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WELL, KIDS THAT CERTAINLY COULD HAVE GONE BETTER BUT IT COULD HAVE BEEN A WHOLE LOT WORSE THE
EDGAR SOTO MEMORIAL STAGE RACE
When last we checked in I had just completed winning a stage race against men who resolutely refused to race, one of which called me a Butt-Hole. Over Memorial Day Weekend, Team Delta (or at least 3 of the 4 of us who still do bike races) once again made the trek south to the Edgar Scissor Hands Memorial Stage Race. The long weekend started on Thursday evening as The Lovely Kathy and I decided to split the trip into two legs, so as to avoid 6 hours in the car just prior to a time trial.
LEIPERS FORK TIME TRIAL The prologue TT of the Soto Memorial Stage Race is key. It's a 7 mile technical, hilly course and it's sets the order of the GC for the next 3 days. A fast start is critical and there is little margin for error if one wishes to contend for the overall GC. The course was originally scheduled to be at a different venue, but the local residents protested the encroachment on their roads to the extent that threats of the use of fire arms on any one wearing lycra were made. This is not made up. Lord knows that hills and sharp corners are obstacle enough for time trials, so the organizers opted to not have the potential of buckshot heightening the degree of difficulty. Stone Pony was my 20 second rider. I had another strong TT man right behind me, Ron Swope from Chattanooga, TN. I needed to rip off a good one with names like Robbie Ventura, Curtis Tolson, Cayce Tiesler and Steven Spanbauer in the field. I was hoping for a top 3 placing, within 10 seconds of the top of the board. As the official counted down my start I was in full froth and ready to roll. I started strongly and within 5 pedal stokes I was off my bike. I had put enough force into my initial pedal strokes that I had once again dislodged the disc wheel in the horizontal drop outs of the Leader TT frame. The rear wheel was rubbing the left stay. Unlike my experience in the ABD Outdoor TT (see FALLOUT article for reference) I did not do the entire 7 miles with a rubbing wheel. I got off the bike, re set the wheel and took off again. Dammit! 20 seconds wasted as I heard Swope start behind me. I managed to gain back time on Stone Pony ahead until the big climb on the outward half. Going up the hill, the force was again enough that my wheel dislodged. For a second time, I was off the bike to re set the wheel. I got passed by Swope and started over at the top of the hill. Fuggit. I was not going to be on the podium, let alone in contention. The wheel stayed put for the remainder of the 7 miles and I finished with a time of16:00, which was good for 13th position: 37 down to Spanbauer, The World's Strongest Man. After finishing, I recalled a conversation that I had back in April over lunch in San Diego with Sal Lombroso, the owner of Leader Bicycle. I mentioned to him that he needed to make some changes to the horizontal drop out of the TT frame. This is what he said, which I recalled AFTER I had potentially cost myself a podium finish for the prologue stage. "If you'll look at the dropouts, you'll notice a hole at the front of each one. These holes are not for water drainage. You received a couple of bolts with the frame that you very likely put into your water bottle cage mounts. I want you to take those of out the water bottle cages holes and put them into the holes in your drop outs. Those are the set screws which are designed to keep your wheel from twisting under pressure." DUH. The set screws are now in place and after doing a 52:54 40k this weekend past, all appears to be functioning well. Back to the story… The next two stages were a 45 mile circuit race and a criterium. I was fairly certain that each stage would finish with a front group receiving the same time. Both races were challenging enough courses, but there were also enough strong riders and large teams with vested interests in sprint finishes that a break would require a fairly monumental effort. My instincts proved to be accurate. The circuit race was all together save for the guys who had been shelled - guys who should have never been allowed to register for the event - 85 or so riders going 40 per with 2k to go. Sensing danger as one of the Team ONE riders was attempting to move up through the CENTER of the heaving mass to help his team with a lead out, I suppose, I backed off and moved to the back. I did not care at that point if I finished 85th, as long as I received the same time at the winner. Up front, everyone who has ever heard Paul Sherwin say that a race is always "safer" at the front was fighting for position as the downhill 45 mph sprint wound up. Crashing bikes and bodies flew all over; I saw both the yellow and green jersey wearers in the ditch as I went by and one of Ventura's Vision Quest riders lying next to a broken bike. I finished same time, avoided the crash. My team mate Chris Mosora managed to narrowly evade the carnage to finish 10th. Tolson won the stage. Tolson is capable of managing such chaos. Many of the others in that mess were not and stuck themselves in harms way for no good reason. I counted myself lucky. Kathy was nauseous after initially thinking it was me she saw flying into a road side sign post. Ventura's team mate had a fracture of his C-7 (thankfully no spinal injury) and several chain ring gashes that required stitches. Yellow Jersey winner Spanbauer, an ER doc attended to the wounded before finishing. He was given same time but was banged up and had a severely busted up bike that cost more than my entire Leader road bike to repair. Another rider had 6 broken ribs and a collapsed lung. All for a same time finish. Go figure.
