Author

Bill Seliger on Mar 27, 2009

Race name: Kevin’s Crit Thursday 3/26/2009 Race date: Friday, Mar 27, 2009

I raced (well, started) Monday and Tuesday night and due to the triple witching effects of bad tactics, being under the weather and being out of shape I blew up very early (that’s my story and I’m stickin’ with it). After being lapped early it was all I could do to still pedal my machine enough to stay upright. Much thanks to Matt who valiantly contributed to the Sisyphean task of giving me a wheel to help me to continue moving in a forward direction!

Congratulations to Dave for 1st place Wednesday night – I heard the pace was impressive for that race. I took Wednesday night off to make some music (banging on drums is the other thing I do in my spare time when I’m not raising a 9 year old daughter). The recovery time was well spent and good for my body as I appeared to have come back tonight improved. (The freshly shaved legs no doubt helped as well…)

Thursday night’s race started slow and I decided it was best to hang at the back of the pack. The group did eventually ramp up to speed (likely from the multiple attacks that Matt and Sean were laying on at the front of the pack; I wasn’t able to witness these attacks firsthand from the lanterne rouge position but did experience the effects of them). I was in the back third most of this time which gave me a good opportunity to get more comfortable cornering in a large group as well as getting some fartlek whenever the pace picked up out of a corner. After 30 minutes a few riders trickled off the back of the pack; I was among this inauspicious group. Soon 4 of us grouped up and worked rather well together, each taking half lap pulls (were all of mine into the wind or did it just seem that way?) and managing to stay less than half a lap off the main field. All that wheel sucking for 30 minutes left a little in the tank to participate in a sprint - I took a close second in the sprint from this group.

It’s great to have this early season race available to us. Much thanks to Half Acre for their stewardship of this race – for my first race on the road I was impressed with how well it was managed, especially the easy registration process. It’s well located and the road was in good shape (I saw Half Acre out there Monday before the start of the first race brooming away what must have been lots of broken glass as well as shoveling up lots of other debris). It’s also quite picturesque - after I blew up Monday and Tuesday I had plenty of time to take in the sights of the beach, the lake and Gary, IN.

I’ll be back Friday night!