Racing - 2014 Ronde de Bethel

You can read about my trials and tribulations in the post before this but basically I wasn't really keen on actually racing. I mean, okay, I wanted to race, but more as a vehicle to ride away some of the immense stress I've felt rather than race in the sense that I wanted to be competitive.

One thing I didn't mention in the promoting post is that I kept putting off the eating thing. The night prior I didn't eat much, I woke up pretty hungry, and then for one reason or another I kept saying to myself that I'd get food "right after this".

Well, this happened, that happened, and before I knew it the clock said 10:30 AM and I hadn't eaten for something like 13 hours. I went to the bakery (street clothes, no bike) and ordered a couple pizzas, some sweets, and a coffee for myself (and a hot chocolate for Joel's other half). I ate the sweets pretty quickly, a couple pieces of the pizza at about 12:30 (I forgot to get them), and then it was time to race.

I changed quickly, eating two gels and a pack of Bloks, stuff I'd picked up before the club ride. I debated having all the Bloks because they boast electrolytes and if there's one thing that makes me cramp it's consuming electrolyte stuff. Nonetheless I was still shaking with a combination of cold and hunger so I stuffed the remaining 4 or 5 Bloks in my mouth. I managed to get them down without choking, but for a minute or two I just grinned to people, my mouth closed.

I hoped I dressed okay for the temperatures. I had on my heavy tights (windproof front), long sleeve base layer, jacket, gloves, neck thing, head thing, and booties. At first my head was cold - I hadn't taped the vents, which I should - but after about 10 laps I was suffering so much I forgot about my cold head.

Single file, strung out, gaps everywhere.

The race started out with some aggressive riding. I had two teammates in the race, Joel and Esteban. Joel went after the first move, forming a three rider break. Later two more bridged, including a long time Bethel racer Vassos and a NY rider Eli. I mention the latter because if you were in the race you saw the guy in the yellow jersey with pink booties constantly rolling off the front. That's Eli.

During the winter I wondered how I'd go on the hill. In 2010, at under 160 lbs, I actually dragged my brakes on the slower laps because I didn't want people to think I was doping. The lower weight really helped my climbing.

In 2013, starting the Series about 23-24 pounds heavier, I struggled to get up the hill without blowing up.

This year it was somewhere in the middle. I was 15-16 pounds heavier Saturday morning but I think I was weighing myself at the wrong time. I'm guessing that I'm maybe 14-15 pounds heavier than I was in 2010. No flying up the hill but not quite as bad as 2013 when I struggled literally every lap.

Near the front but carefully not at the front.

At some point in the race I headed up toward the front. I'm not normally one to move up that much but I do move around in the last 20 or so riders in a field. With a tiny 40 rider field if I moved up even a little I'd be near the front. I spent a few laps up front.

Bethel Cycle had a guy off so I discretely followed. I knew they were sitting on moves and I didn't want to ride against them. At some point I thought that maybe the guy off the front wasn't one of theirs so I asked.

"You have a guy off the front?"
"Yeah." He looked at me. "Maybe I'm not supposed to tell you that."

We both laughed.

Even with no wind I got pummeled up front so I eased back. The break came back also, a few hard efforts bringing them back.

I started to struggle a bit. I looked at the lap cards, hoping to see 10 laps or less to go, out of 30. Instead it said 18.

We weren't even halfway through.

I dialed back my efforts and tried to save something. I was already digging pretty deep.

Suffering following Esteban.

With just a few laps in the race Esteban rolled to the front. I happened to be there so I followed him, an accidental piece of teamwork. I started to blow up and had to ease off. On review, looking at the helmet cam footage, you can see that I'm in the 500w range, my heart rate in the upper 150s. My heart rate is a bit deceiving because I'd been anaerobic so it lagged behind my effort - I'd see mid 160s before I recovered.

Joel asked me if I was going to contest the field sprint. After a couple laps, when I confirmed that my legs were, in fact, cramping, I told him no. Of course the pace eased significantly right after that and I could rest and recover. I felt like I'd have a 20-80 chance of making the sprint, more than the 5-95 chance. At best I usually think 80-20 so 20-80 wasn't unusual. I've done sprints on worse.

