ELITE ROAD NATIONALS

I had just a three hour drive to Nationals, I couldn't NOT go. I drove
down to the O.C. on Thursday night to meet Megan and settle in. On the
other hand, Mel and Virginia started the weekend off a little stickier,
driving 8 hours from the Bay in a car that would spontaneously overheat.
So they got in their pre-race warm up by enjoying the heater in 90
degree LA traffic. We all met up at Kate Mill's place in Irvine,
within riding distance to the race! Thank you Kate.

We woke up at 5 AM on Saturday morning to eat, biked to Dotsie's, and
rode over to the course for a 7 AM line up. The course was a 20 mile
loop with two 4% to 6% climbs. It was a typical O.C. neighborhood, 4
lanes wide, no trees, and it was hot. Starting at 7am was worth it. I
was expecting some wicked attacking, so my goal was to follow wheels and
get in something. The race started slow, with a few attacks. I saw
Virgina sneak into something, but it was quickly swallowed. The South
Bay Wheelmen girls launched a few solo attacks, and Molly from Metromint
made some great efforts, but with a field of 95 and everyone antsy to
win, everything was reeled back. Ozzi from Cal Giant Strawberry gave us
all some excellent ice cold feeds, and even made a friend in the feed
zone (a skinny PROMAN rider who had troubles handing off water bottles
without breaking an arm.)

With one to go on the last climb Mara and Dotsie and a few girls let it
all out there. It was the hardest part of whole race. A dozen girls
got away, and PROMAN was just behind in a large chase group. A lot of
riders had saved themselves for the finish, and it was on! The chase
and everyone shattered on the climb to the finish. Megan was our top
finisher in 29th place, 30 seconds behind the finishers.

~Kristina

CARRERA DE SAN RAFAEL - WIN!

San Rafael Criterium
Teammates: Helene, Kristin, Hanan, Shelley

Life's been pretty chaotic lately with the new house, sick kitties, a totaled car still in Seattle and lots of work to do. I showed up late to the race with just enough time to get a 20 minute warm-up and my number pinned. I caught a glimpse of my teammates before the race, but didn't have much time to strategize with them about race tactics and a game plan. Hanan mentioned that she had ridden earlier in the day and offered to help the team in any way she could. I told her my intention was to race hard and aggressively. I didn't see Helene and Kristin until we took the start line, but I knew they would have the same ideas as me and that we would all play off each other as we always do and try and control the race.

It was a hometown race for the Drumm sisters and Helene is a local hero as a firefighter in the area, so the obvious game plan was to do whatever we can to ensure that Helene wins the race. Because I didn't get a solid warm-up, I wanted to set the pace and ride hard from the gun to open my legs and lungs up a bit and nullify any early attacks. Instead of pulling the field around though, I decided to attack and found myself off the front for a few laps. After I got caught, the counter-attack came immediately from Vanderkitten, followed by another attack from Velo Bella. Both riders came back and I felt good again so I launched another attack through the start/finish. This time I had some strong riders, Sarah Bamberger of Cheerwine and Hannah Banks of ValueAct, come with me and we were able to open up a big gap. However, this break was doomed by the ValueAct rider who didn't seem interested in working with Sarah and I and we were eventually reabsorbed by the field again.

This was a perfect set up for the team to launch a very effective attack, which came from Kristin immediately after the catch. It was perfectly timed and she had 5 girls go with her. The only problem was, Sarah was able to cover this move too. This was not an ideal breakaway situation for us, with only 1 out of 6 girls up the road, including Sarah Bamberger who was the most dangerous rider in the field. I waited to see the reaction within the field. There were a few moves here and there and a small effort to chase, but it was clearly not going to be enough. So, I decided to go across the gap by myself.

After bridging halfway across the gap, a rider from the break began falling back to me. That rider was Karla Kingsley of Easton/Specialized. She is a solid rider who I have raced many times with on the track. She is a great competitor with tons of potential and I was happy to see her coming back to me. When we made contact with each other, the fight in her came out and we worked together to close the rest of the gap. Little did I know, Helene had also made a jump out of the field and was coming up behind us. Man, was I happy to see her. So, now we are three strong and the gap to the 5 riders ahead of us is quickly closing. Kristin had started to sit on the break at this point, once she realized that she had teammates bridging up to her, so that helped us get there much faster. It's different racing without radios. The spectators and crowds were incredibly loud, which was so cool, but it made it hard to hear what our teammates and friends were yelling from the sidelines.

Just before making the catch to the group ahead of us, I dropped back to Helene and asked her how she felt about attacking as soon as we made contact. She said, "wow, that's aggressive," but I knew she would and could do it if she wanted to. I worked to bring us up to the group and immediately Helene attacked. But, Sarah is a smart rider and she had already dropped to the back of her group to prepare for the counter-attack that would come from our team and she was on Helene right away.

Now the break of 8 is all back together and we have a comfortable lead on the field, so we started feeling each other out to set up for the final sprint. With about 7 laps to go there was a prime and Helene went for it. She got it easily. I rode up to Kristin and asked her to help me drive the break to set up Helene for the win. She did exactly that. Then I rode to the back and told Helene to ignore any late primes and save all of her energy for a solo attack with 2 or 3 to go for the win. She said o.k. but asked me to go for the primes if there were any. I assured her I would, except there were no late primes to go for. Kristin and I kept the pace high and tried some attacks just to make people suffer a little before the final sprint and keep Helene in a nice position to attack with 2 to go.

Like clockwork, Helene sensed the perfect moment and attacked just before the bell lap and opened up a gap that held through the start finish and up the hill on turn 1. On the climb, Sarah Bamberger attacked in an effort to chase and catch Helene and I was on her wheel. Once she saw she had me in tow, I sensed that she backed off a bit, but held speed through the last two corners and onto the final straight. Helene was clear but I opened up a sprint to make sure we would finish 1st and 2nd. Sarah finished just behind us in 3rd. The picture of the three of us crossing the line is funny. We all have our arms raised. It's pretty cool. Sarah was awesome to race with. She's so smart and strong and it was fun battling with her the whole race.

Props to my teammates for a solid race and tactically perfect execution despite having no pre-race plan or radios. Hanan remained in the chasing field to ensure that we would have one more card to play if it all came back together. We raced like a team and that's what it's all about. We were happy to get the win at San Rafael. It was a great course, very well-organized, and the fans were amazing. Thanks Ryan Dawkins at project sport and the City of San Rafael and all the volunteers.

Thanks for reading - Shelley