Dunnigan Hills Epic Story: Mark Dames-Cat 5 45+

Race: Dunnigan Hills
8/14/2010
45+ Cat 5 group.

Rider: Mark D.

Steve McQueen said, “Racing is life. Everything else, is just waiting”.
Well, in Dunnigan, there was a lot of “everything else” going on.
The racing was, shall we say, limited, and when it did happen, it was over in about three minutes.

Let me begin with the waiting.
This was to be a racing double header for myself and my daughter who would accompany me to the aforesaid bicycle road race, and co-author a relay team effort at the Folsom Olympic Distance Triathlon on Sunday. The plan was to leave early by noon on Friday to beat traffic on the drive up to Woodland where we would spend the night before the Saturday morning race in nearby Yolo. (Why this isn’t called the “Yolo race” escapes me, and I’ll explain the thin connection to Dunnigan later). The “waiting” began in earnest on I-80 when I suspect an obligatory summons was sent out to every Contra Costa County goof with an automobile advising them that I was approaching Fairfield and that they should immediately flood the freeway with SUV’s going 5 mph so that my forward progress would be impeded to a crawl. The good citizens of CoCo County were attentive to their duties, and successfully extracted two hours from my life, which tragically will never be recovered.

Arriving in Woodland, further delay was threatened when the motel clerk advised that my online reservation was made for a smoking room (they still have those?) and that no non-smoking rooms were available on the ground floor. As it happened we were in luck per the clerk, as a baseball team had just cancelled, opening up a second floor non-smoker. Fine, we’ll haul the bikes to the second floor. Gimme the key.

After checking in we drove the five minutes to the Yolo exit off I-5 to reconnoiter the race course. This a 43 mile, clockwise circuit of county roads, along the flat farmland of the Woodland area. The roads are mostly dead straight, set at right angles to each other, in giant grids that are reflective of the square mile farm plots that typify rural areas. Occasionally, hilly topography presents the anomaly to this pattern, and some curves and climbing opportunities appear on the course. John Pauley has cautioned that there is a crucial left turn crossing Highway 505 that will turn into a fierce, pelaton splitting wind. Those who are lagging behind the leaders at this juncture he advises, will be subjugated to playing catch up and will likely fail. We find the aforementioned turn along a frontage road that has been following 505 for five and a half miles. At the juncture of Road 14, the frontage road rises gently to the freeway overpass level wherein the left turn lies. Across 505 road 14 winds and twist with ups and downs before falling back down to the valley floor for a dead straight run due West to a right turn at Road 85. Pauley advises that this entire segment is critical. Stick to the leaders or you’re done here. Several miles down 14 I pull over and get out of the car to test the wind. It’s not a head wind but is coming from the side and behind, a three-quarter tail wind. I wonder if the time of day is the difference. I also note its 92 degrees out. We complete the reconnaissance of the route arriving at the final leg, a right turn at the “town” of Dunnigan (a cross road junction with a couple of buildings) , and a flat 10.9 mile straightaway South on Road 99W. I think in automotive terms a lot, and this section screams out for high speed, the kind of triple digit mile per hour blast one might due if a Ferrari was nosed down this stretch of asphalt. I don’t know why but I’m thinking huge pulls by organized teams and breaks are going to go down here.

The race finish is just off 99W on a cross street that crosses the adjacent I-5 Freeway on Road 96. We make the turn and explore the road. It ends in a “T” a half mile after the overpass. Somewhere along here the finish line will be. Andrew has advised that the decision in the race will likely be made on the sprint up and down this overpass. I’m not entirely comfortable with letting this go down to a holeshot on an uphill stretch. The 96 cross street is almost imperceptible from the rest of the landscape along the vast length of Road 99W. We return to identify some landmarks. Several large silos are on either side of the road just before the turn. Those will be my markers. I decide, somewhere before the silos, I’m going to launch.