Bell lap.

At the bell I was close to the front, but of course everyone was close to the front. I eased, let myself back a bit, and figured that if I opened the sprint from pretty far back then if I cramped I'd be less of a danger to the others. Everyone obliged, the cross headwind just before the hill slowed things down, and I had a great opportunity to get to the line.

Then, as I set off, I cramped.

I headed left, too far left, to try and clear the road. I knew I'd have to basically slow and if my leg seized I'd have to stop or fall.

When I sat up.

I got to the left curb just as my legs went. Everyone went by me. The guy next to me got 6th in the race, 4th in the sprint, so I was there.

But I wasn't.

Tactically I was fine. I just didn't have the legs to back up my tactics.

The only shot of the trailer, Expedition, registration area.

I clawed my way up to the line, death grip on the tops, trying not to cramp. I managed to roll over to the registration area. I had my head down most of the time so the above shot is the best one I got of the registration trailer.

The SRM told the tale. I'd averaged, for 60 minutes, 202 watts. I normally can't sprint if I average that - the last time I saw that number was in the 2009 Harlem Crit and I blew up exiting the second last turn. I normally see 160-180 watts, and if I see over 180 it's a special race for me.

202 watts is a bit crazy, considering all the stuff I've been doing other than training. So good that I could do it, not good that I had to do it.

Next week, without having to do Sweep, without spending most of a few nights out in the freezing cold making or packing stuff, and remembering to eat before 10:30 AM on race day, I hope to have more reserves, some more legs, and some more speed. I'll see how it goes.

Promoting - 2014 Ronde de Bethel

"We brought two monitors for you."
"Awesome. One should go to the finish line, one should be here at registration."

A short time later.

"The monitors aren't working."
"What?"
"We need some kind of adapter."

I thought about the adapters on the cables for the two monitors I use with the laptops.

"Right. I forgot about them."

I'm not sure where to start as it's been a long couple days. I suppose it was Friday, or even Tuesday. See, this year I had this idea to use a few thousand pound registration tent, aka a trailer, and this meant a whole lot of learning.

Tuesday I went to pick up the trailer. That in itself was an adventure, but it was just the beginning. My initial plan was to pack up the trailer on Thursday, head down to my dad's on Friday night, go to Sweep Day Saturday morning, and then, after returning to my dad's for the night, head back to the course for Sunday's race.

It went a bit differently than that. It was tougher than prior years, so much so that I couldn't even think about getting to my dad's until later on Saturday.

Thursday I tried to get the trailer packing done but simply could not do it. I had to make a few things, including the platform for the officials and the camera, the base for the tent, some other stuff. I was working away in the garage until I couldn't think straight and started worrying about cutting off a finger or something. I was already bundled up, both for temperature as well as safety. Circular saws, drills, sanders, all inside the unheated and bone chilling garage, meant ear, eye, and nose protection.

Early in the evening when I went inside for something.

I went and got the Expedition + trailer, parked it on the street, and moved stuff into it. Then I moved it to our storage bay and repeated the process - this was super nerve wracking as it's a narrow curving lane to the bay and I had to back out of it. Finally I drove it to where I've been parking it and got the Jetta and drove back home.

I got the major pieces in there, like the platform for the camera, the pallets (for the officials' platform), tents, heaters, cones, leaf blowers, snow blower, tables, chairs, shovels, brooms, course stakes (like cyclocross ones), propane tanks, gasoline, some tools to finish up the platforms… you get the idea.

That closed Thursday, with all the electronics and paperwork still to get done.

Friday I sent out the print jobs for the releases. The BikeReg releases was straight forward - they're pre-filled with the pre-reg info. However the blank releases was different - I got a waiver off of USAC and was about to attach it to the email I send to Staples when I decided to double check the waiver. To my shock it had all my info in it, like I'd filled it out. 1000 copies of that wouldn't do anyone any good so I cleared it all, saved it, checked it again, and then sent it out.

