UCLA Road Race - Hill of Suffering

2-14-09

28th out of 75, my best showing on this hill of suffering and my 2nd race as a San Diego Cyclo-Vet racer. I believe I was the only San Diego Cyclo-Vet that ventured this far North but this race is right in my backyard as I live only 30 minutes away in the city of Lancaster. This course is tough. There are not a lot of courses where you can be waiting at the starting line with a heart rate in the 90s and a minute later, right after the start of the race, your heart rate is at 155.

As I said in an earlier posting, I entered the UCLA road race as a Cat 4, where they had a Cat 4/5 group in this race. This allowed me to only do two laps of 12.5 miles each instead of 3 or 4 laps. Look at the profile below and you'll see what I mean about this course - it immediately goes vertical.

The morning started very cool, with temperatures in the high 20s F. The Cat 4/5 race was at 9:15 and the temps had warmed up to a balmy 36F, and at least most of the ice on the road was gone. I got signed in, race number pinned on at around 8:30 and I started riding up and down Pallet Creek road to get my heart rate up and blood flowing. I always enjoy reading the sign posted on both both sides of Pallet Creek road - San Andreas Fault - a reminder that we are riding on the junction of the Pacific and North American Plate.

I finished my warm-up and headed for the starting line which was forming at the junction of Pallet Creek Road and Longview Road. I showed up at 9:10 and already 50 guys or more were lined up. The race field ended up full, as all 75 riders showed up for the race. We listened to the usual pre-race stuff and at about 9:25 or so, the whistled was blown and we were off. We made the immediate left turn onto Longview Road and within 200m we were heading up a 3% grade. I was sitting back in 50th plus place wondering how I was going to move up with the field stretched from center line on the left to the curb on the right. As I was pondering this thought, several riders, in front of me, nearly collided and shouts were exchanged. One guy behind me yelled, "F...ing settle down, this is a long F...ing climb." I couldn't agree more; we're heading up this hill at 12mph and guys almost go down fighting for position - not an unusual problem in a combined Cat 4/5 field.

The problem of moving up was solved about a half mile later. At around mile 1.5 my Garmin started showing 10 to 13% grade - ouch. I've never checked the percent error of my device but my legs, heart and lungs were telling me the Garmin wasn't far off on the grade. Other evidence was that riders all around me started going "backward" with the result that I found myself in the top half of this race. I'm still big for a cyclist at 180lbs but what a difference 15lbs makes as the last time I did this course I was at 195lbs and one of the guys going backwards. Just past mile 2 the grade eased up to only 7-9% and I could look ahead and see the sign pointing right for the right turn onto Juniper Hills Road. You always think the climb is going to end at Juniper Hills Road but the right turn gives you only a slight reprieve from the climb as you enter a false flat. After the tough climb on Longview, Juniper appears flat but you are actually climbing a 2-4% grade until you reach mile 4. Now the field began to stretch out with all 75 racers seeming to suffer alone - no main peloton in evidence and no chase group working together. Finally at mile 4 I crested the course and started down. There are a couple of big-ring rollers before you hit the true descent but you are so happy to be off the main grade that you just plow through the rollers. My heart rate at the top of the grade was hitting 173bmp so I was looking forward to the down grade to recover. I started working with a group of about 10 or so racers on the down side. We were hitting speeds in the mid 40s and my Garmin shows that I hit a top speed of 47mph. A bit of a head wind was slowing the descent and this group of 10 was not working very well together so I often found myself on my own bombing down the grade.

The 5 mile descent ends at mile 9 and the hard right turn onto Fort Tejon Road and back into climbing. This climb is not too tough as it is about 3 miles of 3-4% grade as you head back to another right turn which will place you once again on Longview Road and the eventual start/finish point. A few of us, tried to get the group to cooperate and make the 3 miles a little easier but only a couple of us would pull and we ended up leaving the wheel suckers behind as we started up Longview Road and the main climb again. Shortly after passing Pallet Creek Road, I ran into rider 157 (I was rider 106). Rider 157 (I'll get his name after I see the posted results) was a newly minted Cat 5 on his first ever race. As we were suffering once again on the main climb we had time to talk a bit and I remarked how he picked one of the toughest courses in SoCal for his first race. We actually worked well together, the 20 something "newbie" and the 52 year old "old timer". Drafting is pretty pointless on the 7-10% grades we were dealing with but just having someone else right in front of you struggling up the hill really helps focus your concentration. We crested the course, once again on Juniper Hills Road, and started working together down the grade. We passed several riders and within a couple of miles of the end of the grade passed rider 104 who immediately jumped on board for the rest of the descent. As we made the right turn onto Fort Tejon Road I set up a 3 man pace line, but only two of us were working it. I could not get 104 to help out and do his share of the pulling. He looked to be in his 30s and no stranger to racing. After a couple of miles of just me and the young Cat 5 doing all the work I turned around and said to 104, "pull through." He kept saying that we caught up with him and he didn't see any reason to pull through and help. This continued for another couple of miles and I could see the writing on the wall - this wheel sucker was going to let us do all the work and then come around us and take 20 something place. Normally, this wouldn't bother me as 20th something place is not exactly the top 10. But it was the kids first race and I wanted to see him finish ahead of both of us old timers. The kid already figured this out too and asked me to work together and drop the wheel sucker. So the kid and me attacked, jumping out of the saddle and going hell bent up the 4% grade - damn if the wheel sucker was able to stick with us, though I probably shouldn't have been surprised with all the recovery time we gave him. So okay, that strategy didn't work. With only 2 miles to go I tried another one - I told the kid to attack and I would block. So off the kid went and 104 tried to go with him but he had my 180lb butt in his way. This annoyed him and he went on a long diatribe of how he had been in many races and never won any of them and we were not competing for the top spot in this race. I told him I agreed with him but I wanted to see the kid beat both of us because he had worked so hard up to this point. Number 104 was not impressed and went wide around me in hot pursuit of 157, who had made a 30m gap on 104 and myself. I wish I could tell you that 157 made it to the line before 104 but alas, 104 caught and went around him with just meters to spare - hey, that's bicycle racing and good lesson learned by the new Cat 5.