COOKING WITH DRUBER GOES ON THE ROAD While in the Nashville, area, Moso, Kathy and I were fortunate to lodge with a Nashville team mate Ian Lochridge and his wife Shelagh. For the uninitiated, I am an amateur chef. Cycling is not my chief avocation. Creating original recipes and meals is. Thus, in exchange for lodging I offered to prepare a meal for my hosts. I was under pressure as Ian and Shelagh have refined palates and Shelagh had invited a fellow Vanderbilt University Hospital associate to join us. Below, is the continuation of the livin' large south of the Mason-Dixon theme…Seared Ahi Tuna with balsamic reduction, Portobello mushroom and saffron risotto accompanied by seasoned asparagus, baked en papiere. This as it turns out, was a damn site better than Long John Silver's Fish and crispy fried stuff or even Spaghetti with Ragu sauce covered with parmesan cheese from a green cardboard shaker.
The Sunday criterium was more of the same as the large field lined out over a 6 corner 1K course with the start/finish line in front of the world famous Crazy Horse Saloon and turn two at the Country Music Television studio in downtown Nashville. Stone Pony had the break of the day as he managed to stay off the front solo for about 4 laps before the sprinters brought things together for the inevitable bunch sprint which former US Pro criterium silver medalist Robbie Ventura won. I spent the crit moving through the field which contained more than the normal share of completely terrified riders and finished safely in the front bunch as a couple of crashes resulting in more broken bones (IDIOTS!) from guys trying to move up from 60th to 55th place separated the group on the last lap. Moso and Spanbauer were in the unfortunate second group that lost 15 seconds and The Worlds Strongest Man was forced to hand over the yellow jersey to one of the Team ONE riders - a sprinter type who wouldn't make it to the top of the next day's final climb within shouting distance of the winner. YOU WON'T BELIEVE THE DAY I'VE HAD! Above is exactly what I said to The Lovely Kathy immediately after finishing the final stage of the race. This is what happened… The final stage transferred us 100 miles east of Nashville to the tiny mountain hamlet of Spencer, TN for a 77 mile road race finishing with a 4 mile climb from the valley back to the top of the Cumberland Plateau finish in Spencer. I remained our teams' top GC hopeful, but well down the list of 15 paying spots, in 13th place due to my negligence of not properly installing the set screws in my TT frame. I knew with a centerline rule and 90 or more riders that I needed to be near the front of the race. The stage was going to be epic and the idea of having to make my way around guys being popped off the back over the hundreds of rollers we were to climb during the day didn't sound appealing. I wanted to save my energy. The race started off at a good tempo onto the wide avenue of state highway 111. With the centerline well blocked, I used the shoulder of the road to move toward the front which was working well until I ran over some gravel and punctured my front tire. The SRAM neutral support driver, Merlin, jumped out of his car with a front wheel after the field passed and had me back on my way about a minute later. This was barely two miles into the race. I made my way through the caravan of cars that were marshaled behind the race until we turned off of 111. Up ahead, I saw that my faithful team mate Stone Pony had dropped back to help me regain contact. Once we made contact with the race, I was feeling VERY European and proud of myself when I noticed that my front flat was actually a DOUBLE flat and the slow leaking rear was now completely deflated just as we made contact with the race. AWWWW NUTTTS! I shouted. Only that's not what I said, and the above scenario repeated itself. By mile nine, I was back in the group just in time to take pleasure in the ramp up for the sprint points at mile 14. Riders were attacking and chasing and the pace was frenetic. After the sprint, the pace settled down to a steady 22 per and I was feeling fortunate to be back with the race, riding a pair of Zipp 404's on my bike. Sweet, it was worth the flat tires to experience these wheels, I'll tell you! We were in a state park climbing up and down beautiful tree lined parkways on perfect pavement. Guys were congratulating me on making my way back after TWO flat tires and I was in ego heaven. As we were climbing a steep little hill at mile 21 my nearly new chain - less than 500 miles of use - snapped in two for no good reason! I had made my way up toward the front of the race, so after the chain snapped I had to let about 60 guys go past, and then the stragglers and finally the SRAM Volvo showed up. Merlin
