The spring giro's are an annual training race series in the Rochester area. They are not USAC sanctioned races, but training rides. First 4 weekends of March, both Saturday and Sunday. Great events for checking fitness when you don't have other races. Racing on the collegieate team and travelling back home for a week of training, I haven't made any up until this weekend though. I made it out to the last one, groups are split up into an A and B field. The A's are essentially a 123 field and the B's a 45, although those super awesome atheletes who are just coasting through upgrades and killing the 45's also race in the As. There are two courses, this weeks was a 14km loop, mostly flat with a couple small but reasonably steep rollers.
The group at these races is always pretty small and breaks tend to stick. I estimate there were 15-20 riders in the A race this morning, but I'm not sure. Right from the start 2 guys rolled of the front and I quickly took off after them with one other. We got up and started rotating. This is wear the story gets really boring, the 4 of us rotated for the next 30 miles, then we started thinking about sprinting. Dylan from Mt. Borah started us off with attacks at approximately 1.5 km to go, I grabbed his wheel hoping he would spend his energy and I could jump around him, but then another rider (Dave from Towpath bike) got up front and tried to motor away. I stuck his wheel and then he pulled off, leaving me up front. I put it in a gear I could jump from quickly and started riding low end tempo. Just about the time I was debating jumping Dylan came around me again, I tried to grab his wheel but he kept inching away and then rider number 4 who I don't know pulled past me. I grabbed 3rd.
Overall I'm really happy with the outcome. I've never ended up in a functioning breakway, so getting a good rotation and working together was good. Last year I was in terrible shape and kept getting spit out the back of these races. So getting in the break, sticking with it was great for me. I was definately surprised at how tiring it was though! I had very little energy left for the sprint and had been hurting the whole last lap (as I know at least Dave was as well. I could have managed my energy with my pulls better and certainly setup the sprint better, but overall a great "race" for me. I wish I could have contributed more to the break, but I didn't have much, if any, more to give. Time to go train more so I get to the finish line fresher and can TT better.
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