A Podium for the Finale

Our season ended quite the bang at the USA Crits Final in Vail, Colorado with a 3rd and a 5th. With a 4pm race, both Kat and I drove up the day of, Kat with a hefty 7 hour drive, and me with a meager 3 hour drive into the heart of the Rockies. Fall has hit and it made for probably the most scenic drive to a race imaginable.

Ugly, huh? :)

It was a bit shocking with how narrow the course was. The rumor was the Corvette lead car had acquired some damage after leading a few of the fields and was out of commission for the pro races. When I say narrow, I mean, one pretty small lane wide...with big metal barriers enclosing the entire course. You can think yourself skinny, right? The course was also full of cobbles and manhole covers, and some roller-coaster like waves on the cobbles. Luckily the corners were sweeping and no real crashes resulted from the craziness of the course.

I wasn't anxious at all for this race...after a somewhat personally disappointing season for me with the shoulder fracture and trying to come back from that, I had no real expectations that I could break. I didn't really feel exceptional on the bike all week either. I wanted to enjoy the final race with Kat and enjoy some time off the bike and come back stronger. Zack found me and stood next to me on the start line and whispered "try going from the gun- I think that's the best for this course." Going from the gun has way fewer consequences than later risky behavior- plenty of time to get caught, plenty of time to recover too if you get caught.

A half lap in, I attacked hard. Another couple laps later, I hear Alison Powers behind me with Erica Allar. They had bridged. It was a decent gap and we worked together to really expand that. The field got close a couple of times, but then we lapped them with 35 minutes. I chose not to go for primes as I wasn't sure where my fitness was and was really focused on making the break stick and surviving.  Kat did an excellent job of playing defense and making sure nothing got up the road. Here is a good pic on Cycling News of the break: http://www.cyclingnews.com/races/usa-crits-tour-of-vail-2012/tour-of-vail/photos/240755

After we lapped the field, things were strange. It seemed game over for aggressive racing. After trudging slowly for a few laps, the attacks started flying from everywhere (Kat and I were both very much involved), with Erica Allar sticking on Allison Power's wheel wherever she went. Eventually Amity Elliot from Kenda was able to slip away and got 30 seconds on the field and held it. With two to go, thinking I'd be unable to outsprint Erica or Allison, I attacked and was brought back with 3/4 lap to go. I should have just continued to go all out but instead I pulled off and got stuck on the wrong side for the finish but finished 3rd. D'oh! Kat did excellent and snuck on the inside line and finished 5th, narrowing avoiding this pretty gnarly crash: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QAI48YtyPl0.

A podium finish to conclude the season!

Finishing 3rd and 5th was such a fun way to finish out what has been such a fun season, full of learning experiences with the new program, triumphs and tragedy. Racing is such an adventure. The word on the street is that they will be posting the race on YouTube in upcoming days :)