Carolina Masters put on a clinic today plain and simple. The way they're riding right now there's no doubt that they could do some damage in the regular P,1,2 field. All 6 or 7 or 8 of them lined up on the start line and from the gun they were launching bombs. The first 25' we were close to 28 mph and my IF was pegged at 1.0. Let's just say it was pretty dynamic but our OSB team was always in the mix. I was actually feeling good and had pretty good legs today...for a while.
Ryan Jenkins and another guy ended up in a break (Karl came sooo close to bridging...Arrrgh) then CM sat on the front and aggressively covered any and all attacks. At this point as a rider you can choose to just sit in the field and follow CM around riding easy tempo on the front or you can do what you came to do and actually race your bike. 98% of racers will amazingly choose the first option.
Very quickly the break got to about 2' and I knew that without some form of chase that they'd be long gone. And this was only in the first 20 miles of a 90+ mile race. So after Karl did a monster pull (he then disappeared to recover) I found Robert and we went to the front and basically did a 2 man TT and began to *very* slowly bring the break back. I tried to go pretty hard on the climbs to limit the attacking which was fucking up the chase. Also kudo's to CM for letting us do our thing without interference. I didn't think we'd actually make the catch but just wanted to keep it close so LL had a chance to get across later in the race.
Now I know that a lot of guys just do these races for fun/exercise and to just sit in...but in a field of 50+ guys it's ridiculous that not ONE other rider from another team came forward to help with the chase when Robert and I were killing ourselves on the front for 45 minutes. If you're reading this and were in the race: LAME!
After 20+ minutes of chasing I was getting pretty fried so I told Robert that I was done and drifted back into the field to rest. Unbelievably Robert stayed on the front drilling it solo for the next 20 minutes. That was impressive to watch.
At about mile 40-something I knew that I wouldn't survive the next 47 mile lap as I was already cramping...I gave LL and Karl each a bottle then picked up one at the feed zone and did one last chase back to the field and gave it to Robert.
My day was done. Eventually LL got 9th and Robert 15th...CM went 1,2,3,4. Ugh...
Saturday, April 10, 2010
Rock Hill RR
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5 Comments:
Preach it, brother. You did good work today.
I have said this on every forum I can find. Without Robert, Karl and you, Ryan would have won by 10'. Several riders commented on how great the OSB guys were.
I truly believe people are scared of CM. (Maybe we all should be.) But when they have one guy solo up the road and 3 guys on the front and the rest of the field is rolling around....I just don't understand. Great job! Thanks for the work. Ryan within sight with 20 miles to go. You did your job!
What are these forums of which you speak, Mr. Lumpkin? I need more sports on the web to go waste time upon!
Good pics from Eddie Helton here:
http://picasaweb.google.com/Eddie.Helton
yours, email to JC...
are there any others that really matter?
Hey boys-Phil from Window Gang here. I missed the race, but your commentaries are truly great reading. I agree with you that it seems everyone just rolls over as soon as CM attacks. If there were a few more teams like yours willing to chase in earnest, the racing would be so much more exciting and less lopsided. Whenever I see you all in the next race I get to, I'll be right there with you in the chase! I have no teammates most races, but hate nothing more than to sit in and watch the race ride away from me. Good work!
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