In the (Feed)Zone
w/Mark Swartzendruber

Meeting Billy at the Cross: Good Coffee, Tactical Illiteracy, Misc. Musings

Arriving at the Crossroads Criterium in Terrible Haute, Hoosierland, I see a Labor Power Jersey languishing at the back of the Master's 30+ field. Flushed of face, corpulent, sweating profusely and wheezing, this valiant soldier is desperately fighting to keep the rubber band from snapping. "Power on Labor! Go Labor! WOOOHOOOO!" After the race ended said Labor rider made his way to thank me for the encouragement. So I sez to him I sez (speaking this way, is quite Hoosier) "Psycho Wyko, what are you doing all the way out her"…just about then my salutation was loudly stepped on conversationally and I found myself engaged in what became a very long, one sided tête-à-tête in which my efforts at participation were met with interruption and continued pontification. I realized I had made a grievous error. I wasn't speaking with Psycho Wyko at all. John Wycke, the Labor sprinter par excellence had not made his way to Hooterville from sunny SoCal. It was Rev. Billy. Billy had just completed his 3rd race of the day and I was being given a run down on all three. Starting with the 50+ and working through the 40+, he was now beginning the recap of the 30+ race, which I'd just seen. For the last hour and one half I had stood there like a Druber Bobble Head doll, nodding agreement, smiling wishing to God that I had to use the restroom. Something, any thing so I could make an excuse to cut the conversation short and at least get my clothes changed and a warm up before the dreamer race which was scheduled to start in two hours.

At last, Billy had to excuse hisseff (more Hoosierspeak) to clean up and make his way to the announcers stand as he was going MC the Cat 3 and dreamer races. Knowing that Billy, and more importantly his S.O. Marsha, are appreciators of fine vino, I had brought a bottle of one of my latest discoveries to share with them. It's a '98 Amarone. Imperio is the vintner. For those of you unfamiliar, Amarone is a rare dry red from the Veneto region of Italy. It's pressed from 3 varieties of grapes indigenous to the region after having been allowed to dry on racks, which concentrates and reduces the yield of fermentable juice. All this to simply say that it's a good sight better than a 1-gallon jug of Riunite Lambrusco. I hand the bottle to Billy, he stuffs it in his rear jersey pocket hissing "come with me precioussssss" and rides away.

After getting changed I made my way to the racecourse. On my way I saw Marsha who had some how managed to wrest the bottle from Billy's clutch. She thanked me profusely, as did the Rev. who at this point, taken aback by my largesse was rummaging through his 7 series Beemer looking to return the favor, not wanting to be in my debt. Unable to find a bottle of brown liquor, as he's going through his trunk he found a clean shop rag and tossed it my way. "Here Druber, use this to wipe the snot bubbles off of your face after your next time trial." It's the thought that counts. Many thanks Billy.

It was fun hearing Billy announce the race. Chiding teams and riders for not working together, being sarcastic, announcing two place primes when in fact they were only one place, $100 cash prime when in only a water bottle was up for grabs, telling stories. He did a good job. While racing it sounded like this.

"and then I had to go the chiropractor as my back has been acting up again and I can't seem to get the last 10lbs off that I need to lose in order to at least show my face at the front of a race at Stupidweek when my team mates from SoCal will show up and pummel all of the pretenders from around here including but not limited to Druber"

The delivery was non-stop, just getting louder each time we raced past the start finish line.

In the dreamer race itself we raced hard, going repeatedly clockwise around a 1.2-kilometer rectangle for what seemed like an hour. The usual Zip Code teams were present: Newbop, 2 gas station teams, Bacardi coolers, TX roadies, two Subway pros, Dukes and a couple of Hushpups who didn't make the trip with the Superstars to MN. Turin was minus the Ryan who was in MN and He Who Cannot Be Named. There were 3 pages of 17 riders on the start sheet, which Billy reported as being 54. The Nuvo BAP team controlled things. Big Al won a set of wheels. With two laps to go my teammate Big D was in perfect position to win the race or at least get into the top 5 in a bunch sprint, which the race was coming down to when a bunch of guys fell off their bikes in turn four just before bell lap. D was caught in it; I was behind it. I rode my bike as hard as I could for another lap and would have won the race myself if only the 18 guys that finished ahead of me had fallen off their bikes too. Aaron Hubbell won.

