Dash for Cash and Dunlap TT

The guys raced at Dash for Cash and Dunlap ITT last weekend.

The Dash for Cash sounded totally nuts as usual. The team did well to grab several primes and be active the entire race. Despite solid teamwork, the end was insanity and the team didn't luck out with all the reshuffling. Below is Rand's Report.

At Dunlap, one of the strongest groups of local TT'ers in recent memory assembled to test themselves against the clock. Rand scored a top ten for W/AV while Health Net Pro Roman Kilun ripped off fastest time of the day on a fixed gear TT rig. Insane. Following the crit report is a TT report from Beebe.

------------------------------------------------------------
2008 ICCC Dash for Cash
May 31, 2008
P/1/2/3
Teammates: Lots. Aroussen, James, Tore, Neil, Bo, Chris, Graham, Elliot, Bob
Finish: 14th out of 130 riders (Official Results)

This was a well-played race by our whole squad, with everyone working well and keeping the pace fast. The race played out as it has pretty much every year I have done it: fast, with the crosswind and crazy cones/medians on the backstretch leading to a gutterfest every lap. For the first 20 minutes or so I was on the attack trying to stay out of trouble. There were 8 $40 primes available, so I thought it would be a good idea to get some of those as well, while still keeping some in the gas tank for the finish. Aroussen did a great job of nabbing two primes, while I made a solo move to nab another. Throughout the race, we had a solid presence at the front of the race, and all our riders were quite active. Crawford hit 90% of the cones on the backstretch and kept it upright. Aroussen went for a break with about 5 laps to go and got a decent gap, but was reeled in. Heading into the last few laps, we tried to get something of a leadout going, but the front of the race was chaotic. James got caught up on some bad wheels, and was boxed out of position. In the meantime, Tore was on the front drilling it for an entire lap. It was epic. After I couldnt find James with 1 lap to go, I tried to get into position for the sprint, got knocked around a bit with one corner to go, and sprinted for a mediocre 14th. The end of this race was really really nutso, with no order whatsoever and a lot of yelling and pushing and shoving. Awesome.

Overall, we had a great race, and everyone did what they needed to do. It was a really hard race to control, and unfortunately the cards did not fall in our favor. However, with a little luck in our next race I think we can execute.

Rand

-------------------------------------------------------------------
Race: Dunlap Memorial Individual Time Trial
Date: June 1, 2008
Course: 31K, loop with several turns
Category: P/1/2
Top Placing: Rand Miller in 7th of 31 (Official Results: Still waiting...)

The Elite Team made a showing at the Dunlap TT in Davis on Sunday. Rand Miller, Peter Cazalet, Jeff Williams and myself (Matthew Beebe) made the trip to see how we would measure up against a very strong NorCal TT field. Following on last week's Beat The Clock, this would be the last test before the District TT in Sattley this coming weekend.

The short and sweet version from Rand our top finisher on the day:
2 hours on trainer, 41:18 minutes on course, hurt really bad, didnt go fast enough to win, but didnt go too slow. Finished 7th out of 31 guys. Jeff made the solid observation that Disc Wheels sound really cool unless they are passing you. Jeff, Peter and Matt rode solid, looked sexy, and we all posed for the cameras. I think we looked good enough for the next GQ issue.

Extended remix from Beebe's perspective:
We all arrived in plenty of time to register, set-up the trainers and pin the numbers to the skinsuits and get a solid warm-up in. The sun was warm, but heat wasn't an issue so early in the morning. There was wind, but I for one found the direction somewhat difficult to determine and felt it wasn't so strong a wind that it would be a real deciding factor. Additionally, the course had several turns which would complicate things when trying to gauge efforts by predicting headwind sections. I did spend several minutes staring at the course map hoping to internalize it in order to use the turns to gauge my effort from a distance perspective.

I was happy to have a rabbit - someone starting before me (which often I don't get when they do alphabetical start lists). I arrived at the line with 5 minutes to spare. With several known very strong TT riders starting not far behind me, I focused on keeping my head focused on my ride and not worrying about the big guns behind me.

I started hard, but not too hard. I slowly ramped up the effort over the first 5-10 minutes. I came up out of the aero bars in the turns - with no chance to pre-ride the course I took the cautious route with the thinking that wiping out in some gravel would hurt my time (and hurt me!) much more than the aero dynamics hit of coming out of the bars for a couple seconds.

About 20 minutes into the ride my 30 second man caught me. I wasn't gaining on my rabbit, but he wasn't gaining too much on me either. For the rest of the ride my rate of perceived exertion remained steady, although I definitely struggled in one section of headwind (maybe I could have predicted that better?). While my RPE was steady and very hard, I didn't quite have the speed in my legs that I have had on my best TTs. I was fighting too big of a gear most of the ride for some reason I can' t really explain. I was caught by one more rider with maybe 5 minutes to go.

After the last turn I was able to ramp it up significantly. I knew from the course map that there wasn't much left so I really tried to throw down. Signs indicated how far I had COVERED, but not how much REMAINED... This was frustrating because 1) I'm not good at math even under the best of conditions and 2) I wasn't sure if this was a 30K TT or a 31K TT... I guess I didn't study the map that well after all!

I crossed the line cross-eyed and slobbering (always a good sign) and promptly forgot to stop my clock. I cooled down as my team mates rolled in. Everyone was asking each other why we continue to do TTs!

The results were posted after a short while and Rand was the team's highest place. I think Rand placed 7th. We all got served by Roman Kilun who supposedly raced with his fixed gear track disk. He had a sub 40min time. Jeff Williams was next for the Green Team with a time at 42:09 - good enough for 14th. I didn't get my own time (place 21) or Peter's (not sure what his place was either...).

Next up for the TT guys - District Championships! Here's hoping other people hear our disc wheels and we don't hear anyone else's!!!