Cherry Blossom SR - Stage 1

Stupid, stupid flats. That's all I have to say about yesterday's stage. The day started with a sea of blue and black of Portland Velo at the start line, what with 13 of us in the field. With a total field size of 86 riders, moving up in the field was a bit tough. That's the start of the story of flats and chasing.

Right off the bat, when I was seeing that the field was so congested, I had thoughts of moving up. I tried the middle of the field, but there weren't any gaps that I was comfortable moving up through. I tried the centerline and same thing. I had more luck over by the shoulder side of the lane. I was slowly moving up through the field led by a large contingent of blue and black, when the field went around a corner and shifted a little, pushing me off the road for a very brief spell, maybe 5-10 seconds tops. I think little of it; it was a hard packed gravel shoulder; get back up on the road and think nothing of it.

Then someone yells up to me from behind that he thinks my rear tire is going flat. I say, "no, my bike feels fine." I bounce on it a little, it feels fine. Then it feels soft. Then I am on my rim. This is 3 miles into the race. Fuck. I drift back through the field to the rear and stop as the wheel car stops right behind me. Shout out to the driver that I need a Shimano 10 speed, and digs one out. I slap it in, do a cyclocross remount and I am on my way. Tom Ricciardi, on of my teammates but one I didn't know very well, offered to wait for me as I was drifting back and I took him up on it. I owe him a beer or something.

Anyway, I am off at a full sprint to get back up to speed and I see him up the road noodling along, waiting for me. I blow by him and then slow a bit so we can work together. We work together smoothly and the field isn't actually that far ahead of us. Midway through the chase though, I notice my front wheel is feeling funny. I blow it off. Can't think about that now; my only thought is to get back to the field, which we are slowly gaining on. Then I start hearing my front tire making a "swish swish" noise. I blow it off again. We are getting closer. Now, along with the swishing noise, the tire is feeling soft. I look down and can see it sloshing side to side as I push on the pedals. Fuuuccck. This can't be happening. Now my entire weekend is in danger because the wheel car is ahead of me and if I get a flat now, it's a long walk and DNF or wait and beg a wheel from the wheel car of the next field, which they are not obligated to give me.

We are getting close now to the rear of the field and my rim is getting closer and closer to the ground. I tell Tom, who is on my wheel, that I'm just going to push it really, really hard and sprint the 100m left so I can get to the wheel car and get a new wheel.

I get to the back of the last car in the caravan and try to get the driver's attention. No response, but as I pass the car to talk to the driver, I find it's just a random car and not the wheel car. My rim is on the ground now. Up ahead of that car is the wheel car. I get up to it and tell the driver I need another wheel. We stop, I get it, and after futzing with the skewer for forever, I am off again to chase, this time by myself.

Now, the story gets boring. Chase, chase, chase. I am passing little fragments of the field who are getting blown off the back. I pass Rob who is dragging a brake pad. He hangs with me up the hill for a little, but he is eventually dropped from the pace. I get up to the top and I join up with a group of 4 or 5 riders, including Tom, who apparently made it on just in time to get dropped again when the course took a turn into the wind and uphill. Dropped riders make for bad chase companions though, and I end up pulling most of them along, with them taking short pulls and myself taking longer ones. One last push, and I am back on the back of the field, just in time to finish the first lap.

Going into the second lap, the pace rockets sky high as the field turns down-wind and starts chasing a couple of riders who broke away. We are flying at almost 40mph over level ground. After chasing the field twice and spending a hour at threshold, this eventually drops me. I limped in about 8 minutes back.