Westlake Village RR Victory. it’s fun to get it right!
Posted by: tjwoodruff in UncategorizedIf last week’s road race was a lesson, then today I totally aced the test. For the first time on skinny tires I brought home the W. I used the same game plan, but this time no one was going to take advantage of any tactical mistakes. Here is the recap:
So we have a couple mile roll-out to the 7.5 mile course. We did six laps which equated to about 50 miles of racing total. Halfway through the loop there was a mile long climb at a 5% grade. Other than this single climb, the course was rolly and divey with a lot of fast cornering. The final 1000 meters to the finish was quite technical with a hard right turn downhill followed by a fast 90 degree left turn, setting things up for a 200 meter downhill finishing straight. So now that you know the general layout, here is how it all played out.
Laps one through four were all quite chill. Each lap I’d sit in the bunch only to ride at the front on the climb, setting the cruise controller at about 350 watts. This was just enough to hear some bigger dudes breathe hard while some pretenders fell off the pace. By the end of lap four, the lead group was down to about 18 guys after this consistent pace setting on the climb. On a flat section of lap five one guy rides off the front and we let him go. I haven’t seen him near the front on the climb, so I wasn’t too concerned. We get to the climb and I stomp on the gas to get things going as usual. All of a sudden a younger rider from Bakersfield totally got on the throttle, going wide-open. I was there to grab his wheel as we rocketed away from the field. After about five minutes at 400 watts we summated the climb. Somehow Mitchell, the GC leader and pro Devo racer, also bridged up to make it a three-man group at the top.
We rotated nicely on the downhill and soon picked up the solo attacker. All of this time we are being chased by a fourteen man group which included about five guys from the Cadence team who had totally missed out on this break. Nice and fast rotations went on as we maintained about a 20 second advantage over the group to finish out lap number five. Through the start finish area I won the bonus sprint to pick up five seconds on the GC clock. More rotating and smooth pulling kept our break alive, but eventually our solo-attacker dude could only manage to sit at the back. “Whatever, we’ll ditch him on the climb if he can’t ride� I say to myself as we switch into a three person rotation. We are now on the climb for the final time and the Bakersfield rider gets antsy and goes on ahead by himself, riding super (too) hard. I led Mitchell and the previously non-working rider up the climb. Somehow he dug deep to stick on, and even put in a few efforts to help pull back in the Bakersfield guy on the downhill.
With only about two miles to go we are four riders all together, really pulling hard now since the fourteen guys are literally just 10 seconds back and looking mad. Somehow we hold them off until about 1000 meters to go and by this time we were really flying. Our rotation turned into each man for himself and I worked hard to get second wheel position as we approached the technical S turn descent to the line. A quick look over the shoulder confirmed that the group was now 18 riders once again. I really went for it up a little rise to get the holeshot before dropping into the corners. The Litespeed Siena was on rails as I totally pinned the line through the corners, setting me up perfectly for the 200 meter dash. I jumped out of the saddle and was in the perfect gear, laying out a healthy 1000 watts for the last ten seconds crossing the line in first.
Wow, that was awesome! The additional ten seconds for the win moved me into fifth for GC on the weekend and also added another $50 to my pocket. I’m really starting to like this road racing stuff… I honestly feel stronger each and every weekend that I line up and the power numbers confirm that this is true. For now I’ll keep a good thing rollin’! Keep it Real, -TJ
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