(As the racers at Bethel know the releases were properly blank so it was okay.)

I had to pick up more things from the local True Value - more cones, more heater stuff, more propane, some nuts and bolts. I had to pick up the print jobs from Staples. I debated some other stuff but decided against it. A post office visit to send a letter to a land owner, then back home to pack the rest of the trailer.

By this time I knew I wouldn't have time to drive to my dad's, and in fact I had to leave the trailer a few miles away because there's no place to park it at our house. I packed the Jetta with the more precious stuff - camera, radios, race numbers, stuff like that.

After the Jetta was packed I still had my bike, gear bag, overnight bag, and a bunch of stuff to put in the already full car. I was too tired and too cold to figure it out so I called it a night.

Saturday I had to finish packing the Jetta - my brain worked better after a few hours of sleep, drove to the trailer, packed that stuff in the already full Expedition and trailer.

Here was my big shock regarding the rental trailer. Every trailer I've looked at had D-rings in the floor, meant to tie down cargo. The most dangerous thing to have in a trailer is an unsecured cargo, one that can move around. A tail heavy trailer is a guaranteed recipe for disaster.

The rental had no D-rings.

Therefore I bought, that morning, some eyelets, turned the platform upside down in the trailer (4'x8' platform), mounted the eyelets (drill hole then screw in eyelet), and used the eyelets as light duty D-rings. I managed to move a lot of heavy stuff out of the Expedition and into the trailer, but this took some time. I needed to leave at 8:15 at the latest to get to the course by 10:00 AM. I got to the trailer just before 8, due to the time factored in to pack the Jetta in the driveway.

I left at about 8:55.

However now I had much more stuff in the trailer, it was tied down, and I felt reasonably comfortable driving forward with the trailer. I got the grate covers in there (heavy!), tents (heavy!), tables, shovels, cones, gasoline, stuff like that, in addition to the 4'x8' platform (heavy), snow blower (heavy!), two leaf blowers (heavy!), blah blah blah. The Expedition inhaled all the stuff in the absolutely packed-to-the-gills Jetta.

In a minute or so of driving I realized that an unloaded trailer bounced around like an unloaded van (we used to have a 15 passenger van for Bethel stuff). With 1000 or more pounds of stuff in the trailer it seemed much more smooth, much less jerky.

On the other hand the total weight had to be about 10,000 pounds - 5500 pounds for the Expedition, 3000 for the trailer, about 1000 pounds in the trailer, a little less in the Expedition, maybe 300-400 pounds in there.

This meant I had to actually get into the slow lane on the hills. The Expedition struggled up the hills - I didn't want to put my foot on the floor for minutes at a time so I let the whole rig slow to the high 40s on the longer hills.

I got to the course at about 10:35 AM, so better than I expected, but it was still later than I wanted. We worked on the course for a while, a good team of people sweeping, chopping, and shoveling.

The sand blowing team.

Ice chopping team.

SOC and I went to get some ice melt. We could only rock salt - the good stuff, the calcium chloride, has been gone for a while. The rock salt didn't do much but I dumped much of it on the ice on the road.

I had to print out start lists and some other stuff so I optimistically set up a mini office in a parking lot. I got everything going and then realized that I was too cold and too tired to think. I packed it up and went to park the trailer.

Mini office, Saturday late afternoon.

Of course to park the trailer I had to clear a spot in the snow as well as back the thing up. I kept forgetting this or that - I couldn't remember where I put the padlocks, my keys, the chocks, I actually almost ran over one of the generators… I was a mess. Finally, the trailer totally crooked in the spot, I decided that since I hadn't broken anything I didn't want to push it any further.

I headed to my dad's.

I wasn't much better there. I'd spent about 7:30 to almost 9 AM outside, then 10:30 to almost 6 PM outside again, and this only added on my Thursday and Tuesday stuff.

I had a cool little thing, negotiating my three nephews' sleeping arrangements. After a few reports of so-and-so bothering so-and-so I could sort of sense a pattern. I suggested a minor change in the arrangements (meaning switch two of the nephews) and they were asleep shortly after. I was out not much later.

