Hilltowns Cat 3 (late)

Sorry so late, but finally got my write-up done. Rough day on the bike, I definitely need better fitness for this course.

Summary: Brutal course, 43rd out of 71 finishers, finished in the 3rd pack on the road.

I had circled the Tour of the Hilltowns on my calendar since the beginning of the season, since I was unable to race it last year. As the day approached, my apprehension grew for a couple of reasons: first and foremost, everyone I talked to about it warned me about how difficult the course is, and secondly, this was my first race in Category 3. By the end of the race, I had a very good idea of what I was up against in my new class of racing.

I had studied the course a little going in, and even set up a garmin course using MapMyRide so that I could follow it on my handlebar GPS through the race. Sharon, Maddy, Dodger and I stayed out at my friend Bruce’s gorgeous place in Stockbridge (on the Stockbridge Bowl, no less!) the night before, and I even had time on Friday for a little pre-race loop out over Olivia’s Lookout to W. Stockbridge and back (photo below of my race steed and the Stockbridge Bowl).

I woke up Saturday morning feeling pretty good, though I harbored no spectacular designs on this race other than to feel out the pack and see what my legs had left in them. It has been a long season already, and I hadn’t been out for a real race (excluding Wells Ave) since my last cat 4 at Sterling. I ran into a few people I knew before the start, including Michael Brier and Neal Heffron, but I didn’t know anyone in my field and didn’t have any teammates. Not having any teammates to help or rely on, I just planned to sit in and hopefully hang on for the long climb up E Hawley.

I warmed up a little around Windsor before the race, and lined up next to Chris (?) from Cambridge and right behind Leo Desforge, who was sporting a Camelback under his kit. I felt pretty happy about bringing along a third bottle in my jersey pocket, as the it was obviously going to be a humid and very sunny 80-deg during the race. After some chatting with the guys around me about the course layout, we rolled off and made the right hander onto Route 8a (Savoy Rd) and everything was fairly calm for awhile. There were some rollers at first, but the first third of the course essentially consisted of a lot of downhill. Some of it was winding, and some of it was very treacherous (we were warned at the start about some bad sections) – there were a few sections of 35-40mph downhills during which I had to be very focused on the wheel ahead, the quickly incoming potholes, frost heaves, and cracks, as well as the numerous water bottles that were hitting the deck all around me.

There were a couple of really sketchy incidents during this section, the first of which was a Battenkill United guy who had something come loose and start striking his spokes LOUDLY (probably his cadence/speed sensor). He was pretty close in front of me as we were descending quickly, and was for some reason just continuing on and looking down at his bike trying to figure out what to do. I finally yelled at the guy (I was freaking out by now) to get the hell off the road before he takes us all down, which he promptly did. Not long after, on a similarly sketchy descent, I felt something slapping against my hand and realized that my Garmin had shaken loose of its mount (it’s the wristwatch type) and was rattling around my handlebars. This really made me unhappy, and I didn’t really have a lot of bandwidth to deal with the problem. It took me about a mile or so to sort it all out, and I ended up gingerly unclasping the strap and just shoving the thing in my backpocket for the remainder of the race, effectively eliminating any mileage or course information that it was providing me. Bummer.

We finally made the hard right hander onto E Hawley Rd, and my heartrate shot up before we even started climbing. I had been dreading this, and it did not disappoint. I tried desperately to hang with the big guns, but was ultimately shelled once we hit the second long section of 8-10% grade. I was definitely not the only one dropped through here, and a small and scattered group of us soldiered on through the steep section, then finally through the seemingly never-ending stairstep climbs up to the top. It was probably 5k of climbing all told, but it was a very painful 5k.

Our group of ~10 riders congealed at the top and quickly formed into a nice paceline, mostly due to some strong work by a Cambridge guy, some guy from Nantucket, and me. Many guys were toasted from the climb and just sitting in, skipping their rotations, but we were pretty motivated to try to make up some time on the groups in front of us. We were pretty organized, and worked very hard over the next 20-30km or so, picking up random riders ahead of us, some of whom joined our group and helped out. By the time we made the couple of hard little turns near Plainfield, we were able to easily catch and join up with the largest group ahead of us (2nd big pack, behind the first group and the winning breakaway). I had to keep asking people around me for their mileage, just so I had some idea of where we were on the course.

Unfortunately, catching the group in front of us effectively doomed us for the rest of the race. Everyone in that group had already given up the chase (the break was almost 9 min ahead), but they were more than happy to reel in anyone who did try to get away. A few of us stronger guys from the catching group made some moves to shake things up, but we eventually gave up and just sat in for a “club ride” to the finish. I wasn’t that upset about it, as I had nearly drained all of my fluids and generally felt cooked. The Cambridge guy made one last, solid dig on the long steady climb up Rte 9 to the finish, and he was able to stay away for a couple of km until we finally reeled him in with about 2km to go. He settled in next to me and openly complained that someone should take the opportunity to counter-attack to the finish, and all I could do was shrug (I had no legs left for that, since I did most of the work to reel him in). We finally hit the 1km to go marking and a small group made a move off the front. I accelerated and grabbed on, not really motivated to sprint for 40th (and my legs were cramping hard). I sat up before the finish and ended up 43rd, which I guess isn’t too awful for my first cat3 race. If nothing else, I definitely know what kind of fitness I will need for next season, to compete with these guys (and the masters)