The final numbers: 28th place out of 75 (73 finished), the race was 24.95 miles long, 2,897' of climbing, and I burned 1827 calories. It took me about 1 hour and 20 minutes to finish the course. In two months or so I'm back for the Devil's Punch Bowl Road Race held on this very same course. The Punch Bowl variant is a little longer and slightly easier, with the extra length giving you a little more recovery time. Two months to drop down to 175lbs and about 60 more seconds off my climb - it's the little things in racing that excite me!

Boulevard Road Race – Rain, Hail, Snow…Snow?

(photo from velonews)

Saturday, Feb 7, 2009
One of Southern California's most demanding amateur road race courses is behind me, and what a race it was. A powerful storm system entered California on Friday and stayed around on Saturday to make this a truly epic race. The Cat 4 race went off at 9:31 am, and before it was over we battled standing water, rain, hail and within 15 minutes of our finish – snow. Temperatures were hovering around 36 degrees as we started the 44 mile race (my Garmin says it was 42.11 miles). As I sat eating my after race cheese burger in one of the cafés close to the start, I felt nothing but pity for the groups lining up to start their race in a driving snow storm. For sure, the Pro 1/2 race, Masters 30, and 45 were on the course during the falling snow.

I rolled up to the starting line at 9:25 wearing my San Diego Cyclo-Vets Kit for the first time. As all 61 riders arrived at the starting line, one of them moved over to me and said hi. He noticed my racing kit as he was wearing the same thing. Chad Holcomb had also entered the Cat 4 race, so the Cyclo-Vets had a team of two in the race. I never did see another Cyclo-Vet rider but missed the start of the Masters 45 race so I don’t know if we were the only club members or not. We exchanged the usual pre-race conversation and talked about how challenging the course was going to be – was it. I’ve included the course (see at end of this post)and profile downloaded from my Garmin to mapmyride.com.

The race started with a rolling neutral start for about 100m and off we went to the short climb over Live Oak Springs Road. This leads to a bombing descent down HWY 94. The water covered street tended to focus all of our attention on the descent. This descent covered about 7 miles, starting from mile 2 to mile 9. I certainly did not have any problems staying with the Peloton on the descent. There were no attacks at all, as all riders knew what was coming up in miles 10 through 21.

The race really took off at mile 10 at the right turn onto La Posta Road and an immediate 3 – 6% climb. At around mile 12, and just before a slight reprieve in the climb, the 61 member peloton split and at least 20 riders dropped off the back. I was definitely working hard and glanced at my heart rate monitor and saw 173 bpm! My maximum heart rate is only around 181 bpm and my lactate threshold is 161 bpm, so I knew I was operating at close to red line. The climb continued with a 4% climb up to mile 14 and I was still hanging on by the skin of my teeth as we crested a small hill and had a short descent. I tried to relax as much as possible and saw that my heart rate had dropped back into the high 150s. But this short descent was long on short. As we got to the right turn at the junction with I-80 we were at the bottom of the real climb. My heart rate was soaring again as I struggled to stay at the back of the peloton. To add to my problems, my new chain started skipping badly on my year old cassette. I kept searching for a gear to stop the skipping as it was throwing off my concentration needed for the climb. At mile 16 I cracked…I just couldn’t maintain the pace and began to drop off with about 10 other racers. It’s always a lonely feeling to go OTB, especially when the following motorcycle speeds up and goes around the newly formed chase group. Now it was every man for himself as we struggled up the remaining 5 miles of climbing. Some where around mile 21, I passed the Pro Women 1-3 racers, who had started 10 minutes ahead of our race. At this point, I caught up with racer 210 (I was 231) and racer 245 caught up with both of us.

