Not often do I get to do a race that is literally right down the street from my house. The Barry Wolfe GP used to be in Woodland Hills and this is the first year they moved it to Westlake Village. I was super excited to do this race because I knew all my friends would be there as well as Ashley, who could make time in between clients to come by and watch me race…finally. This was also day 2 of my mini stage race. My coach had a “wonderful” idea to make this long weekend match up with the TSS of a 3 day stage race. TTT first day, Crit second day, and a long training ride ( I dubbed it the Mountain Stage) the third day.
Got there early to get signed up as I was the first race…Cat 5 at 7:30am. As usual, signups didn’t go all that fast and my warm up was limited to about twenty minutes. I was ok with that. Having done the Team Time Trial yesterday, I was a little tired so the warm up was really just to get the legs moving again. Once I got off the trainer and did a couple circuits around the course, I felt fine.
Plan for this race was to win….plain and simple. I’m confident that with some good strategy and a little luck, I have what it takes to win this race. We took off at a rather leisurely pace and I was just sitting in the back when we took off. I even got a shout from Win from Wins Wheels to “Get going!” During these races, I do my best to hide and not be on any one’s radar. Just sit in the middle of the pack and wait for the end. I stay enough forward to be able to respond should anyone make a big move that I either want to be a part of or bring back but usually, just saving energy. This race was fairly “normal”. It was an easy pace and I was just making sure to stay safe and keep the effort level as low as possible. On the final lap I moved to about 4th or 5th wheel and just tried to stay in good position. Two turns to go and a guy starts motoring…perfect. This guy was the perfect lead out. I could tell by the way he was pedaling that he wasn’t going to make it far….but far enough. Through the last turn and I’m second wheel with about 1k to go. I’m in perfect position and about to spring my sprint when BOOM! I see a guy go and go hard right out of the turn…whoa! Good move if he can hang on. I go as hard as I can and start closing down the 10 meter gap he had created with his sneak attack. Pushing pushing pushing but it’s closing too slow….he sits down with 50 meters to go and I push harder….but I didn’t make it. I came through second and have to give him props for a well timed sprint that just got him there.
Turns out that it was my buddy Nick Cali who won the race. He and I have just recently reconnected through cycling but have known each other for years through motocross. I was really happy for him. 2nd was solid but not what I was looking for.
Next up was the Cat 4/5 race about an hour later. This race I was going to try and make a few moves and see what I could do. I knew I didn’t have much chance in a straight field sprint so I took some risks that didn’t pan out. Pace was once again, fairly easy. If you wanted to just sit in, it was no problem. About halfway through, two guys made a solid move to get away. I thought that with three, we might actually be able to make it stick based on how the main group reacted. So I made a mad dash to catch them and closed the gap. The moment I got up to them, I was ready to start sending it when all of the sudden, they both sit up??? WTF? It was completely baffling to me. We had gaped the main field really well and stood a good chance…but nope. That was really weird and sure cost me a lot in terms of energy.
Sat back in and waited till the end. Right before the final lap, about 1 1/2 to go, I made my way closer to the front when the same guy that lead me out in the first race came storming by. I decided to see how far he could take me. I sat on his wheel and we started to drop the main field. I told myself, if he can get me to 1/2 mile out, I’ll try and make a go for it. But he only made it to about 1 mile out and there was no way….so again, it just didn’t work out. I had to sit up, latch on and just finish the best I could. I didn’t have much left for the sprint.
I finished in 13th place and was the 1st Cat 5 across the line. I don’t know if that really means anything in these mixed races to be the first in your division…but I’ll take it. I’ve got 4 more races to go before upgrading to Cat 4. Next up is District Road Race Championships this weekend in Bakersfield. Although, in the interest of full disclosure, the Cat 5 race is not a Championship event 
This race popped up on my radar about a month ago while I was perusing the events calendar on USA Cycling’s website. Being so new to cycling, I’m not all that familiar with all the local events. I really love TT’ing and have been so enamored watching TTT’ing on TV as it is often one of the stages of the larger Tour’s. I know a few cyclists now and thought it would be “neat” to try and put together a team for this race. I immediately thought of my Wattie Ink teammate Chris Masilon as I know he is a monster on a TT bike. The original plan was to do the two man +70. I contacted Chris and he was in. Then, on one of my every other day visits to my local shop, Wins Wheels, I got to talking to Dave Feldman who works there and also runs the Lux Pro Development Cycling Team. He suggested that maybe we do the 4 man team and he could grab a 4th off the development team….PERFECT! If we are gonna do this, let’s do it!
