congratulations to Shannon Madison and the NEBC cat 3-4s for making it a double NEBC women’s day! [3/4 report in the works]
Clara Kelly (1st), Brooke O’Connor (4th), Rebecca Wellons (6th), Susanne Delaney (7th), Natalie Dumont
How it unfolded
Lap 1: Susanne and Brooke held pace at the front of the group the first time up Oak Hill (neutral start). At one point, Brooke had to tell Susanne to slow it down a bit as Susanne was climbing well. After coming up over the top, the race was on and there was the nice long downhill for a couple of miles. Pace was a bit too slow for Brooke on the downhill, so she half-heartedly decided to jump to see if she could mix it up a little bit (it IS a race after all). That attack came back very shortly afterwards and was countered by Rebecca. After passing the cemetery and turning onto Shaker Rd, Brooke decided to attack again to warm up everyone’s legs and make sure that no one was too rested for the next big hill. This ended up being a decisive time in the pack. Kat Carr (Sunapee) bridged up to Brooke and the two started working together knowing that they both had teammates in the field to block. Brooke didn’t think they could stay away for the whole race, but at least it was giving some action to the race and letting our teammates rest. Once we hit the 2nd (steep) hill of the lap, Kat fell off the pace, but Clara, Debony Diehl and Karin Holmes (both of Sunapee) bridged up to Brooke. Brooke told Clara to conserve her energy and Brooke pulled the next couple of miles down the hill to end the first lap.
Lap 2: Once we got going on the 2nd time up Oak Hill, Clara rode off into the sunset with the two Sunapee girls in tow while Brooke fell off the pace. The rest of the pack had splintered by this point. On the downhill, Brooke decided to wait for a lone rider named Melissa (moved to the area last year from WY). Then looked back again and saw the red and white of NEBC and told Melissa to wait so that we could get more horsepower. Rebecca and Susanne bridged up and the 4 were off, except Melissa couldn’t quite figure out the rotating paceline thing and kept surging ahead. It broke up our rhythm a bit, but also caused Melissa to waste more of her energy. We never caught Clara’s break, so we settled into our own pace.
Lap 3: Debony and Clara traded pulling while Clara was worried about how well Karin was resting up in the back of the group. Clara didn’t know that the 2nd Sunapee girl was Karin and she was concerned that it was actually Kristen Gohr (Colavita) who last year beat Clara a few times by sitting on her wheel and then powering around her on a short climb.
Behind in the second group, Brooke and Melissa kept the pace at the front of the small group up Oak Hill which unfortunately was a bit fast and Rebecca and Susanne dropped off the pace. Melissa and Brooke kept going for lap three while Susanne started feeling the need for more water.
Lap 4: Debony tried to get around Clara at the base of the long climb on the third lap (the steep bit). Clara was able to stay up and tried to maintain a good pace up the rest of it and over the top. Clara’s not sure what happen to her, but realized she wasn’t there when Clara was pulling the section after the descent. With maybe half a lap to go, Karin told Clara that she wasn’t feeling well and didn’t plan on sprinting if she made it with Clara to the finish. She hung on into the the final stretch and Clara didn’t see what she was doing when she started (too early) a sprint to the line for the win.
Behind, Melissa and Brooke made a pack not to kill each other on the 4th time up Oak Hill and stay together. On the final downhill before the finish, Brooke led at first, but then Melissa came around, so Brooke let her lead all the way until the 200m to go sign when Brooke easily sprinted around her to grab 4th place. Rebecca and Susanne finished shortly afterwards and napped 6th and 7th place.
Next team race is Sterling Classic Road Race on May 9th – hope to see many of you there, it’s a great course close to home!
—Brooke O’Connor
If you don’t try, you’ll never know what it’s like.___