After the short pitch climb over Live Oak Springs Road we had the bombing descent again down HWY 94. At 180lbs, I’m definitely in my element when descending. I put everything I had into the descent and rider 210 and 245 joined in for a fast 40 mph, 3 man rotating pace line. We kept this up for mile after mile, until I noticed that 245 didn’t come up during his turn in the pace line. I asked if he was okay and he said he was feeling the strain of the high intensity riding we were doing. I said let’s slow down the rotation, so we took turns pulling for 20 seconds allowing the rear riders a little more rest. It worked, at around mile 28 we turned a corner and saw a large group of riders 200 meters ahead…it was our peloton! The three of us felt renewed and within minutes we were back into the race, members of the peloton again. At about mile 30, while I was marveling at how we had rejoined the peloton and thinking how strange it was going to be to go OTB twice in a race, Chad Holcomb showed up beside me. He was back too. He had dropped off before me at mile 12 and said he worked hard with a 6 man group to also regain the peloton. Unfortunately for Chad though, the climbing had started all over again and once again another group went off the back, Chad included. It was at about the exact point that they went off in the first lap. I gritted my teeth and said I’m going to try to stay with the group as we made the turn at the I-80 junction - mile 16 all over again. And the same thing happened; another group of 10 or so, me included went OTB (I love being consistent). And once again, I got to watch the motorcycle go around me. This time, number 245 stayed ahead of me but number 210 dropped quickly behind me. Every man for himself again as I time trialed up the remaining 5 miles of the course. At around mile 39 the rain turned into hail, bouncing off my arms and bike. I thought at least I only had a few more miles to go in the hail before the end of the race, little did I know how lucky I was as the snow would follow the hail minutes after I finished the race.

I crossed the finish line in 2 hours, 6 mins, and 37 seconds. My Garmin showed the race was 42.11 miles long (67.8 km) and that I had climbed 3,928 feet (1197 m), burning 2,982 calories in the process. I had taken 34th place, and later found that Chad Holcomb was not too far behind me, taking 41st place. Rider number 245, who finished ahead of me, thanked me profusely for pulling him back into the race. I congratulated him on his finish and rolled on through the rain to the staging point and warm clothes. All in all I was pleased with my performance. Three years ago and 10 lbs heavier, I completed the same course in 2:25; so I definitely improved – thank you Cyclo-Vets Saturday training riders and the L & 20th group in the Antelope Valley for all the rides that make tough races like this possible for me.

See complete results at Socalcycling.com.

West Coast Racing

While the Mid-West and East Coast is probably still in a deep freeze, California is already starting their racing season. I've got two races coming up, Boulevard Road Race about an hour East of San Diego on Saturday, Febuary 7, and UCLA Road Race held on the Devil's Punch Bowl course, right in my Antelope Valley back yard.

Neither race is my kind of course being a hill climbers delight. At a 180lbs, I don't actually "Dance on my Pedals" when climbing out of the saddle. I set up both races as level C and B respectively (following Joe Friel's method for catogorizing races based on importance, with A races the important ones) and use them for fun and training purposes. Though I'm a Masters 50+, I've elected to enter the Boulevard RR as an Elite 4. Now why would I do this? The elite IV's will be predominately younger guys but age is really not a factor in this 2 lap, 44 mile race. There is no category for Masters 50 just Masters 35+ or 45+. If I put myself in either one of these cats, I would have to complete 3 laps on this hill course or 67 miles, and I'm just not ready for this length at this time of the year. Also, I put myself in with 45+ guys that are Cat 1, 2, and 3s. I'm a lowly Cat 4 and my ego just doesn't need the hurt this time of year. One can argue that the Elite 4s are not as skilled and there is more of a chance for accidents - true. And if this was a crit I would avoid them and do Masters. The road race gives me a bit more room to stay out of harm's way. What I really need to worry about is the climbing. The last 11 miles of the 22 mile lap is all uphill with at least two 4-4.5% climbs. I did this course years ago when I raced in the San Diego Omnium. I weighed around a 195lbs at the time and was OTB by the end of the first lap. I'm looking forward to seeing how the lighter, new me will do. Below is a graphic showing the profile of the course.


The UCLA Road Race on Feb. 14 is also problamatic for non-climbers. I've also raced this course years ago and got to go OTB in this one too. Heck, take a little time reading other racer blogs and you'll find comments like, "this is my least favorite course of the season" without looking too hard. It's a pretty course, nestled up against the San Gabriel Mountains at the Northern edge of the Mojave Desert, like it is - it is just hard. But it is 20 miles from my home in Lancaster, and I've actually trained on this course. The course is 12.4 miles per lap, with 1500' of elevation gained in each lap.

Which category did I enter for this race? I'm pretty sure I entered the Mens' 4/5 race. Again, I had the option to enter Masters 45+ but they've got 4 laps or 49.6 miles to race. More importantly, they've got 6000' to climb. I've got only 2 laps or 24.8 miles and 3000' of elevation to worry about - only 3000'! It's not hard to see by my comments that I'm still a sprinter at heart. Hell, the leg speed is not what it used to be but it still sounds good to say, "I'm a sprinter not a climber" when I'm having those interesting conversations with other racers that have become vertically challenged.

Here's the profile for the course: Note the 5% to 7% parts of the course.