VALLEY OF THE SUN - ROAD RACE

Combined field of cat 1/2 and cat 3 approx 65 women

Conditions: hot, dry windy desert

This day turned out to be quite an adventure, to say the least. Niki and I abandoned our usual “let’s arrive 2-3 hours early” anal-retentiveness and arranged our time to get to the start about an hour early. Our legs were nice and warmed up from the TT, and all the details were taken care of at home (numbers pinned, bottles mixed, etc.) well, wouldn’t you know the one day we decide to take it relatively easy, we hit stopped traffic for 10 miles on the freeway. AAHHHGGG!!!! We started changing in the car, much to the pleasure of the truckers surrounding my little civic, and pulled into the race about 10 minutes before our start time!!! I was literally coming out of the port-a-potty to face the already assembled field of women on the start line, then running through them back to the car to grab my bike, which Tracey was graciously hooking my number on! One calming factor was the handful of other women pulling in late as well. Needless to say, there was no warm-up to be had. No problem, right? It’s a flat course and a large field. Plenty of sit-in time to be had. WRONG. WRONG. WRONG. This was to be a bloodbath. A battlefield. A race of attrition. For the first half of the race we were hit with the most brutal, dry, hot crosswind. And I mean brutal as in no where to hide, no chance to take your hands off the bars, pedaling as hard as you could and maybe hitting 12 mph! After that stretch, which we had to ride 4 times, the course turned and now we had a blissful tailwind. However, this was not enjoyed for long, as it led right into the climb, which wasn’t brutal, but given a tailwind, all the pure climbers floored it to the QOM, which was on lap 2, approaching the QOM, i had been gapped off along the windy stretch. a colavita rider and i leap-frogged our way back to the front group, which niki was in. (niki was determined to stay in the front group for the QOM as she knew it would be a fast ascent) she saw me coming and powerfully dragged me up to a top 10 position, which i could not have done on my own - i was fried from the wind!Then, after hanging on to the front pack to the top, we hit the long, mellow decent. Giana and I had planned a counter attack here, after the KOM, but with the tailwind and long, straight rode, it was almost impossible to get away solo or even in a small group. About 20 of us made that first selection, and then that group in turn split with the GC contenders flooring it up the road. I ended up with 6 women, and we worked well together for about a lap, when we split again, with 3 of us drilling it up the hill and shedding the weaker three. We stayed together for the last lap, picking up one more Expresscopy rider who had crashed and was braving the windy stretch alone.
Oh! Did I mention the miscommunication about neutral feed. Yeah, there was supposed to be some, but there wasn’t. It was so dry I went through my 3 bottles and actually ran out with ½ lap to go. If any of you are riding with Amanda Shaw from Expresscopy and she is thirsty, give her a drink for me…she saved me! Anyway, the four of us came into the finish together, with Amanda taking the “sprint” and me second. It was only then that she turned to me and said that her coach had let her know we were still in the top 10 due to several girls succumbing to the elements. Well, I’ll be! Hadn’t figured on that at all! Awesome news to hear after such a torture-fest!
As Shelley likes to constantly remind me, I am a big girl. Well, given the way the smaller girls were getting blown around like paper dolls, seems my size was a great advantage at this race, and hopefully others in the future. How ya like me now pee-wee?!? ;) * BTW there was a neutral feed at the end of the feed zone – good idea to re-check to see if available. - Emily