In the (Feed)Zone
w/Mark Swartzendruber

Driesdaagse van de Hooterville OR Dummy Heroes

The Tree City Stage Race is one of the few time stage races on the Midwest racing calendar. 3 days, 4 events, great roads, challenging courses, excellent support, Rev Billy pacing back and forth on the announcers stand, sounding very much like Robert Byrd filibustering Congress or making a case in a jury trial as to why his client deserves an $110,000 settlement for slipping on a banana peel in front of a smoothie stand. What more could a cyclist want? For Hooterville masters racing, the answer is unknown, but leans in the direction of cool temperatures, early start times and slow racing. This reporter draws on both anecdotal and empirical evidence to reach this conclusion. To wit: when presented with the opposite, the fields dwindled from average to small as the stage race progressed.

Early in the week following Memorial Day, I began to receive phone calls and e mail from my team. The word was CT and the RoadHound boys were assembling a formidable squad of professional bike racers for the 4 man team time trial, the first event of the Driesdaagse de Hooterville. The challenge was laid down, as this was to be the last event for Der Hausfrau, who is moving to Augusta, GA, as "Come and give Der Hausfrau one last bitch slapping before he leaves Hooterville." If you have been keeping up, you know Der Hausfrau has been on quite a roll of late, winning every race he shows for - at least the ones that he tried to win, ergo, the "A" races. The RoadHounds have more than once this season been shown Der Hausfrau's backside in sprint finishes and pride prevents them from allowing him leave Hooterville without the administration of a firm reminder of what bike racers with muscular definition in their legs can do. The challenge was made and the duel was set for 6:30 on Friday evening. The Roadhounds are known savages, who snarl and frighten other bike racers. They are the types of men who might intentionally swerve their bikes to run over bunny rabbits and other harmless small animals just to sharpen their bike handling skills.

In response, Team Delta cobbled together a team that at least on paper looked good. This being the last weekend of racing with the team for a while, we were hoping to send Hausfrau off with a VEE, especially since he grew up in Greensburg, IN - location of the Driesdaagse de Hooterville - and was being featured prominently in the local newspaper's countdown to the stage race section complete with photos and training diary entries. The series of articles was similar to OLN TV's "The Lance Chronicles" except it was called "Cooking with Der Hausfrau" and featured recipe ideas for 20 minute meals and flower arrangement tips as well as a daily mileage log, which is dull stuff to most Hooterville sports page readers who are generally looking for stock car racing results.

Team Time Trial: In addition to a very "on form" Hausfrau, we had Nooner, who a couple of years ago won the Elite Mixed Tandem Time Trial with his wife, Johnnie the Mole a top 10 finisher in the last two masters nationals and this writer, who has been known to do a TT or two. Also in the event was the Honeydrippers/Spinergy Team from WV featuring Andy Appleseed, the 2001 Masters National RR champ and the Saturn of Dayton team with last years Driesdaagse de Hooterville stage winner Abe McNutter.

I've heard it suggested that teams preparing for TTT events should practice together at least once. The only TTT I've seen in which two riders thrown together for a TTT were practicing before the event ended with the guys crashing into each other and one rider nearly breaking a hip. Based on this experience, we chose not to pre ride as a foursome. Next time we might re think that strategy. Delta started two minutes ahead of the Roadhounds. Johnnie the Mole leapt to the front of line for the first pull. Johnnie is normally a big gear masher, turning an enormous gear with a cadence as that rotates about as quickly as a sun dial. However he was ticking the gears over pretty quickly in this instance. I pull up next to him, "So, what? You're all of a sudden Lance Armstrong?" "My legs are lactating." "Your legs are producing milk?" "No, Acid". "Acid?" "Yeah, acid and not the kind that makes colors talk, the kind that makes your legs hurt." "Well, drop back in line and slow your damn cadence down, you're making me dizzy." I was next, then Nooner, then Hausfrau. The Mole took over at one mile still dialing up a cadence that hurt my crotch just to watch. It's one thing for a man with only one teste to sit in TT position and spin 120 rpm but for an intact human male, it can be uncomfortable. My turn came again and I started to ratchet to the lower end of the cog set. I was feeling quite spry fan old guy so I took an extra long pull. "Shit". "What's up 'frau?" "We shelled The Mole." "Really?" "You want I should slow down?" "No, just keep plowing, Nooner and I will bring him up." The wheels were off the train and we hadn't even gone 2 miles. 'Frau brought Nooner and The Mole back up and we resumed. Much to my surprise The Mole rolled through the rotation. I remember thinking, - "It's good, his cadence is like molasses in January, he's okay" as he took a monster pull. Nooner stayed put - the smart thing to do and I rolled through again, trading pulls with 'Frau. The Mole and Nooner both dropped off the back again. I slowed and Der Hausfrau came back again, but this time only Nooner was in tow. "We need three to score, let's go." We each took a pull and in bang bang succession Der' Hausfrau hit the only rock on the entire 10 mile course which started a slow leak that went completely flat after the turn around and Nooner detonated completely. The wheels were off and the train had derailed. The Team Time Trial ended with me finishing in roughly 22 minutes, Nooner rolling through in about 25 and The Mole who had stopped to chit chat with Der Hausfrau before being remembering that he was the scoring rider, crossed the line in 29 minutes. The Roadhounds only shelled one rider who didn't warm up and finished in about 21 minutes. They also killed a rabbit along the way, and ate its liver just because they could. Molto Brutto.

