My First Crit, or, How to Improve Your Cornering

I was very nervous for my first GVCC race. What if they're all faster than me? What if I don't like anyone? What if I make a fool of myself? Many bad scenarios got replayed in my head over and over again.

When I arrived I realized my first big mistake. I had hardly eaten anything since noon. It was now 6 and my body was used to eating every 3-4 hours. This was a big problem, but there wasn't much I could do about it. We rode around the course several times to warm up. It was a 0.6 mile loop, with only two real corners. One half was slightly downhill and the other half was slightly uphill and into a headwind. Within a lap or two I realized my second big mistake. My legs were toasted from the ride on Monday. Maybe that has something to do with the crazy headwinds, but I bet it also had to do with going out dancing and only getting 7 hours of sleep before my insane first day of class. Just maybe.

I did my best to work the kinks out of my legs, but they were having none of it. The muscles were sluggish and already burning on the uphill. The race was going to be 20 minutes plus 5 laps. We started with a few neutral laps, which were nice to continue trying to coax my legs into good behavior. It didn't work. Then the racing started. At first I was fine, in the middle of our small pack (only 10 women) and breathing hard but not dying. I lost some ground on the uphill each lap, but I always do. The difference this time is that I couldn't make it up on the the downhill. After about 3 laps I was dangling off the back, gasping for air. After 5 laps, the pack was barely even in sight around the corners.

There are few things more demoralizing than putting every ounce of energy you have into just clinging to the back of the pack, and then getting dropped anyway. But, I have the voice of Neil in my head telling me over and over again, "If you get dropped, it's still good training. Just keep riding." So I kept riding. For a little while I made futile efforts to get back to the pack, but I never gained any ground. At one point someone else got dropped and I spent the rest of the race chasing her. I never caught her, but I never let her gain ground on me either. I owe her a lot of thanks, because having someone visible in front of me was just enough motivation to keep me going.

Throughout the race I also got to practice high-speed cornering. Cornering and I are not comfortable with each other yet, but I figured I might as well make the best use of my solo training race and practice. I started out taking the corners at about 19-20mph, and by the end I was pretty confidently taking them at 25mph. I call that good practice.

At some point along the way I got lapped. That was about the point that my energy reserve kicked in. Or maybe I was just mad about being lapped. Either way, my speed picked up significantly. There were only a few laps to go by then, though, so it hardly mattered. Shana ended up winning the race, and I was shocked to find out that I hadn't actually finished last. Someone else who was racing a crit for the first time had been dropped before me. That was also when I found out that in the pack had been three Cat 3's and a Cat 2. I felt a little better after that.

That race wasn't fun. There's no way to twist it around and make it seem fun. I got shelled off the back, heartily embarrassed, and was suffering badly the whole time. Luckily, I was stubborn enough to keep riding. I think I earned some respect for that, even if my bad judgment and lack of fitness were blatantly obvious. Next week it's a regular road race, and my goal will be very simple and very modest: Finish with pack.