At 3:45 AM I woke up with a start. I thought about what I might have forgotten. I knew I forgot the monitors at this point (I don't remember when I realized it). I worked on the spreadsheet - I added the sweep folks in BikeReg but hadn't added them into our spreadsheet. I left when I realized that I was actually late - I spent almost two hours working on the spreadsheet.

Race day went well. There are a whole slew of new people working with me, we had two police officers instead of one, we had one less business to handle (the volleyball place is gone), and one really busy new one (Skyzone, an indoor trampoline place).

I parked the trailer about where we used to have registration on the first turn, but later we realized I'll need to move it down a bit. Outdoor Sports Center set up their tent next to us, and they let us put the table with the releases a little bit under their tent.

With a couple extra marshals things went pretty smoothly on the course. I carried a marshal radio with me during the race, just in case something happened. From it I could hear chatter the whole way around the course, marshals calling out cars, bikes, and all that.

Registration, once I got a printer switched out (the original one wasn't printing so we did a quick change to the back up), was fine also. The rental trailer was a bit cramped but it was still much better than the tent set up we had before. With four dedicated registration people things went really smoothly.

The camera went great this year. I had concerns going into the race, with a new guy Mike doing the camera work. I met with him earlier in the week, we went over things, and then we (or rather, he) did three test runs during the Cat 5 clinic and race. Those went well, the numbers were good, and by the time the finish came up he worked the camera like a seasoned pro. All the races got scored accurately and in a reasonable amount of time. With such pressure to have a flawless finish line camera set up this was a huge relief for me.

Cat 5 clinic

The Bethel Spring Series almost didn't happen this year because of tenant complaints. I tried to make it clear where riders should not go, even making a really crude map to drive home the point.

Red striped area is off limits

One surprising incident involved a rider not only riding his bike into the off limits area but then stopping to pee said same off limits area. When the official ejected him he complained that he "did it all the time and no one ever says anything."

Really?

The Sterling RR in Massachusetts is gone for one reason - racers peeing on peoples' properties. There's no other reason, it's not budget, it's not the course, it's not the promoter, it's not even the municipality. The reason it's no longer on is because the town's people made it clear that they will not tolerate rude and impolite strangers rolling up to their yards or houses and peeing on them.

Our rider went into the upper red striped zone and took a leak. So that racer was tossed out of both races he entered.

(To be clear the driveway in the lower section is okay to stand in, and anything downhill of the finish line is okay, but the red striped areas are simply off limits to cyclists, bikes, etc. The only thing we had to do was to set up the wheel pit along the left side of the road between the driveway and Turn One.)

Overall, though, things went surprisingly well. I think the low turnout helped. It was like a trial run for us. I follow F1 and the situation this year reminds me, in a very distant way, of the massive changes in F1 for 2014. See, in F1, they have a twin hybrid drivetrain now - a smaller V-6 (instead of the V-8 from last year), an inline electric motor (sort of like a hybrid on the street), and, the biggest thing, a new hybrid turbo. They also have rear wheel electric generating brakes, new for this year. All this complexity has meant a lot of work and a lot of teething problems. The champions for four years in a row, in their last test, couldn't get their car to do a lap, and in the last run literally couldn't even make it to the end of the pit lane.

Those are some bad teething problems.

With us, going to the outdoor registration, using the trailer (with no D-rings for now), packing the trailer, with more businesses in the park, more traffic… things were a little rough. Not "car broke down at the end of pit lane" rough but more like "not quite there" rough.

I have stuff to do this week. I need to troubleshoot the printer, or buy another back up. I have to figure out the two new heaters (neither worked). I also need to think of some better arrangements for the trailer and better packing protocol. With just one race under my belt with the Expedition/Trailer combo I haven't come close to figuring out the best ways to pack either.

It's a long list but I'll get working on it.

I know where I'll start - remember the monitors.

Bethel Spring Series p/b Outdoor Sports Center - 2014 Ronde de Bethel

Results here.