Road Race: Showdown between Papa John's doughboys and Delta. The doughboys have also been seeing a fair amount of Der Hausfrau's rear end at the finish line this year. The doughboys are a formidable squad with strong riders who ride well as a team. They're good guys for the most part too, which completely ruins the opportunity to write humorous things about them. I was hoping to catch Bobrow bragging or Spanbauer dissing a Turdle or a Hero, but they just don't do that stuff. As the race began, Doughboy Credulous went up the road 100 meters into the 65 mile race. Two Heroes, venturing into USCF territory for one of the few times of the season got into the move and Billy Redbeard from the home team - who claims to be a track specialist but never ceases to bust legs in road races - bridged up and the early race break was gone. The Indy Smashters and Team Shave Cream missed the move but did a good job burying themselves to keep the break pegged at about 1:30. The field allowed nine guys from 2 teams to do the work, knowing that when the pace got hot eventually, we'd have two less teams to worry about. This happened about 20 miles into the race. Knowing Der Hausfrau was the marked man, I attacked hoping the Pizzateam would be forced to chase. The move spawned a chase group of a Hero, a Shaver, 4 doughboys and 3 of the good guys. Much to my surprise, the Rev. Billy who had been riding well on the first lap, even passing other riders going up a hill had missed the chase group.

Just as our chase group was about to catch the 4 rider break, we came around a corner to find the road blocked with an ambulance and support personnel picking up a 9 rider pile up from the Cat 4 race. We were neutralized. Believe it or not, one of the Doughboys accused the race promoter of neutralizing the soon to be caught break only so her husband could win the race. This created some interesting histrionics during the 5 minute lull in the action so the stop was at least entertaining. Once we were given clearance to resume the race, the break got 20 seconds and the chase got 20 seconds and things pretty much stayed that way until Doughboy Bernie and I escaped up a hill to catch the break. Over the next 35 miles the break got bigger then smaller, I took 10 seconds worth of time bonuses by sprinting - something new that I'll try again some time - the break got bigger still, I rode fast with 10 miles left to race and only one doughboy -Glenn Homeboy - came with. We raced, passed, got passed and re passed the Pro 1,2 field who had started 10 minutes prior to us. I tried to shake ol' Homeboy but couldn't. Despite his being 10 years my senior, he was a rock. It worked out because he was interested in the stage win and I was interested in the GC. We put 3 minutes on the break and 4 or 5 on the field. Homeboy did a better job of dodging the Pro 1,2 officials car, which for some reason had stopped in the middle of the road 300 meters from the start/finish line and he won the race. I was in good position for the GC with a Time Trial and a Crit left to do.

TT Stage: Pizzaman Dr. Spanbauer won the Sunday a.m. TT. He's good.

Crit Stage: It was anti climactic. My High School Football coach used the derisive term "dummy hero". It's when the first team defense is practicing against the scout team, who is running the upcoming opponents offense in order to give the 1st team D a preliminary look at the opponent's offensive formations etc. The scout team is moving at half speed due to the fact that they're uncertain of the plays they're running and they are unenthusiastic about being the scout team. Truth be told, they'd rather be changing the spark plugs on the '78 Camero or smoking a doob. At any rate, invariably, the temptation to clean the clock of an unsuspecting scout team halfback becomes too strong and the All State linebacker blind sides some underweight scout team kid who isn't paying attention, just because he can. That's how the crit was. Delta played dummy hero. All the Doughboys except for one went home because it was 90 degrees and the race was in the late afternoon. None of the Indy Smashters or the Shave Cream Dream Team was around on Sunday either, having blown themselves to smithereens chasing the previous day's break. The race consisted of 2 Heroes and a Papa John who earned much respect by sticking around to play bikes vs. 9 Delta riders. It was a daunting task, but Delta rode brilliantly to defend my 3 minute (I could have been lapped twice in the crit and still won the Stage race) lead from the 3 non team riders in the race. I attacked early got a big gap because none of the three non-Delta riders cared, Hausfrau and Mole bridged up and we lapped the disinterested field. I crossed the finish line first with Der Hausfrau and The Mole who sat up, after I offered the VEE to the Frau and he refused, instinctively knowing that a VEE in this race would come with an asterisk on the resume. The asterisk reference at the bottom of the page would simply say "Dummy Hero."

Personal note: Just a brief not to express my gratitude to Der Hausfrau for being a most excellent team mate, a first class rider and more importantly, a decent human being. It's been a pleasure and I look forward to Labor Day and the opportunity to do a lead out for you again. Take no prisoners down South and don't come back with confederate flags stickers in the rear window of your mini van.

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