SCNCA Masters Championships - Bakersfield, CA

Finally, I've got a race under my belt after having my head bounce off the road in Murrieta. The Southern California Masters' Championships took place in Bakersfield, Ca today and I raced the 50+ group. I took 18th place but I was inches behind a friend of mine who took 11th and I sure didn't see 6 guys between him and me so I'm not sure how they pick the places. The funny thing is, I could have won the damn thing. With about 200 m to go in the 31 mile race, I was right behind 5 guys that were spread out across the road lane. They were not sprinting hard, just cruising in the 24 mph range or so. I assumed that we were a chase group and that others were off the front and that's why they were moving relatively slowly but I looked out to the finish and saw no one - I was sitting in 6th place and I'm a strong sprinter! The only problem was that they were completely blocking the road. In frustration I yelled, "start sprinting or get out of my way!" Instead, they actually slowed down, which slowed me down. I started to look for a way out on the left...bad choice; a gap opened on the far right and a whole bunch of guys went screaming up that side. I was out of altitude and air speed. By the time I spooled up to top speed, really standing on my pedals and driving hard, I had to be content to travel on the groups wheel, leaving the 5 blockers back in the dust. But I'm happy. The last two weeks were very bad training weeks for me as I did a lot of traveling to NorCal and back, which left little time for training. I even gained 5lbs somehow, so I had low expectations going into this race. Now for the play by play - see the map of the course below as outlined by my GPS and MapMyRide...

Bakersfield is 1.5 hours from my home in the Antelope Valley so I was up at 4:15 am and out the door at 5:00. I hitched a ride with Randy, a fellow 50+ rider and the guy that took 11th place. We were the 3rd group on the line at 7:30. The Cat 5 guys were first, followed by the women 35+ group. As I type this into my computer, results have not been posted online. When they come in I'll update this blog with full results and a link to the Kern Wheelmen site that put on the event.

As I'm straddling my bike at the starting line and listening to the pre-race instructions I was gazing at the overcast skies and wondering what the chance of rain was for my event - turns out pretty darn good as a light rain started right after the whistle was blown. It was already cold enough for me to have my arm warmers on; not a usual event for Bakersfield in June. The whistle was blown and off we went. It seemed like about 40 guys or more in my race group of 50+ guys. We headed North up Granite Road at an easy pace. My Garmin was showing a steady 2% grade and nobody seemed in a hurry to "put the hammer down." Since I had been off my bike a lot in the last two weeks I decided to stay near the rear where I wouldn't be tempted to pull the peloton. We also had a 5-7 mph head wind and I wanted to protect myself from that as well. The course was reported to gain about 1500'of elevation over the single 31 mile loop, MapMyRide shows an elevation gain of 1358' - not bad.

We crested a slight rise at around mile 3 and our speed dramatically increased. There was some movement in the group but still no one took a flyer off the front. I was content to hang back and enjoy the 40 mph ride. The steady drizzle had me a little concerned as the road seemed slippery, judging by my back tire sliding out a little in a couple of places. The road was also a little rough and cattle guards make for an interesting diversion. At one point, a calf started to walk into the road right in front of the peloton. That caused a little excitement and the yells chased the calf back off the road and back into the weeds. The descent leveled out at around mile 6 and stayed level until mile 10. This was an area for some attacks but nothing really stuck. I never felt concern but I did have to get out of the saddle a few times and really pick up the pace to avoid any gaping between me and the leading group. I did notice the pace changes were enough to drop a few weaker riders and we haven't even hit the only hill on the course. It was around this time that my heart rate monitor failed. The damn thing had been acting up over the last couple of weeks. I kept assuming it was a battery problem but I'm on my 3rd battery now in 3 weeks so I'm thinking it is time for Bob to upgrade his Forerunner 205 to either a Forerunner 305 or an Edge - now to convince his wife of the great necessity of this device...

At mile 10 the race went vertical - that just sounds good. It really was a much easier course than either Boulevard or the UCLA road course at the Devil's Punch Bowl (see my earlier posts on these races.)The climb was about 5 miles long and switched back and forth up Round Mountain Road. I moved to the back of the group just to keep an eye on everybody as no one was attacking off the front. I really didn't know the course and kept thinking that it must get a lot harder near the top and that's why no one was attacking. With my heart rate monitor out I had to go on feel and my feel was telling me that I was working hard but that I had a lot left if I needed it. Still, guys kept dropping off in front of me and I continually moved up the peloton by attrition. We crested at mile 15 and the real fun stuff started. The descent was about a minus 6% grade with a lot of switchbacks - in short, a technical descent. To make matters more interesting, the rain kept falling and all the riders were fighting the wheel spray from other racers as well. Normally I'm a guy that loves to bomb the descent but I'm still pretty sheepish from my crash so I kept my speed at around 40 mph at the top end and rode pretty loose down the hill as far as my placement next to other riders. As we leveled off at mile 20 I stomped on the pedals and closed the gap with the lead racers. I was feeling so frisky that I even went to the front and took a few pulls. At one time, I ended up with a group of three, 20 m off the front. Had we taken off at that point I think we would have kept the gap and beaten the peloton. At around mile 27 the road began to go up at an easy 1-2% grade. I positioned myself in the top ten and stayed there with less than a quarter of mile to go. Now go back to the top of this post and read how I could have placed in the top 5. But that's bike racing and I sure love it.

Final numbers: 18th out of 40? 30.9 mile loop with 1358' of elevation gain. Average speed of 22.8 mph. 2,128 estimated calories burned. Oh, and the rain completely stopped and the sun came out right after we crossed the finish line - just another beautiful day in Bakersfield, California.