So the team was Chris, Dave and Eddy Roche ( a superb triathlete and cyclist)
So I signed us up for 4 Man Open. The race took place in the sparkling desert town of Lake Los Angeles. Now, before you get all up on me and ask me where this breathtaking lake is named after the City of Angels, just know it’s not “all that”……seriously, it’s not. But, it’s the perfect damn place for a TTT! Situated between Lancaster and Mirage Dry Lake it’s sits out in the open and pretty much exposed to any element planet Earth has in store for that day. This day was wind….
After coordinating our arrival and getting all signed up, we all prayed it would warm up just a bit from the balmy 42degs that it currently was. It did warm up enough to actually be rather comfortable, but the wind kept up pretty good. Not so much that I had to reconsider wheel choice (I still ran a deep HED 9 in the front, plus the disc) but enough to keep your attention. The good news about the wind was that it was very constant and not very gusty at all. It was just blowing solid which made it very predictable and manageable.
Now, in a TTT the most important thing is to have 4 evenly matched fellows and an impeccable knowledge and understanding of each other as riders….we had neither! We had four dudes who had never ridden together and had really just met. We didn’t even have time to ride down the road…lol. We literally warmed up on our trainers and rode to the start line. I did go over some strategy with my coach, Brian Stover, in the couple preceding days. Just enough to get the gist of this type of event. So we did have somewhat of a game plan, just no practice executing. Ah well, wouldn’t be the first time I’ve done something for the first time…
We lined up and took off….we were on our way.
The course is just short of 40k. It was advertised as 23.5 but I had it as 23.09 on my Garmin. But I’ll just round it to 40k and talk in rough kilometers because the course breaks up nicely that way. The first 10k was an absolute blast. It was a straight shot downwind and we were absolutely flying. We took our turns rotating at the front and at this point, we were sticking to the plan. The course is a big rectangle. We made our first right turn and had 5k of a dead perpendicular cross wind. This is when things just started to unravel a bit. We quickly modified the lineup to form a nice echelon to deal with the cross wind. The problem was that we weren’t getting much of a draft and we were slowly starting to lose Dave. Oh, one thing I don’t think I told the guys beforehand is that we only need 3 to finish…so you can drop 1 rider and still be ok. Chris didn’t know that so we held up a bit and got Dave reconnected.
Just before the first turn! Dusty followed by Dave
Then we made a right and now had 10k dead straight into the headwind. Now, you would think this would be terrible, but it wasn’t. It wasn’t bad at all….allow me to explain. Since the wind was such a perfect headwind it meant that the guys sitting in the draft barely had to do anything. You could almost cost behind the rider in front of you. So while you did have to put out a big effort while on the front, your rest was plentiful. It was like 1 part work and 3 parts complete rest. Dave was still attached at this point but starting to do less and less work at the front. In the middle of this 10k there was a short, kicker type hill. I made a split second decision to drag the group up this hill. My thought was that since the draft was so epic, I could really crank this hill and not drop the group. I made my way to the front and poured on the gas. Unbeknownst to me, since my new TT helmet covers my ears such that I can’t hear shit, Dave and the group were yelling to slow down and I dropped the group…LOL…so much for team leader! <—-idiot.
We regrouped at the top of the hill and started back at it. Chris took matters into his own hands and literally pushed Dave up the hill to get him reconnected.
Once we made another right and hit the crosswinds again, we dropped Dave. I told Chris on the fly that we only needed three, so we pressed on. Dave did a fantastic job and hung in there as long as he could. It was up to Eddy, Chris and I to keep the dream alive. We made our final right and this 10K was again downwind and retraced our first 10k from the start. It became quickly apparent that Eddy was struggling. Rather than have him come to the front and slow the group down, I decided to just drag him in…that was the fastest option. So Chris and I traded off at the front and kept the level just high enough so Eddy could hang in there.