The race website advises that race registration will close at 7:45 am with race waves starting thereafter. The next morning I’m there by 6:30, I get my number, and park. Andrew, Mark F. and John H. show up. Gregg S. is in route but has to wait in a crowd that is competing for limited registration resources. We wait. The start time gets pushed back 15 minutes. We wait some more. The start is on a side road leading to Road 17, and the 43 mile loop. Hundreds of racers are here. I note numerous teams, Taleo, Wells Fargo, Smith Barney, Webcor, and many others. The organizers line up the waves, give brief instruction about staying on the right side of the road, and send them off. One wave seems to have over a hundred people. Andrew and John P go off. Finally it’s the 45+ cat 5 group turn. Mark Foster, Gregg Shores and myself are lined up. I recognize several guys from the Copper Town race, including Thor Hushovd’s lookalike and his teammate. Taleo has three riders in our group. They’re rail thin and look like bike racers. I expect them to be a force. One guy joining the lineup gives cause for concern. He’s wearing a motorcycle helmet with a face guard, the kind you see dirt bike guys wearing. The helmet only partially contains a long beard and wild frizzed hair which seems to explode out the back. He looks like a helmeted Hagrid from the Harry Potter movies. I guess that this chap regards bike racing as a contact sport. Hmmm. I’ll keep my distance. The Coretechs trio poses for a photo shot taken by Gregg’s wife Susan. Having memorialized his appearance, Gregg’s rear tire then blows out, just as we are sitting on the starting line. He offers his apologies for having to withdraw without a sweat and promptly makes lunch reservations. No goo packs for him today.

At 9:30, the race starts and a pack of about 35 riders is off. I try to stay near the front, about 10 riders back. Mark F. does better and is generally in the first 5. The roads are narrow and we’ve been advised that if we cross the center line we’ll be disqualified. There is a race referee following our wave on a motorcycle to enforce the sanction. This makes positioning in the pack a bit dicey. There are large tractors and other pieces of farm equipment that lumber along these roads which make excursions into the opposite lane inadvisable. Within the first ten miles a solo break goes off the front. He gets out several hundred yards and hovers there looking back to see if anyone will join him. No one does. He gets swallowed up within minutes. I am nervous about getting gapped. I stay close to the wheels in front. They are going to provide me shelter from the Pauley promised hurricane winds that are coming up. I have a business card sized race map zip-tied to my handle bars. I glance down to check the mileage on each segment to compare with my bike computer. I want to be ready for every turn. During one of my map checks I nearly run into a rider in front of me. I decide not to do that again. As we approach mile 13.8, the critical turn to Road 14, the group seems to get antsy and starts to crowd forward on the run up to the overpass. Hagrid is off the pavement passing people on the gravel. I believe something is going to happen. I accelerate to the front.. We are up and around the turn and I tuck in behind the leaders. We roll into the hills at a brisk pace. People are up out of the saddle keeping the pace high but there are no break away efforts. The feared split in the pelaton hasn’t yet occurred. When we flatten out onto the valley floor I expect a huge push at high speed to split the group. It doesn’t happen. I keep to the left side of the pack to avoid what I perceive is wind coming from the right. The wind appears moderate. No gales are blowing out here today. We get all the way to the Northbound right turn at 19 miles without event. Now undulating hills take us up and down numerous rises. The schizophrenic leaders accelerate up hills, then slow on the downhills, sometimes threatening to crash the too-fast approaching rear of the group. An hour into the “race” and we’ve passed the selection point, I’m not tired, not even working hard. I start to think I could make it to the finale. I expected a sustained hammer-fest attempt by the leaders to thin out the crowd, but this group appears to have no such ambitions. We turn right on Road six, a section with more undulating hills and several miles along the pelaton suddenly slows. Dismounted riders from a previous wave are out in the middle of the road waving us into the other lane. We come upon a bike crash with a victim lying prone on the pavement. As we pass the scene the front end starts to accelerate. It’s a little more than a get-back-up-to speed acceleration. Maybe this will be the attempt to split the pack. It doesn’t come to pass. The entire pack reforms.

