The Dirt Field

The Race: Giro di Coppi
The Course: 5 laps, 62.5 miles, holy balls that was more climbing than expected
The Field: 1/2/3 men
The Finish: 38th

Since my focus lately has been on improving my climbing and overall stamina, it seemed like a great idea to race Coppi – a course I remembered from last year as never once being flat – with the 1/2/3 men’s field. Going into the race, I had three goals: climb well, finish the race, don’t get dropped. I accomplished two out of three. One of my goals was NOT to watch Rugg pee off the side of his bike and then hear him talk about his chest hair, but that happened.

I felt good at the beginning. Two guys took off right after the neutral rollout, one of whom was on my team, and the field seemed intent on giving them a huge head start. We coasted through the early miles, crawling up the hills while guys made jokes about how I was probably wishing I’d done the women’s race for more of a challenge. Seriously, I was on the front. Coasting. In the men’s 1/2/3 race.

Then a few guys got tired of the scenic tour of Dickerson, MD and attacked. Since I was sitting at the front and had a teammate up the road, it seemed like a good idea to follow wheels. It felt great to get moving and I was having fun, until it started to get a little tiring [Match #1: Burned]. I slid back into the field and took shelter in the spandex man jungle.

The rest of the lap and the second lap went by smoothly. The two-man break held a gap, the field ebbed and surged, I powered over the climbs and started to feel confident about my ability to stay attached. I looked down at one point and saw some big power numbers on my computer, but hey, working hard is good and I figured I’d just keep recovering.

In the downhill right turn on lap three, there was a crash that included an ABRT rider who went down in the middle of the corner. As he lifted himself off the pavement, he was clipped sharply in the head by another guy. I was able to swerve around but was scared he was seriously hurt, so I paused and asked if he was okay. Since he was able to answer clearly “NO!” and there were other people already stopped, I started moving again but was gapped off the field. It didn’t take long to chase back on and move up, but I was rattled from the crash and feeling the effects of the effort [Match #2: Burned].

I think the hills got steeper on the rest of that lap. There was no point at which I was fighting to stay with the field, but my legs and back were starting to hurt. I know things are getting rough when I want to slap people for using their brakes. FREE SPEED, PEOPLE. When we rolled through up the finishing climb and turned the corner to start lap 4, I didn’t so much get dropped as forcibly ejected out the back of the field [Match #3: Burned. Three strikes and you’re out].

Chasing wasn’t a consideration. Cramping had started in both quads and one calf and a chase might have rendered me back in the field, dead and primed for dropping. Since I still had 25 miles left to ride, it seemed smarter to pick a steady pace and keep going. This is when I discovered the three dozen small hills that had gone unnoticed in earlier laps while rolling blissfully in the draft of the field. It’s great how that works, isn’t it? Not only are you off the back and riding alone like a lonely snowman, but then you have to work 30% harder just to keep going. For some reason, I was totally fine with this today, grinding along while grinning and waving like an idiot at everybody I passed.

When I crossed the line at the end of the 4th lap, the very nice USA Cycling official called out, “Lindsay, I’ll place you, but I have to pull you.” This was bad news, because I was determined to do all 62.5 miles.

So hypothetically-speaking, there was the option of smiling and nodding agreeably before turning the first corner, removing my jersey, unpinning my race numbers, and continuing to ride the lap anyway to complete the race. All hypothetical, of course. Because if I were to have done that, surely I would have ended up very tired and sore at the end, but satisfied with having finished and knowing that the 38th -1 lap placing was actually just 38th place.

But I am an avid follower of rules, so clearly that did not happen.

Congrats to my teammates on their solid results today, with Nick Bax taking 1st, Steve Gordon in 2nd, and Jose Escobar winning the field sprint for 7th. And thanks to Mr. Sjoberg for providing a desperately-needed full bottle to use on that fifth lap, the one I didn’t do. While the guys don’t make the racing easy, they couldn’t be nicer about having me in their field and that makes for a great experience.