Mas pulling Dusty and Eddy to the finish!
We finished with a time of 51:13 for 7th (out of 10) on the day. All in all, I think we did a pretty damn good job for the last minute team we had assembled….and I’ll tell you what, it was a BLAST! I would definitely do it again….we all had a great time.
I want to thank Wattie Ink for assembling such an awesome team this year. I’ve met so many great people through this new community (I also got to meet “KB” Kirk Bausch from the team “management” 
who incidentally is a fricken MONSTER on a TT bike). It was so cool to actually race with a teammate. Special thanks to Chris, Dave and Eddy who all put out spectacular efforts and made this a super fun race. Thanks to my personal sponsors, Wattie Ink, 101 Pipe & Casing, Kurt Orban Partners LLC and Wins Wheels. Also thanks to my coach who has really helped me make the best of this running injury and is slowly turning me into a decent cyclist and swimmer.
Oh and quick update on running…I’m up to twenty minutes pain free. Watch out suckas cause when I return, most of you are gonna be chasing after T2!
It’s never easy to have things not go as planned. You sit around all November and December and figure out your goals for the next year only to have them basically flushed down the toilet by May….LOL. But, you have to be versatile and roll with it. There is no sense in getting frustrated and upset over things you can’t really control. The only thing you can do is continually make the best decisions you can based on the information you have at the time….
So, what’s going on. The stress fracture and ankle problems I encountered for the first part of this year are on the mend and feeling really good. I started running again about 3 weeks ago and it has been going really well. However, my coach and I have been very conservative with the running. We’re talking about 5 minute runs to start. Currently, I’m up to about 15 minutes. I can tell that this amount of running is appropriate, ie if I were to run more, I would probably re-injure the bone. So we are building back strength and fitness slowly and carefully.
The problem is, it’s too slow to make Boise 70.3. I simply won’t be ready to go and race competitively. I probably won’t be ready for some time. So plans have to change. I have decided to take Vegas 70.3 WC off the table. I don’t need that pressure when dealing with this type of injury. It just leads to bad decisions when you are trying to stick to a time table that is not based around your physical condition. I need to be mindful of my body and realize I can do much better if I’m healed completely than trying to make some race that will probably just leave me hurt.
I have decided to not race any tri’s throughout the summer. I’m going to stick to cycling races and swim meets as well as some open water swim events I would like to do. I also have Santa Barbara Aquathon that I’m signed up for. Throughout the summer I will be building my run back up into top shape. I’m going to attend Vegas 70.3 WC’s and throw a nice get together for my friends and Wattie teammates racing at my house in Henderson which will be a blast. After that race, I’m going to reevaluate a late season charge…including Nautica Malibu, LA Tri and probably Soma…at least, that’s what it looks like now.
Hopefully everything goes well…but if it doesn’t, we’ll reevaluate again. No stress and no frustration…just take it as it comes.
Vlees Huis Ronde Road Race
2012-04-21
Bakersfield, California
United States
Team Action Sports
75F / 24C
Sunny
Cycle – Road Race
Total Time = 1h 24m 30s
Overall Rank = 8/34
Age Group = Cat 5
Age Group Rank = 8/34
Pre-race routine:
First road race….I drove up to Bakersfield the night before just to make the morning a little easier. I had a smallish breakfast and drove out to the start. I was only about 15 minutes away but wanted to get there kind of early. I’ve never done one of these before so I was a little unsure how the process goes and how fast registration is etc etc. I was also on my own and I knew I’d have to pin my own number which can be a daunting task in and of itself. As I’ve discovered with bike racing, registration was a snap. I walked up and they handed me a number and off I went.
Event warmup:
I headed back to the truck to unload the bike and trainer and get a bit of a warmup in. I’m still recovering a bit from last weekend’s Mulholland Challenge. That race turned out to be 560TSS and you don’t just bounce back from that…that’s some people’s weekly totals. I’m also not a huge fan of warming up. I don’t know why but I don’t really find much benefit. For me, personally, it’s really just to get over that initial shock of doing work and I’m set to go. So 15 minutes on the trainer was good.