A more in depth post to follow.

Promoting - 2013 Ronde de Bethel

I don't know where to start so I'll back track a little bit.

It all started falling apart back in January or so, when I asked the town to confirm that it would be okay to hold the races. I'd sent them a letter a while back but it got lost in the shuffle and never made it to the town's board. Instead of getting ready for the races I decided to wait until I got permission. I figured if I started to prepare then they would say no and I didn't want to tempt karma.

Because, you know, karma's a b...  well you know.

This set me back by a month since I had to wait for the next meeting.

And from there it just went down hill.

I was pretty sick for a while, which is okay, but then my back went out. Instead of building my bike and preparing for the Bethel Spring Series I was laid out, unable to move much, barely able to look after Junior.

Write off another couple weeks.

I wanted to have a meeting with our regular permanent staff, the people that the races probably recognize as "part of the race". I planned the meeting for a certain Saturday. Because I've moved since the Series started it would be a 90 minute drive, minimum, to get to the meeting.

Then my brother asked if we could babysit their kids that evening. I figured it would be tight but I could do it. Then it snowed that day, the worst snowstorm in recent memory.

Push the meeting back a week.

I met with the folks on Turn One. They put $15,000 buying sod for their lawn. They wanted people to stay off of it. I promised them we'd keep them off the grass.

In return they allowed us to use their driveway to route bakery customers and volleyball participants (there's a volleyball tournament place at the other end of the registration building). This was good except I needed three more marshals now.

I met with the bakery folks. They had painstakingly built a regular Sunday business over the last year and they didn't want to lose it. This meant I couldn't use the front door area of their dining area for registration - I needed to find a different place for registration. I steeled myself and the staff for a return to the bone chilling outdoors for registration. I mentally told myself to remember the heaters and the propane tanks.

Then someone called someone who called someone else. Word filtered through the grapevine that we may be able to do registration indoors a few doors down from the bakery. We'd have power, a bit of space, and heat. It'd be a limited space but hey, that's better than outside.

I headed down there one day to check it out. It seemed like it'd work fine. It was larger than I expected, it was heated, and it even had a power outlet in the wall. The location was a retail lab of sorts so it had to be pristine when we left it. In the past the racers absolutely trashed the bakery, damaging fixtures in the bathroom, ruining the finish on the floor, etc. We couldn't have this happen in this new location.

After the meeting I waited word from the higher ups. Ultimately the powers that be approved us using the new location.

Phew.

Suddenly it was time, the last week before the Series. I had to get things done now, no excuses. It didn't matter that I had the worst sinus infection of my life - coughing so hard I was yakking, coughing so hard I couldn't sleep, ultimately giving in and going to the doctor. Junior had something similar, snot and spit up everywhere, then had a round of pink eye when it seemed like he was finally getting better.

Inevitably things fell through the cracks.

For example, in the past we would drive the van down a week early, loaded up with all sorts of street sweeping accouterments. This year, due to me being sick, Junior being sick, and even the Missus getting sick (she never gets sick), each time we planned on driving the van down we had to cancel. It finally got to the point where we wouldn't be able to drive it down before Sweep Day.

This meant I had to carry the sweep stuff and the race stuff in the van.

Now, in the past I've carried some extra stuff in the van, extra finish line cameras, an old printer, and all sorts of stuff we never used. I'd bring it "just in case". This year, to streamline things, I took all that stuff out - when I started loading the van it was virtually empty.

Yet when I tried to get everything in there that I needed for Sweep and for the race... it didn't fit. I started putting non-essentials into the Missus's car, one that she would drive down Saturday afternoon.

The van, a huge 15 passenger size van, was packed to the gills. My bike ended up sort of wedged up against the ceiling of the van.

With Junior in the picture we needed a sitter for Saturday morning. Luckily we had one but this was a new thing for us - the Missus working and me driving a vehicle that wouldn't hold a baby seat, going to a place where I couldn't really take him. Junior had to wait at home, and to do that we needed someone to look after him.