BAP stands for Bicycle Action Project. I always thought it was a tribute to the old Batman TV show. BAP was the "noise" that showed in a jagged conversation balloon whenever Batman was clobbering The Joker's henchmen. The Bicycle Action Project is a subversive group that is attempting to create a bicycle-centric society in Indianapolis, the automobile racing capital of the world. It would be sort of like China. Just outside of Indianapolis there is a Jeff Gordon Boulevard. I wish the BAP well. Their next project is to move to Detroit and encourage Ford and GM to begin making bicycles.

If Hooterville doesn't have good coffee, at least the gas is cheap. I filled my tank after the Terrible Haute race at $1.78 a gallon. Eat your heart out Californicators!

The Feedzone would like to thank Bob Brooks, who in response to my not finding good coffee during my first trip to Hooterville sent me a pound of Evans & King Coffee Co. of Indianapolis beans. It's the Big Easy blend and it's very good. Not like Italy good, but very nice. The phone number of Evans & King is (317) 769-BREW. For you MTB riders reading this, the letters in BREW correspond to the numbers on the phone dial you have to touch. BREW is as in brewing coffee, not slang for beer.

I've noticed an insipient disease creeping into the Pro 1,2 races. It's the same disease that drove me from doing masters races, but I'm afraid it's contagious. The disease is caused by a lack of confidence and fitness. It creates symptoms of laziness and general aversion to effort. It's called "Onlysomanymatchestoburnitis". It manifests itself this way, mostly in criteriums.

Rider A attacks a field and gains a 7-10 second advantage. Riders B, C and D bridge the gap to Rider A and sit on his wheel. There are 4 riders with a clear gap - A potential winning move. Rider A gives the chicken arm flick for riders B, C and D to pull though. Riders B, C and D refuse. They just sit there with only so many matches to burn. The break fails. You had the energy to bridge the gap. C'mon, put your chips on the table and roll the dice.

While I'm on the subject of tactics…this is another thing I notice. I'd like to believe it is a result of over eagerness or inexperience, but I'm afraid the true core is selfishness. Not wanting to be left out of a winning move. No one seems any longer to understand the wisdom of once in a while allowing a single rider from a team not represented in a break to bridge. Let's hypothesize - and it can only be hypothesis because it never really happens any more - that riders A, B, C and D from above actually get into a move together and are working it smoothly. A rider from team E has missed the move, his team now being the only team not represented in the break. Team E works together to shrink the gap and a rider from E attacks and attempts to get across. Here is what I see happening nearly 100% of the time. Teammates of riders A-D jump on rider E's wheel immediately, causing a chain reaction from the field to also jump. Rider E's team mate then attempts to bridge and the scenario repeats itself until the field has jumped so many times that the break which formerly was gone is now only 5 seconds up the road. Opportunistic unattached riders start flying across the gap, teammates jump onto wheels and the break is reeled in. Some times a team, in order to protect a break actually needs to allow a single rider or two to go across. It eliminates the incentive to chase. It's a paradox, and might be a bit difficult to wrap the mind around, but I've seen it work. It's Zen cycling.

Seems my piece on the virtues of time trialing has had positive effect. Yesterday at a 40K in the middle of nowhere, 150 people showed up and a goodly number of real bike racers. I did two 40k. It was windy and it sucked but I posted the two fastest times of the day. No one cussed. I won't win at Master's Nationals in Utah unless the officials from Temecula are in charge of timing but I'm going pretty well right now.

As if it's not tough enough already with the likes of The Vampire, Turbo Rogers, Evan Teske, Rich Meeker and MKA in the 40-44 age bracket, I'd like to see Steve Tilford and Mark Southard show up. I'd sit out and spectate for that battle. Is there another age category with such depth?

Next week is Peoria. Last year it was on the NRC. This year it's not but the money is more. I predict a large turnout of dreamers and posers. I also predict that it will be very difficult for me to repeat a second place finish in the road race. So it will be like any other weekend. Rest assured I'll try. I'm not very fast but I do try hard.