Cycle
Comments:
This kind of went down the way I expected. The first 5-6 miles was a short downhill followed by a long flat stretch. I knew there was nothing to do here so I just sat in and kept an eye on the leaders.
Once we hit the first hill, the pace quickened a bit. No one really made any kind of a move for a while. The climbing was just really steady and comfortably hard. At about 10 miles or so, one guy rode off the front. Just about 100 yards off the front and settled in. I didn’t think too much about it. A few minutes later, three more guys off the front to close the gap. BTW, we are still climbing. It was a long steady climb. One of the three made it to the front guy. The other two kind of lingered in the middle. I wasn’t paying too much attention to what was going on behind me. I was sitting at the front 2-3 wheels on the chase pack. Again, the leaders were just kind of lingering out there and I thought for sure would come back.
The first turn around is a short descent, turn around, and back up the hill. When we made the turn around, the leaders were still only about 100 yards ahead and if memory serves, the pack was down to about 10 guys. From there it is a short ascent and then a long descent to the first turn off which is again, another out and back. Seeing the first two at the first turn around would prove to be the last time we would see them.
We made the turn to the second and final out and back and the pace stayed roughly the same. The hills on this out and back were a little more severe but shorter in duration. Once we made the final turn around, I couldn’t figure out who the leaders were because we were starting to run into the back of the Masters group that started ahead of us. At this point, our chase group was down to 6. One of the guys said that we had to organize to catch the two ahead of us and we did. The pace skyrocketed and we began taking turns pulling…way to damn hard. I knew there was no way these guys would be able to hold this pace. So when the final climb came which would return us to the main road, the pace slowed as I thought it would. I decided to make a break for it.
I didn’t sprint away. When it was my turn to pull on the final climb, I just tore into the hill at a really solid wattage. I decided that if they were able to stay with me, I would sit in and hopefully chase back with them. If I dropped them, I would make a go at trying to catch the leaders or at least trying to break away for third. When I reached the summit, I looked back and saw no one. The hill was kind of windy so I wasn’t sure how much distance I had…but it was enough to make up my mind.
I had about 6-7 miles to go with a descent, big flat section and small hill at the end. I knew I could stay away for the descent and flat section, I just was worried about the final hill. I put my head down and hammered as best I could. I caught three Masters on the final run in just before the hill. As I passed them, I saw a squirrel playing with something in the road…turned out to be a fricken rattlesnake! Crazy…road right by it and pointed it out to the dudes I just passed.
I looked back but the three masters guys blocked my view and I couldn’t tell how far back the other group was. I had a thought of easing up and letting them catch me just before the hill and then slingshoting around them…but I didn’t have enough info to make that decision. I got to the base of the hill and stood to hammer…yup, nothing. My legs were toast. With about 500M to go, the pack stormed by in a mini sprint. I couldn’t contest. I just ran out of power. I cruised across the line as there was no one for miles behind us.
What would you do differently?:
Only thing I would or of could have done different is to let up before the line, rest/recover and let them catch me before the final climb and then attack again. I guess I also could have covered the first two that went away earlier but I honestly didn’t think they would stay away.
Post race
Warm down:
Nothing…loaded up and left
What limited your ability to perform faster:
Probably a little fatigued from prior weekend but that’s ok
Event comments:
This was a great learning experience. I’ve basically decided to take my mandatory 10 Cat 5 races and use them as experiments. See what works and what doesn’t based on my abilities. When I Cat up to 4′s soon, I’ll start looking at what my best chances are to place well and perhaps win.
Thanks to Wattie Ink, 101 Pipe & Casing, Kurt Orban Partners, Wins Wheels and all my great sponsors. I’ll still thank Ashley even though she has yet to see me do a bike race. As always, my coach Brian Stover of Accelerate 3 who is convinced I will make a great bike racer
Mulholland Challenge
2012-04-14
Agoura Hills , California
United States
Planet Ultra
60F / 16C
Sunny
Cycle – Century
Total Time = 8h 09m 10s
Overall Rank = 47/~600
Pre-race routine:
I’ve been reminded over and over again that this is not a race…it’s a timed event. Well, to me, I treat that like a race…lol. I want to finish in the best possible time I can. So, while there may not be any trophies on the line or upgrade points, my approach to this “event” is pretty much exactly the same as a race. Try and go as hard as I can for the duration of the event. Roughly 117 miles and about 13K+ of climbing.
