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!