Iowa receives a taste of Team Wheaton
with Eck and I blowing off our corporate responsibilities in order to get down early enought to scout the Snake course and get a short ride in. The expo center in Burlington was rockin’ and the beers were flowing with some live music riverside. Normally I’m a sucker for that kind of stuff but we had other thoughts on our mind and after watching some of the road race finishes, headed to the hotel to clean up and then off for some wannabe Mexican.
Saturday – The Snake Alley in Burlington
Saturday morning arrived too early with Eck needing to get breakfast in before 8 so he wouldn’t puke on his 1st shot up the hill. The rains were looming in the forecast but he managed to get a race free of precipitation. He did a great job hanging on for half the race but his enormous proportions eventually worked against him. A rider from EMC out of CA kinda walked away with the thing in the end. Eck finished up in 11th and I got a new appreciation for suffering in the faces of numerous riders. New rider Jessie D raced just ahead of Eck’s group and placed 10th in the women’s 4’s. Pretty impressive for a first year racer so we’re looking for some great results from her during the season. Ben drove down from WI that morning and lined up for the 30+ race, only to get totally soaked. He’s still in training mode and it’s a long way to drive for training but he rode his own race and forgot about everything else. I didn’t get to see his event since I was warming up. The Snake Alley climb isn’t for the weak of heart and certainly not for those weak on training miles. His heart got him through all 12 laps in flying colors. While Ben was racing I later determined I should have been practicing my manners and my clip-in procedures because they were both Cat 6 quality. I whiffed 2 times at the start, dropped some words not appropriate for this site, then whiffed a third time for good measure. Follow that with some guy crashing right in front of me before turn 1 and I think I started the climb virtually dead last. I’m attacking the climb trying to make up as much ground as I possibly can but when I crest I see the leaders are already down the hill around the corner. I already know it’s going to be a long day. I try to recover on the flats hoping I can just attack the climb each time and make up ground. I was only semi-successful managing a 24th place which is a far cry from what it could have been. A horrendous headache plagued me from about lap 8 till the end and I almost pulled the plug on the whole mess but knew I needed to finish what I started. Tomorrow would be a new day.
Sunday – Melon City in Muscatine
Once again, the morning on a holiday weekend arrives too soon because Eck’s got the early call again. Cool route in Weed Park that reminded me a lot of the rolling Muskego or Whitnall courses with a longer climb built in. Another course that didn’t really suit Eck proportions but he made the best of it. The EMC rider that scalded the Snake course the previous day used the hill to his advantage with 3 to go getting a gap which Eck tried to bridge with 2 to go and got little help closing so the guy managed to hold about 13 seconds of space to win and in the process shattered Eck’s hopes of a decent finish. Jessie toes the line in the women 4’s again and from my perspective found this course more to her liking. Always hanging with the pack on the climb it appeared she was having a good day. Only a small selection was able to ride away putting a small gap on the rest of the field on that last lap but she held in there for a 6th place finish. Ben was hanging around to do the 30+ and Eck decided to jump into that race with us too. We figured the hill would suit me pretty well and they’d work to set me up for the last lap. The course didn’t offer much for breakaways since the field would completely fly on the downhill carrying it all into the climb negating anything tried on other portions of the route. I’d faded towards the back at one point and Ben told me he had the rear covered so I needed to move up. Thanks, Ben. So we’re into the last lap and Eck gives me the nod to look for his wheel on the downhill but there’s traffic keeping me from getting a clear shot and he said I had that look of despair on my face (in fact, I did but I still had something left for one last push). I still manage to get a few wheels back and Eck’s got it pegged for the run into the climb. I get a fairly clean line to the outside but I’m on the wheel of a guy who fades rather quickly and there are 6 guys moving pretty strong up the hill while I’m trying to find room to maneuver around. I’m hoping I can get up and past a few of them through the chicane because it’s a short sprint to the finish. I’m only able to get past one and land 6th but in the money. A bit better luck with the tactics and we might have been able to post a better result.
Monday – QC Crit the Rock Island District
I was going to be Eck and I doing battle as a duo on this 8 corner crit since Ben had to split. The M123 group was going to be fast but it was a course that reminded me of the Elkhorn course I won on last year and there was a vibe in the air. I think the beers I had Sunday got my mojo going because I was feeling strong right from the start. Eck and I were doing a good job alternating covers on what we thought might be credible moves. Mack had a full sqaud, EMC had a host of riders, Mercy and All9Yards had good showings. It wasn’t going to be tough picking up something that had enough horsepower to sustain a break because there were a ton of strong guys capable of making a go at it. On separate occasions, Dave and I both got on moves by the Mack strongmen only to have them totally let up. Not quite sure what the deal was with their tactics but we suspected they’d just send guys all the time because they had plenty. We both did a good job conserving the rest of the race and with a little over 2 to go a rider from Kovarus/Squadra Ovest went and I had been resting prior so decided to move up to him. I commented to him as I was rolling by that it was he and I but shortly after the start/finish area it seemed like he wasn’t holding my wheel and therefore couldn’t do any work. I thought to myself ‘this sucks’ but I’d laid the cards out and had no way to pull them back at that point. I just kept the pace up at around 26-27 hoping it would be enough to hold them off. I had a good block gap which amounted to maybe 10 seconds and it was cool with the crowd totally cheering me on. Unfortunately, I started to feel a little gassed coming around the 6th corner on the bell lap and eventually got caught going into the last corner with about a 200 yard sprint to the finish. So close is all I can say and if the Squadra guy would have been able to help a little it might have been successful. Turns out he was their sprinter and he thought there was only one to go when he made his move. It was still fun and I’m looking forward to it again in 2008.
Thanks to everyone who cheered us on during these events. Next year we need to take a squad to these events and bring home some $.