I did this Century last year with a finishing time of 7:37 and 47th spot. I had a flat tire last year and that cost me about 10 minutes. This year, the course was lengthened slightly with some pretty substantial climbing added in with the addition. I would say they added roughly 5 miles and maybe just under a thousand feet of climbing. So a time goal was a little tough to estimate given the course was not the same as last year. I figured with the addition, I would be happy to finish in the same time as last year. That would represent a fairly substantial gain in fitness.
Last year I also made a very bad move tactically and that was to leave too early. This year, I left at the last possible moment with some faster riders in hopes that I would be able to share the load with some other people. Last year, I was basically alone the entire ride…bad idea. I headed down to the start, which is only about 10 minutes from my house, after a great breakfast and a good night’s sleep at about 7:30 for a 8am departure. I had all my nutrition planned out and it was just going to be a long tough day…no two ways about it.
Event warmup:
No real warm up for this monster. I met my friend Bodie in the parking lot before the start and we decided to try and hang together as long as possible to help each other out. Right before the start we had another friend, Matt, show up and he was going to do the same. We clipped in just before 8am and off we went with the main pack.
Cycle
Comments:
The ride starts off with quit a bit of descent for the first 20 or so miles. Right off the bat, the main pack got away from us. I mean right out of the parking lot. I tried like crazy to bridge the gap and did a damn fine job of it until we were cut off right before we got connected by a line of cars at an unfortunate left hand turn. It was disappointing but we were still ok with four of us remaining together. Once down to PCH, we got hooked up with another couple of riders that were pretty content to pull us down PCH. By the time they figured out that we were just using them down PCH, they finally decided to rotate off the front. By that time, we were only a mile from Topanga and they served their purpose well.
We started the climb up Topanga at a fairly nice pace. Nothing too hard or too easy. Although, I will say that the start, trying to bridge that gap, was a little harder than what I wanted. We made it to the first real climb at Old Topanga and started up still with a group of 4. We would yoyo with this one guy as he was not setting the most even of paces. His buddy was dropping him and he would try and surge to regain contact…not a great idea in the first hour of a 117 mile ride.
At some point between the top of Old Topanga and the first check, we lost Matt. But, we did pick up the other rider that was dropping his buddy. This proved to be good later on. After riding down Mulholland, it was now, Bodie, random surging guy #1, his buddy, and one other guy named Zach that seemed to know who we were from Triathlon. Once again, bad luck on a traffic light broke us up. Now it was just Bodie and I and random surging guy #1. On the way to Rock Store climb we dropped random surgy guy #1 and also began passing the Fortius crew who had over 15 riders out there…great to see you guys.
Once passed Cornell and on our way to Rock Store, I told Bodie the plan was to just sit in and save as much energy as possible and then hit Rock Store fairly hard. Nothing crazy as we had a long ass way to go. We got to Rock Store and by the top, I had lost Bodie…I was bummed but I think the start surge might have shelled him more than he could take to maintain that pace for the duration. So…I was on my own…or so I thought. Right after crossing Kanan, I picked up the dude that dropped his buddy (you know, surgy guy #1) and we hooked up all the way to the top of Yerba.
He was a stronger rider than me, no doubt. But I had two things going for me. #1, He had no problem just pulling me along. I have no idea why he didn’t want to share the work, but he just sat out there in the wind and pulled me to my heart’s content. #2, I was a better descender than him. So I could make up small gaps that he would put on me on some of the steeper stuff. I was really really happy to be hooked up with this guy…he was the perfect ally. Until the shit hit the fan…..