I made it to Sweep okay, we cleared a lot of the course, and I even rode for about 20 minutes until my back went out. Apparently it wasn't as good as I thought.

Then I headed over to my dad's and printed stuff, set up the radios, set up the registration spreadsheet, started adding this person and that person, and finally fell asleep exhausted.

Sunday I hoped things would go better.

It started poorly. I mean we didn't even get into Sunday and Junior was up twice, coughing like mad, doing his projectile vomiting he does so well. The Missus had me sleep in the family room so I could sleep really hard instead of sleeping while sort of listening for Junior.

We got to the race and we unloaded the registration stuff from the van. It was less than I wanted. I'd left behind little things in some of those "unnecessary" bins, things like tape, paper (I borrowed some from my brother), binder clips, some pre-made signs on number placement, stuff like that.

Early in the day someone came up to me and pointed out the release forms didn't have a spot for a team or for the race entered. I had printed out a combination competitive and non-competitive form, not the standard competitive release form.

1200 copies. Of the wrong thing.

Crap.

The camera... what a fiasco. It was set to 1080i, not 1080p, so the images weren't clear. Then it focused on the people across the street. It auto adjusted the shutter speed due to the overcast conditions, blurring the numbers.

Finally, by the women's race, we had it all set. 1/10,000 manual shutter speed, manual focus, 1080p at 60 frames per second. For the 5s and 4s it was too late, we had incomplete results.

It had to be terribly frustrating. One racer complained twice to me in person, then emailed me, then called me, complaining about the results. Someone posted a negative comment on a YouTube clip. I got three hang up calls, and although they were hang ups (well it was just breathing) I never got them before so I'm assuming they had to do with the lack of results in the 5s and 4s. Heck I couldn't say anything because the camera didn't work right for those two races. Going forward for the rest of the Series and beyond it'll be fine, but that doesn't help the racers in those first two races.

I was short marshals, even with a huge number of volunteers. I had some very hard working volunteers around that Turn One building, on the hill, and out around the course.

I entered the 3-4 race but with two weeks of basically no riding I got shelled. (I rode 30 min Friday, 18 minutes Saturday, and about 20 minutes during the clinic, and before that it was 2 weeks of no riding). Somehow that seemed appropriate based on the way the day had gone.

The Missus had taken her one day off that week to help with registration. When things finally started to quiet down she went and retrieved Junior from my dad's place and brought him back. Seeing him put a smile on my face after a long and difficult day.

Other things worked well. The radios, more powerful than last year's, worked fine from Turn Two. I even had the channels set up properly. I got the numbers okay. There were enough pins. We had enough pens. We had some extra primes donated to us. We have new grate covers. The stakes and yellow tape worked well on Turn One, and I have snow fencing in reserve. We didn't need the area rugs for registration.

I need to do more though.

This coming week I have more reinforcements. The Missus said she'd return to help at registration - this meant lining up my brother and his wife to look after Junior. We have two more staff people showing up, two that were unable to make the first week (another will return on the third week and yet another will return on the fourth week). Our camera is working. I packed away enough binder clips for a decade. We have tape.

Personally my back is okay - I'm not walking weird, I can pick up Junior, but it's still a challenge to unload the dishwasher. I'm not that sick now - I finished my prescription stuff last week, I just blow green stuff out of my nose regularly. Junior is a bit better too, sleeping a bit better during the night, no recent projectile vomiting.

Friday I need to pick up the print job (the release forms) and organize the binders and the numbers. The Missus told me she'd help with that - she wanted everything ready to go on Saturday so I wouldn't have to work on stuff when I got to my dad's.

I'll head down Saturday afternoon after the Missus gets home from work - we'll do a Junior handoff and then I'll head south. I need to do three things at the course. First, check the course and do any major sweeping necessary. Second, stake out and mark the Turn One grass area. Third, patch any real bad potholes and smooth out any of the jarring dips I can find.

After that I'll head over to my dad's to meet up with the Missus and Junior. And, hopefully, Sunday we'll have a much smoother race.