This past weekend dawned the opening to my 2011 cycling season. As the weekend neared I was torn between leaving town for the gruesome and brutal Barry Roubaix or simply rolling from home out to Waterford Hills Speedway for some road action. With Six Hours of Warrior Creek approaching this upcoming weekend, I made the choice to simply stay local and race Waterford.
The race went quite well for me. No more than fifteen minutes into it, I found myself in a 2 man break with Martin Vecchio. We worked together cohesively for about 50 minutes or so and I started the sense his energy faltering so I decided to press the pace a bit and see where the chips fell. I quickly found myself out on the course in a solo break and virtually lapping the field.
There are few things that compare to the feeling of rolling your final 3 laps of a race knowing that barring any flat tires or mechanicals, your win is pretty much solidified. I call these “Zen cycling moments”. I’m pretty sure if I could bottle this feeling up and sell it, it would move off the shelves pretty quickly. I embraced the feeling of these last final laps and threw my hands up in personal satisfaction at the line.
Day 2 of opening season had me rolling back out to Runway Plaza in Ann Arbor for yet another season of early circles. On my drive out I entertained the notion of how great it would feel to score back to back wins. I started to visualize my game.
As the race started, again I quickly found myself in an early break. All of the heads of state in attendance that day were represented (Alan Antonuk, Vince Roberge, Alexy Vermullen, Ray Dybowski, and the formally unknown Rudy Peterson). We quickly put time into the field and managed to lap them in about 20 minutes. The elation that is brought about by lapping the field never gets old.
As we were greeted by the announcement of 3 laps to go, I told Ray I was quite confident I could win the sprint with a great lead-out from him. This meant he had to sacrifice his legendary “Ray move” for the chance at my victory. As Mike Walden always professed, “You have to risk losing to win”, which Ray did for me. As we barreled into the last turn I wound up my sprint from 300 meters out. It’s important to never short sell or underestimate your opponents. Based on reputation, I was really only worried about beating Alan, Vince and Alexy to the line, I didn’t think too much of the young Rudy Peterson. As my front wheel approached the line, I looked over my should and saw I had several bike lengths on the wheels I was worried about and I began to let up. However, a race is never over until you cross the line. In the final ten feet or so Rudy came around and threw his bike at the line for the win. I have to give it to the young man; I will never underestimate his finish again.
Rudy nipping me at the line.All in all, I was pretty content with a win and a second place for my first two races. However, just as the LeMond quote says, it will only get faster from here. I may have a good foundation laid, but there is still plenty of work to do.
I have to thank all my fellow teammates that came out to race this weekend. Despite our lean numbers this year, we worked together very well.
