Went racing...

So I went racing last week. Yeah, I should have written about this before, but hey, oh well, you'll get over it in the end.

There is a local sort of velodrome here in AVL, well, actually it's just an old short track that they used to race cars on. I'm not sure exactly how they did that, because it's hard getting a bunch of bikes on there, can't imagine cars, but I digress. One of the local bike clubs, the ABRC, holds a bi-weekly race series out there. It's sort of like a short crit race more or less. I decided to pedal over there, sign up, and take a few laps. I also decided, why prolong the suffering? Hell, I'll do the "A" race, or the race that is supposed to be the hardest, and the longest (60 laps). It said that to do the "A" race, you had to be a cat 3 or better, and that I am, at least on my racing license. I laid down my 10 bucks, took about 16000 warm up laps (it was nice to ride somewhere totally flat for once), and then lined up for the start.

I got into the field about halfway into the line up. Not on the front, not on the book. Whistle blows, we're off. Acceleration goes up to about 30, and stays there for awhile, like, 10 or 15 laps. There are sprints every 5 laps. Nope, not getting involved, or trying to get involved in any of those for now. When the sprint time comes though, there is a surge, and everything gets strung out. I'm hanging on the back, punching tickets, but keeping in touch with the wheel in front of me, and even though we're trucking, I'm not really super duper out of breath, or hurting that bad. The accelerations for the sprints hurt real bad, but everything else was just pedaling through the corners, and staying tight. I'll say this, it was some good speed work.

The first time I look up at the lap board as we come through the start finish, it say 30 to go. Yeah, we ticked off 30 laps, and it didn't even seem like we had been racing for that long. I started to think to myself that I could finish this race off, and finish it on the lead lap with most everyone else. 4 guys took a lap on the field, which effectively ended the race for everyone else (this was based on points, not who came across the line first, and since you only get points for the top 3 for every sprint, and points for the top 3 at the finish, you get the point - no pun intended). I look up again. 10 laps to go. Yeah, I can finish this race, and will finish this race. Last 2 laps we pulled at around 35 MPH (according to my friend Brian who has a computer on his bike, I do not - it clutters the bars and disturbs the line and form of the bike. We all come across the finish line, race over. We averaged just over 29 MPH for the 60 laps, and I hung on to finish with the majority of folks who were out there. Not bad for not racing much since 2005. Sure, there were no turns really, and it was pancake flat, but it was still as hard as woodpecker lips, and I felt good in completing it. 

Next race out there, 2-Jul-08. I'm going to be there for sure.