Winfield ABR Championship Criterium, Winfield, IL, August 14, 2011

With yesterday’s DNF embarrassment still painful in my mind, I drove back over to Winfield for the second race of the weekend. I was worried about how today’s hill would feel after my weakness on yesterday’s incline. However, the hill on this course is quite different.

The course is a big rectangle. Shortly after leaving the start/finish there is a left turn, followed a block later by the long straightaway up the 2-step hill. There is a bit of flat before the road tilts upward, so the momentum gained along that section is almost enough to get you over the first section. Then there is a brief flat followed by the steep “kicker” at the top. Then there is a left-hand turn into a block-long downhill (with some horrible pavement, I might add), followed by one more left hand turn into the long downhill to the start/finish.

Only about 25 riders rolled to the line for the Cat 4 race, and this has been a disturbing trend all season. Turnout for many of the races over these past few months has been down from the last few years. The blogs and boards are all a-twitter with speculation as to why this is, and there appear to be no easy answers.

After the usual instructions we took off for 35 minutes plus 3 laps. I had no teammates in my field, but my brother Kev was on the sidelines cheering me on. Throughout the race he did a complete circuit of the course, so each lap I heard his encouragement at different points.

For most of the race, I felt good. I was managing the hill with few problems, and had no difficulty regaining ground any time I found myself too far back for comfort. There were some attacks on the hill, but none of them got away, and I was able to cover all of them. I always made sure to be near the front of the field, since the acceleration coming off of the hill was always intense. Before I knew it, the lap counter was already showing that we were 15 minutes in.

I shook out the legs and sipped my Gatorade every chance I could to keep the tank topped off. I kept a close eye on the lap cards, and soon we hit the 30 minute mark. I told myself that I just had to hang on for 5 more laps.

As we came across the line with 2 laps to go, I was at the very front of the field and still feeling pretty relaxed. Kev shouted his encouragement, and I was feeling good enough that I even smiled and stuck out my tongue at him. So far, so good.

Or so I thought. We had lowered the pace quite a bit, and in hindsight this was a big mistake. As we entered came out of turn two and were facing the hill, we were probably only somewhere in the low 20s. As soon as the gradient increased, several riders launched a vicious assault. When I stood up on the pedals to match their acceleration, it was as if someone hit an “off” switch somewhere deep in side of me. My heart rate redlined and my legs turned to mush. I struggled my way to the top of the hill, going in reverse of what everyone else was doing. My only hope was to be able to grab back onto the peloton on the downhill. But it wasn’t to be.

Despite my best efforts, I ended up riding the last lap alone, picking off one rider on the final downhill to snag 22nd out of 23 finishers. I was not happy to have ridden so well for 97% of the race only to have it fall completely apart during the last 3%. But I took some consolation that I had recovered a little bit of dignity after the previous day’s DNF.

And, all in all, it was a good weekend for the Bicycle Heaven crew. David Pratt won the Cat 5 races both days, and on Sunday Hal took 2nd in the 40+ Cat 4, Andy Kerr was 3rd in the 50+, Peter Kelly and Eric Christ took 7th and 8th in the Cat 3, and Andy Swims snagged 8th in the 30+.