PolishPostal Race Race Report - Morrow Ohio (CAT 5)

This is my 3rd race of the season and 4th overall. The CAT 5 race consisted of 5 laps of an 8.1 mile course.

The kids (girl 6 & boy 3 ½) have been wanting to go to one of my races. So we decided that this would be a good one. It was less than 3hrs away so it would be one of the closest in the Ohio Valley Racing Series. We headed out about 7:15am. The forecast was not good. High in the mid 70’s and rain with chance of thunderstorms. About 15 minutes after we left the house we could see lightning to the west (the direction that we were headed). About 30mintues later we hit the rain and some of it was quite hard.

It took just under 3hrs to get to the course. From the map that was on OVR’s website I drive the course prior to registering. I’m anal like that. I feel a need to not be surprised.

Upon arrival in Morrow it was still raining. I registered and asked about the location of the finish line on my map. The guy told me that the map I had wasn’t the right course, it was the ‘old’ course. That is nice. While suiting up I see the USCF official and ask him about the course. He tells me that I have the correct course and shows me on the map the approximate location of the finish. So I get suited up. It was about 58 deg and the rain was lightening up. With the rain I opted not to warm up on my rollers but decided to do my warm up on the road. I drove the family out to the course and parked them near the finish location that the official indicated. I then rode back to the registration area, it was about 1.5 miles. I did some additional warm up on the bike trail.

Ok… my rant for the week. I’m still a bit miffed why race organizers have to keep the course information top secret. I would have better luck getting the launch codes to some nuclear missles than the exact course description (with actual distance) including start and finish locations. So, since I didn’t get the correct info about the course the family didn’t see any of my race. I was pretty bummed about that. Ok… I’m done.

We had about a 2.5 mile neutral rollout from registration to the start location. The start was typical of a circuit race, staggered start beginning with 1/2, 3, 4, 5, women, juniors. So we finally roll off with a 3 minute gap to the 4’s ahead of us. The finish is about 100 yds from the location where we started. We had about 20 in our group. The pace of the first lap was pretty high, 23.6mph avg. It calmed down a bit after that. We were to do 5 laps. With that many laps it is sort of hard to recall what happened in each lap so my rundown is going to be more compact than the last.

During the first 4 laps there were 2 significant breaks that I didn’t want to let go and it didn’t appear that anyone was going to chase. In one, the guy who won last week at Reily rolled off the front (Jason from 7 Hills Racing). He got about 100 yds and I decided to bridge. I was afraid that he might stay away if let go. It was a pretty hard effort. Lowcel worked with me to close the gap. Once I reached him I thought that we might be able to work together but the field decided at this point that they wanted to come along for the ride also. The other break was a small group that I noticed getting a gap and I moved quickly to bridge to them.

Several times during the initial laps I decided to just hang at the back. With the small group I was able to monitor the action going on at the front. By riding at the back I was able to smooth out the normal speed up and slow down pace that occurs on short climbs and sharp corners.

There was a climb just before the finish line. The finish was about 200 yds from the top it. Each time up the climb a guy in a blue jersey would basically attach and get passed about ½ way up. I took note that I wouldn’t have to worry too much about him. I seemed to be holding my own pretty well on the climb and still not going all out.

So…. We finally get the bell for the last lap. I’m toward the front after coming up the climb. After about a mile I decide to drift to the back again. While I’m headed toward the back Lowcel and a buddy of his are allowed to roll off the front. They get about 100 yds with no reaction. I must have been day dreaming about his time because the next time I peak around to check their gap 2 other riders have bridged up to them. Still really no reaction from the pack. At this time a small group of P/1/2’s go by us. Soon after that the group decides that they better the four back. We pick up the pace. There are about 5 guys at the front that are rotating through. I’m willing to work but they don’t seem too interested in rotating the whole group. Fine by me. I’ll save every thing that I can.

We finally catch the break and Jason (winner from last week) attacks and Lowcel goes with him. I follow and am able to close the gap. Danny (a buddy of mine) is on my wheel. We hit the climb for the last time. Blue jersey boy attacks again and yes you guessed it he blows. Then Jason cranks it up. I get a little boxed in but get clear and chase. We top the climb with Jason leading, Danny in 2nd, Lowcel in 3rd and I’m 4th. I try to shift to my big ring but it hesitates (during the race I was having trouble going to the big ring and actually dropped the chain once. I was able to get it back on by shifting down. I then had to chase back onto the group.). Finally I have the big ring, Lowcel has a bit of a gap on me. I’m sprinting for the line using him at a lead out. I swing to the right and at the line thrust my bike forward (you know, just like you see the pro’s do it.). I’m not sure if it got me 3rd or not. They will have to determine that by checking the video.

I’m pretty pleased with my performance in this race (3rd or 4th). If I wouldn’t have let myself get boxed in on the climb and I could have had a clean shift to the big ring in the finishing sprint maybe the results would have changed and maybe they wouldn’t have. With the small group it was much easier to respond from back in the group.

So far it seems like small groups in CAT 5 that have a chance to get away just don’t work together very well. They need to do short pulls and rotate the paceline.