jumped out of the car 5 minutes later, I was on a spanky new Orbea Orca, decked out with SRAM Force components and Zipp 404's. The seat height was adjusted and Speedplay pedals were installed and I was on my way to the feedzone to cry to The Lovely Kathy about my miserable luck. First the TT SNAFU and now this! Why did I waste my Memorial Day Weekend - the last weekend that Kathy and I would have together before a business trip to Ireland would take her away for two weeks - driving all over F'ing Tennessee instead of relaxing at home grilling bratwurst, drinking beer and watching the Indy 500 on TV like every other normal American ferchissakes! What a shitty existence I was leading. As I took my frustrations out on the pedals I caught up to guys that I recognized from the race who had been shelled over the rolling terrain. One after another I passed and invited the guys to catch my draft if they were able. None were able and I was settling into a nice hard ride, not like TT mode; but figuring that 40 miles of a hard riding on the cool bike I was on would at least salvage the day. I was looking forward to arriving at the feed zone so Kathy and I could get an early start on the 7 hour drive home and she'd have more time to pack for her trip the next day. I had no speedometer on the bike so I had no frame of reference for speed or distance other than I knew the bike change was at 21 miles and the feed zone was at 39 miles. After some time I crested a small hill riding hard when up the road I spotted what I thought was my race, strung out around a curve about three minutes up the road. F'ing unbelievable! I dropped the hammer and started chasing for real. I gave myself the following out. If the gap was less than one minute at the 39 mile feed zone, I'd continue on. If not, I'd have an excuse to call it a day. I had no idea how far I was from the feed zone. With a police traffic block, I crossed back over Route 111 and saw the SRAM Volvo ahead, off to the side of the road. Merlin had done a wheel change for some unlucky rider. When Merlin saw me, his reaction was one of disbelief and astonishment. "Fuggin-A!
THAT'S what I'm TALKIN' about!" Safely back in the pack, I realized quickly that I had worked pretty hard during my joy ride, as I wasn't able to respond crisply to the surges the race was making. I did what I could to stay in contact up the numerous small climbs and descents until the final long descent, bombing down into the valley at mile 56. The race was strung out, single file down the snaking, switch backs and I wasn't completely comfortable on the new bike as anyone descending near me would be immediately able to ascertain as I burned up the brakes on my borrowed bike. I came off the mountain well back in the field and had to chase with a couple of groups to get back to the front bunch. The efforts were wearing on me. Moso looked fresh; Stoney was making attacks up front to break a small group off to no avail. I was out of liquid and it was looking more and more like a group of at least 60 was going to arrive at the base of the climb back into Spencer all together. In the last feed zone, I grabbed 3 bottles, finished them off quickly while chasing the single file race while avoiding the deedle dinks being shelled by the accelerations. Just before the climb, there was one more short fast descent. On this descent a guy that had nearly taken me out in the criterium 4 times, not knowing his perimeters, fell off his bike right in front of Spanbauer. Spanbauer was down again, this time with no chance of winning or placing in the GC. He likely would have been a contender as a strong climber, for the win. I avoided that crash by inches. As the turned upward, the race detonated. I forced my way around the riders who were losing contact with the front group as the field thinned. With 3k to go in the climb Swope and Tiesler (the green jersey wearer who crashed with Spanbauer in the circuit race) attacked and had a 100 meter gap, which on a mountain is a significant margin. I tried to bridge to them, which I was unsuccessful in doing, but in the process I did split the field down to about 15 or so riders. With 2K to go I surged again and we caught Swope and Tiesler. The group stayed together until 500m from the finish on the 8-10 % slope when eventual winner Will Hibberts attacked and got a considerable gap. Swope (the guy is 210 lb of chiseled mass - I can't imagine the wattage he must generate on a climb like this) finished second on the day and sewed up the overall GC. I finished 13th on the stage and moved from 13th to 9th in the GC: 49 behind Swope, the winner.
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