With a couple of years of road cycling under my belt and some modern equipment under my rear, I felt it was time to try out the whole road racing thing. I’ve always been intrigued by the sport, but it’s an intimidating one that’s not particularly welcoming to newcomers (information is difficult to find, communication is lacking, there are a lot of bad “heads” involved, and much more). Well, I got over all that and signed up for the 2013 riding of the Jefferson Cup, located just south of Charlottesville, VA.

Since many of my readers are not up on how cycling works, I’ll take a minute to explain. Cyclists are broken down into six categories, five through one and then “pro.” You start in five and work your way up. To move up from five (Cat 5) you either need to dominate or race in ten races to prove you’re not some idiot who is going to crash out folks who have put the time in to prove they know what they’re doing. From four and above, you only move up based on performance. I would be racing group five on this day and will be for the rest of the year (only seven races and zero domination scheduled).

The next interesting thing about cycling is that while is may resemble running from the outside, it couldn’t be further from it. In running, it really comes down to you against yourself. You know what kind of times you’re capable of putting up and you’re not going to deviate from your ability too much. Cycling is like high-speed chess. The guy with the strongest legs does not always win. It’s about positioning, teamwork, and timing. It’s you against the people around you, but rather than it being you against their legs, it’s equally or more so about you being against their minds. In preparation, I pounded through Racing Tactics for Cyclists late last week. I didn’t employ any of the methods as they’re not all that applicable to Cat. 5, but it did get me thinking about blocking, how we were being blocked and why.

Moving onto the race…. Three laps of a ten-mile “triangle” loop. After a five-minute warmup (I don’t like warming up and I also didn’t have the time due to some general stupidity on my part), we lined up for a neutral roll-out (no passing, low-speed) to the start line, which was 2.5+ miles away. The start was anticlimactic after hearing countless horror stories from friends. Rather than being a crashfest, it was a casual and safe roll, not too different from a weekend group ride.

The actual racing part? Well, in Cat. 5 a breakaway (small group or a solo rider who leaves the main field and attempts to go faster than them) rarely succeeds. Knowing that, I didn’t really pay attention to either of the breaks. The first only held a fifteen second gap, but did so for about a lap. That’s very silly of that rider; once you see you’re not getting away, it’s smart to come back and conserve energy… especially on a windy day like it was. The next break was again a solo rider who had about a minute on us, then came back to us, and then opened up a minute again on the final lap. Once everyone realized what team he was on, saw his teammate’s jerseys on a bunch of the folks in the front of the peloton (they were blocking by setting an artificially slow pace [but not slow enough to raise major alarms] for the group so he could get away), we knew we had to act . So I didn’t. The cardinal rule of road racing is to do as little work as possible via drafting. I wasn’t feeling like a million bucks so the job certainly wasn’t for me. Luckily, others ignored the rule for the greater good (big ups to my teammates John and Jim for putting some into this), and we caught him with about two miles to go.

I’ll reverse a mile on you for a quick second to share the most noteworthy moment of my race. With about three to go, the trailing motorcycle comes up alongside and tells the peloton how much time the solo breakaway had on us. I diverted my attention to him (he was literally next to me and I didn’t like it) for a split second and managed to find one of the two massive potholes on the course.  Marrow-jarring would be the best way to describe the hit. My rear derailleur untensioned somehow (I didn’t manage to fix it so I was between gears and popping back and forth for the finish) and my rear brake locked up and wouldn’t release (it did after a few hard stops and manual recentering). How I didn’t flat or crack some carbon, I have no idea; it was literally the hardest hit I’ve ever taken on the road and I’ve flatted plenty of other times for far less. The incident resulted me in dropping off the pack (to repair) and losing all focus. Not good with the race coming to an end. I fought back to the group, spending a bit more energy than I’d have liked to, but most important was that my head wasn’t where it should have been.

With half a mile to go, I slowly made my way towards the front of the group. Without our team being too familiar with each other, we were pretty much all soloists out there. Basically, find the rear wheel of someone who looks like they might have some good legs, stick to it, and beat them at the end. For the most part, it’s a game of luck, but there is skill involved in knowing where to place your chips. I found a pretty decent wheel, never knew exactly when to sprint, never really did, and finished in what appeared to be the top 10 (I counted seven or eight ahead of me) [confirmed]. My goal had been to simply finish with the pack and I not only did, but I finished near the front of it feeling like I had much more to give.

Another quick cycling lesson for those not in the know… While “Top 10” might sound awesome, it’s really nothing too special. If you don’t podium in a race and didn’t get dropped from the pack, you’re counted as part of the pack. With the way finishes go, it’s far too dangerous to grant any merit to anything over the top few spots. If the whole field were battling for every last spot, it’d be chaos. Instead, if you’re with everyone, you’re counted together. I will be noted with a “pack” finish. All I was hoping for, but don’t think I’m the next coming of the Lance.

While it was fun and I’m glad I did it, I will have to say it was a bit more boring than I had expected. Without large teams and coordination within them (just the nature of Cat 5), it was really just a fast group ride with a sprint at the end (like a group ride) that mostly comes down to luck. I’ll keep going at it because I love me some competition, but I will go on the record as saying that after a single race, I’m not gaga over it.

Up next are two more road races: the All American Road Race on the 20th, and the Poolesville Road Race on May 11th, both in Poolesville, MD.

As far as training goes, I’m officially calling “base miles” complete (yes, I know I’m a few weeks late on this). That’s the part of training in the off-season where you want to establish a foundation to work from. It’s a lot of mediocre miles (I’m about 1000 up on myself at this time last year), which for me came primarily on the trainer in our basement due to the cold, wet, and wind that was our winter. I know I’m not the best climber or sprinter so those need some work. Luckily, there really aren’t any races with serious elevation in my schedule so I can ignore the climbing bit a little, but it’s definitely time for some sprint/interval work. This past race, had I known how long and how fast I could go at or near top speed, the finish would have been a more conscious effort and maybe I would have come home with something shiny? Next time.

I’d be remiss if I didn’t mention the day Heather and I made out of our time in Charlottesville. Following the race, we visited two nearby vineyard/wineries (I never know what to call them); Trump (just okay) and Blenheim (very good), which resulted in us taking home seven new bottles to add to our already overflowing collection. A quick Yelp search put us at Maya for a great “southern” meal, and we rounded out the trip with a short stop to visit an old friend down the street who has started his own craft brewery in his backyard, Treehaus Brewery. Anyone who knows me knows I’m as critical as they come (hey, it’s my job), but I had nothing but praise for the work he’s done. All three of the beers we sampled were outstanding. I wanted some more body out of the one, but he was already working on it. I’m really excited for him to continue pursuing the dream and have to wonder if he’s taking on investors.

So, a great day. Nice workout, got the first-race jitters out, met some of my teammates, and made a good time out of a few hours in Charlottesville.