We come out of the hills and pass over I-5 for the right turn South on 99W and the 10.9 mile straightway. I wait for a team to try and pull away. I wait in vain. No one goes. After a while I see silos in the distance but they are only on one side of the road, not the silo landmarks that straddle 99W on both sides at the final Road 96 intersection. We move past at a methodical pace which is slowing. Miles go by. Instead of the usual two-across single file lines, guys are arrayed across the entire lane and are dogging it at 20-23 mph. They are blocking any movement up. I’m boxed in at the back. The pelaton seems content to dawdle along in anticipation of the final sprint. I’m not game for that. I try to get around on the dirt side of the road. No one is moving to let me through. One guy comments “I want this wheel” meaning he doesn’t want me to impede his draft of the guy immediately in front. Geez, I just want to go around ALL you guys, Get out of my way! I try and move left to the center line. There’s no room there without violating the center line rule. Minutes drag by. Even Hagrid makes no move. A crease finally opens up on the left side of the pelaton. I look at my odometer. We’re at 41 miles and change. My google maps route has calculated the route total to be only 42 miles and change. The twin silos are less than 1 mile off now. We are still at parade pace. We need some chaos. I decide to take off.

Up the left side I go head down and pumping. As usual Mark F. is near the front when I go. The speedometer goes to 30 mph. I know at least one guy has jumped on my tail but I keep going. I hope that Mark F. is being attentive but I can’t look back. This is it. This is my two minutes of glory. I imagine Phil Liggett screaming “Dames has gone, Dames has gone!” I’m out in front with less than a mile to go. My jersey is zipped up in anticipation of the finish. Somewhere up there the helicopter cameras must be following my every pedal stroke. No doubt now the sponsor is going to renew my contract for next year. Time and distance seem to compress. All the oxygen goes to the leg muscles and my brain goes dormant. I can usually hold a time trial tempo on a dead flat in the 25-27 mph range for a while, but now 30 looks like a nice number on my speedo, and this is pure adrenaline rush so I decide to stick with 30. Hey, why not? It seems like I’m leading for an eternity. In reality its probably a minute plus of red lining effort. This feels good. I have control of my own destiny now. Thoughts of amortizing my effort are dismissed and I keep the pedal to the metal. All my chips are in. There don’t appear to be any other contenders for the front. They’re probably all back there huddled in the draft debating why I didn’t get the dawdle message.

I’m not yet at the silos when the leg muscles start to mutiny. I send down orders for more engines but the glycogen and oxygen stores have been exhausted, and the speedometer is falling off precipitously. I’m desperate for more speed and downshift to get my cadence back up. If I can just make it to the turn I can practically coast home. I’m down to 25 mph when the pelaton hammers by me. Not just a few of them, but everyone. I attempt to latch on to their draft but to no avail. They are like greased telfon, and I can’t grab them. I need a rope and a grappling hook, anything. It’s no use. I’m going backwards. I’ve gone from 30 mph missile to torpedoed barge in less than a minute. A Cancellara seat-tube motor (ask Laura about this) would be nice about now but I’ve failed to plan in that regard. There’s no pity in the pelaton. No words of encouragement, no thanks for the lead out, are uttered as they fly by. They shed me like a used candy wrapper to the curb and move on. We pass the silos and turn onto 96. The overpass looms large, and I get out of the saddle to struggle up the hill. Somewhere up there the race is being decided without me. I summon the spirits of Old La Honda, and surprisingly my legs respond. I crest the hill still at a modicum of speed and spin down the other side, up shifting again and again, gasping for more O2. Two targets appear in front of me. One guy looks spent, the other guy is sitting up as if confused about the finish. Ha! Ducks in a barrel. I claw my way past them both ---finish line ! I barely make it out of the cellar. At the front Mark Foster has made his way to fourth place! Congratulations to him for back to back finishes in the points.

After 42 miles of riding, this turns out to be a one mile race.

Lessons learned:
I’m glad I drove the course before hand. Knowing what was ahead gave me more confidence. The finish line, and last turn landmarks were also good to know.
Now that I’m figuring out how these races go it occurs to me that one’s sprint time and speed over given distance should be a known quantity like a 40 or 100 yrd dash time is for a football player.
I could see a benefit to practicing maximum effort pulls to see exactly how long time-wise and over what distance one could maintain a solo pull at a given speed before blowing up (example: 30 mph for 1 minute and ½ mile). On race morning I’d then backtrack that distance from the finish line and find a landmark for my launch. My idea of what I could do, and reality turned out to be at least a quarter mile off.
All in all a great learning experience.