Boulevard Road Race

Boulevard Road Race Race Report

3^rd out of 35(aprx) in W123

February 2 2008

Live Oak Springs (East of San Diego, 10 miles north of Tecate)

67 miles of hills over 3 laps.

My start time was 9:10 and I live 147 miles away, so I was up at 4:45 to drive there. (Really, to sleep there while me "Team Cara" manager drove--Ahhhh).  It was COLD, around 35F when I got there at 8:00 and the wind was starting to blow.  After a very bad trainer warm-up, I rode down to the start line. 

            The start line is two miles past the finish line.  The race starts out with about 10 miles of non-technical downhill.  Unfortunately the backside of the course had most of the wind, and I was freezing. After the downhill, the course pretty much turns into a climber’s paradise, with some long false flats, a fairly consistent 6% 3 mile climb, some stair-steppy rollers, and then an uphill grind to the finish line.  Two more miles of straight downhill with a few bumps and we’re back to the start.

            On the first lap I was content to sit at the back and try and get the feel of being back in the women’s peleton.  The field size was around 35 or so, and I was pretty sure that on the first lap no one would do anything heroic and many on the non-climbers would just fall off. 

            On the second lap Vanderkitten attacked and Team Rock (with 6 members) went to the front to work the pace.  The second lap was still pretty slow until we got worked in with the Men’s 5s.  They passed us on the descent but slowed substantially on the climbs, and we ended up working it.  At this point, about 5 women got away, including Janel Holcomb of Webcore, Morgan Kapp of South Bay, and Leah Guloien of CA Pools.  I wasn’t paying attention with all the crazy men around us, and eventually realized that there were some strong climbers in front of me.  I bridged up and just sat at the front for the rest of the second lap. 

            On the descent of the third lap many of the dropped riders caught back up.  I stayed near the front for most of the downhill.  As soon as the pitch changed, Webcore went to the front and started pushing the pace.  I sat on her wheel for a while and she eventually let up.  With about 8 miles to go, Webcore went again.  I was sitting 4 back and waited for Vanderkitten and Team Rock to stay on her wheel, but they didn’t.  I moved up and tried to close the gap.  There were about 6 of us chasing, but no one would pull through.  Eventually I decided to not worry about being fresh for a sprint finish and to just try and close the gap with some brute force over the last 6 miles.  I couldn’t quite close the gap on Webcore, but I ended up pitching most of the other women, and was going really hard for the line.  With about 500m to go CA Pools passed me and I was too cooked to respond.  Ugh. 

            All in all the race was ok.  I would have liked to respond better to Janel’s (Webcore) fantastic surge near the end.  I need to pay more attention and not trust that others will want or be able to close gaps on strong climbers.