Kermisch.com

I was pretty psyched for today’s road race. Birchwood always puts on a great race with a neutral feed support. This makes the race so much nicer, knowing you can get water on each lap.

The course this year was full of punch hills, but the key sections were the 3 dirt roads we traversed. The first section was somewhere around 2 – 3 miles long, the second was steep and very soft gravel for about 1.5 miles, and the last was maybe a half a mile, but it came less than a half kilometer from the finish.

We were set to do 6 laps, 72 miles. Our field was small, just 11 at the start line. The weather was humid, but not too hot. The clouds were covering the sun and it looked like it could rain.

The first lap rolled out relatively easy. As we neared the first section of gravel road, it ramped up as we fought for position entering the 1st section. I was sitting about 4th position and Jordan was killing the pace stringing us out. The roads were a lot more sketchy than last week when I pre-road them. It look liked they had been graded, which made the dirt softer and there were sections that just seemed to swallow your wheels. My rear wheel was fish tailing all over the place. Making the gravel section very nerve racking.

As we existed the first gravel section, we looked back and had shed the field down to eight of us. As we hit the next section, one rider flatted and another got caught behind and was trailing us. The six of us soldiered on, but as we left the last section we eased up a bit, as no one really wanted to pull.

Each lap, you could tell riders were getting a bit more tired. The gravel sections were always hard and we seemed to regroup on the paved sections. Two stragglers caught back on to us and pretty much were were eight guys until the 4th lap.

On the 4th lap, the rain came down making the dirt roads muddy. This also made it hard to see, so the glasses came off and then the dirt immediately got into your eyes.

Coming through the feed zone on the 5th lap, Jordan attacked. I bridged and pulled through. For awhile Jordan drifted back and I was on my own. I was not pushing too hard, but figured I would make the bunch catch me, hoping to soften some legs. Jordan then bridged up to to me, and we worked together for a few miles, hoping to make it to the gravel section alone, where we figured we would be gone for good. Unfortunately we got pulled back about a mile before the gravel started. 1/2 way through the gravel section on the 5th lap, our official told us this would be our last lap as lightening and thunder was all over the sky.

When we found out our course was shortened we were about 5 miles from the finish, with the hardest section of gravel left. I moved into second position behind Jordan entering this section and just put my eyes on his rear wheel and stayed close.

As we got back onto the pavement, just 2 or so miles out there were only 4 of us left. We hit it hard entering the last kilometer and as we entered the finish straight I was sitting 3rd position. About 300m out Jordan jumped, then I jumped. I came around him with about 200m to go and powered through to the finish for the win. I looked back and I had a great gap of maybe 25 – 50m, but was too tired to raise my hands over the finish line.

Even though our overall field was small and the course shortened by a lap, I was happy with my win today. So far this year it has been a 4th, 9th, 3rd, and a 1st.