I’m Back

The first of the Tuesday Night World Championships was tonight, and I found myself getting nervous and uptight all day long as I thought about it. This is really a stupid thing to get nervous about, since the Worlds are training races, and don’t count for upgrade points or anything. Nevertheless, I look forward to the races and my competitive spirit comes out.

My race, the “killer B” race, went off at 7, which meant it was a points race, with snowball points for the last five laps. Before the race, the more experienced racers outlined the team strategy to the rest of the team. We could not let any break get away without one of our team in it, and we had to protect our closers. I, as team captain and a reasonably strong sprinter, am one of our closers.

Our team strategy, surprisingly, actually worked tonight. One of our strong novices rode at the front of the pack for almost half the race, chasing breaks and setting the pace, just like we said he should do. He rode so hard, in fact, that he had to pull over near the end of the race to throw up. Despite this, he was extremely happy in a sort of demented way that he had pushed himself that hard. All of the veteran racers kept praising his efforts after the race was over, and he could not seem to get the huge grin off his face.

I was a little worried about my performance after the disasters of the last two races. To combat my problems, I have embarked on Project Overkill, in which I use every remedy known to cycling to take care of my cramping and dying during races. I am now on a regimen of Optygen HP. I now drink EFS, some ridiculously high-tech electrolyte replacement drink. I am stretching every single day despite the nearly deadly boredom that stretching inspires in me.

Either one of those elements in Project Overkill worked, or they all worked in combination. I felt good during the race, almost ridiculously good. My heart rate stayed where it was supposed to stay, and my legs never once felt sore, tired, or in imminent danger of cramping. I also raced fairly smart, staying near the front, but never burning up energy unnecessarily. My team also came through, chasing breaks down for me and setting me up for sprints.

In the first sprint of the evening, my chief leadout guy gave me a perfect leadout, and I followed his wheel until launching a ridiculously hard sprint. I cleared the line with about 50 meters on everyone else, and I increased my lead on the downhill. I thought I could solo in for the second sprint, but I got caught less than 200 meters from the line. At this point, I decided to catch my breath and let my heart rate drop back down to a more reasonable level. I let the next couple of sprints go by, and I started setting myself up for the final.

Going into the last sprint, two guys were hanging off the front by about 10 meters, followed by a long string of other riders. I was too far back at the halfway point, but started moving up on the right side, using my new and improved handling skills to move through small gaps. My leadout guy started pushing, and I followed him for a short distance, but decided that I needed to launch a long sprint to make it work. So I attacked from 300 meters out and passed ten guys in front of me and then set my sights on the lead guys. The second place guy was fading fast, and I hammered past him 50 meters out and managed a very strong second place finish. My points for the evening put me in third overall.

After the race, as we were hanging out and recounting our awesome exploits on the course, one of my friends (he rides for another team, but we’re more or less teammates despite that) said to me, “You’re back.” I am. I’m ready to race again.

EDIT:  Dorothy’s race report is here.  She rode one of the best races I’ve seen her ride.  She’s awesomely strong, and I’m looking forward to seeing her get even stronger this summer.