At the top of Yerba, on the shittiest road ever, I got a flat. Ok, no biggie…let’s stay focused and change this bitch quick and try and regain contact on the long descent. I changed the flat fast. I ran my fingers around the tire to see of there was any debris or cuts…couldn’t find anything. So I put the tube in and inflated it…POW…blew that tube as well…ummmm…ok. I inspected further to find a HUGE gash in the side of the tire that I didn’t see when the tire wasn’t under pressure. Well, it was bad enough that I knew nothing was going to hold this together to my satisfaction to descend Deer Creek with any confidence. I just wasn’t going to risk it…plus, I didn’t have anything to fix it. I had to wait for SAG…so I waited, and waited, and waited, and had no signal, and waited…for 40 minutes almost exactly before SAG found me and got me going with a new tire.
Now, I’m freezing cold, have been riding at this point for 3 1/2 hours and am as stiff as a board. I made the descent down Yerba to Corithan and starting climbing. I would say it took me a solid hour before I regained any kind of form and warmed up again. The descent down Deer Creek was super sketchy. It is very steep and very exposed. The wind was HOWLING. No time to be made up here. Just be safe and get down. I made my way down PCH and to Decker. The hardest climb of the day at mile 73.
I started to climb and one thing was very apparent, I had no top end. I could not stand and climb…my quads were shot. I could sit and climb ok but on the super steep sections when I had to stand, I had nothing. Decker was a struggle until I got about half when and it starts to mellow out. I made it to the top and refueled at the aid station knowing that the next section’s nutrition was vital. I had to keep energy levels up for the last few climbs. Down and over Encinal was rather uneventful. I just had to get to the top of Encinal for some relief. I made it and began the descent all the way to Peter Strauss ranch. Topped off my bottles and began the final march over to Stunt. Day was getting long at this point.
Descending Rock Store
Stunts climb was good. Last year, this is where I fell apart. I didn’t this year. I had a good climb, seated the whole way just bouncing around just under threshold watts. I’ve found that I can pretty much climb all day long about 10-20 watts right below my FTP. Towards the very very top of Stunt I started to slow a bit and was wondering if my legs were going to keep going. There were several points in the last couple hours where I seriously thought I was going to have to stop or my legs were simply going to give out. I decided to just let them give out. What’s the worst than can happen? I fall over…oh well.
The legs hung in there and I actually had a good climb up and over Piuma. The problems started on the descent. I started seeing stars and getting light headed on the descent as I was really pushing hard trying to make up time. I decided to sit up and take it easy and see if I could get some blood flowing..it worked. I knew at the bottom that I just had to get over that one cruel joke of a kicker on Cold Canyon and the rest of the ride was pretty tame…it was tough, but I made it.
The next ten or so miles saw a stupid headwind that would not go away. All the way back to the hotel was this annoying head wind. I made it back, had nothing more to give and was happy to just be off my bike. In the last few miles my legs were hinting that they had enough. I seriously thought they were going to cramp up…I had really put them through the ringer.
What would you do differently?:
Nothing. I performed as well as I could on this day. The flat and downtime was a bummer but nothing I could do about it.
Post race
Warm down:
Went home…lol
What limited your ability to perform faster:
Flat
Event comments:
There’s something about this ride and it being on the roads I ride everyday and every weekend that makes me love it. There’s really no telling what my finishing time would have been. The downtime was just too big of a variable to say how it affected the ride. I had a great time and once again found something inside that I didn’t know was there. The desire to keep fighting. You never know how you’ll deal with adversity like I experienced in this ride until it happens and I’m very proud of how I dealt with it here. My cycling has never been better and I’m still looking forward to more races over the next few weeks.
News on the running front. Ankle and tibia are feeling great. I have a doctors appointment on April 30th to assess for running. Given how it feels now, I would be very surprised if he doesn’t allow me to start running again. Now, how the ankle and bone hold up after I start back again is anyone’s guess. Time will tell on that one. Boise 70.3 is still a major goal at this point.
Sponsors…proud as always to be rocking the W for Wattie Ink. 101 Pipe & Casing, Kurt Orban Partners, and Win’s Wheels need a shout out as well. My coach Brian Stover at Accelerate3 doing an excellent job as always. Next up is De Vlees Huis Ronde Road Race in Bakersfield this coming weekend.
Cycle
