Andrew's FF Crit in Pleasanton Report 8/7/11

Pleasanton Fast and Furious Crit
8/7/11
Teammates: Steve Stewart, Dave Puglia
Place 20th out of 50+
Fast and Furious…living up to its name.

I went into this crit with no expectations and this is exactly what I achieved…not much. The set up for this race is very cool. Right down the heart of downtown Pleasanton. Some fan support, loud music, start time at 5pm, all combined to make this feel like a big time race (well, big time compared to the office park crits out there in the middle of nowhere.).

Course is a .5 mile slight downhill and then a .5 mile slight up hill on the other side. That combined with a nice headwind on the slight uphill lent itself to a fast course. Race had attack after atack and field was strung out from the start of the race till the end. Most the big dogs were present, including the Specialized, San Jose and Safeway teams having multiple guys.

Quick recap: Hung near the front most the race and tried to jump on whatever break went. This meant a whole lot of jumping with not much to show. Five laps to go and three guys get away. Of the three there was a Specialized and Safeway guy. If you have read my past reports, you would understand my belief that this was the winning break. I decided I would get to that break. I jumped and went for it. Turns out my jump needs some work. Seems the rest of my 47 buddies in the race wanted to come along for the ride. Since I was already in front and in the wind I channeled by best TT thoughts and went hard. I actually closed my eyes for most of the straightaway. I was digging to places I did not want to get too. Well, I got there and at the same time I reached the breakaway. As I got to the back wheel of the break, another attack jumped. I was blown. I thought I would just drop from the race at that point. I could barley see straight. Turns out, the pack was so strung out, that by the time most of the pack went by, I had caught some of my breath back, so I jumped back in and sat on for the next lap. One lap to go and I did my best to move up (I was pretty far back at this point). I got up to 20th and was able to watch the finish. A whole lot of effort for a 20th place, but it was fun none the less.

Afterwards I sat around with Steve, Christian, John W., Dave (new team member) and drank margaritas and told war stories. The stories were as much fun as the race. All good stuff.