Sent by Karen Brems on 10/20/09
This Sunday was the 3rd race of the Central Coast CX series in Toro Park in Salinas. This was a new venue for me. Going into the race, I was 2nd in the series, 1 point behind Kerry Barnholt. Kerry had told me last week that she was going back to Boulder for a visit this weekend, so with 50 points on the line for a race win, I knew moving up might be a bit easier :).
The course had a short but fairly steep paved climb - probably less than 1 minute long, but it was a major factor in the races. The descent was a really fun single track with shallow, banked turns that you could really fly down. Then there were 2 sets of tape zig-zag sections on dirt/grass fields and 2 barrier sections. Some of the turns were pretty loose and off camber, but compared to the other races I have done this year, I would say this one was probably the least technical. No run-ups! Course was also relatively short (6 min. vs. the more typical 8 min) so we did the climb more times. In general, if there was a course I could win on, this would be it!
The elite women's field was relatively small - maybe 15 riders. Stella Carey and Sarah Kerlin were there for Rock Lobster, plus Sarah Maile from Ventana MTB. Devon Haskell was also there early, but chose to race with the open men's B field instead of us - she finished 3rd in that race. I knew Sarah Maile was a strong climber, but I was pretty confident I could outclimb Stella and Sarah K.
We started right on the paved climb. I fumbled with my pedal and got a pretty bad start. Stella did her usual fast start and got to the single track at the top of the climb first. Sarah M. was next and then me. Sarah gapped Stella slightly on the descent, so I made a mental note to not get behind her again on that section. On the first zig zag section, a rider I didn't know squeezed by me, but I passed her again on the next turn. Then I managed to get by Sarah on the next turn and now I was where I wanted to be: 2nd behind Stella. I figured I could follow Stella until we hit the climb again.
I attacked the climb and got a gap by the top. I went as fast as I dared down the descent. I tried to not think about all the bright red poison oak that lined the trail and what would happen in I missed a turn and went into it! I could see Sarah not far behind me on the zig zags, and by the end of the lap she was on my wheel, but we had a good gap on Stella and everyone else. Sarah came around me and pulled the flat/false flat section before the hill. It was nice to get a little recovery, so I figured if she wanted to work, we could work together for a little while. I went around her and the top of the climb so I could lead the descent. I had a slight gap by the bottom, but she was back on my wheel pretty quickly.
I tried a few surges out of turns or if I saw I had any kind of gap just to see what Sarah had, but she always came back to my wheel pretty quickly. I knew it would take a big effort to shake her, and she was taking a pull every lap on the flat section of the climb, which was a headwind. She seemed content to sit behind me on the rest of the course. I figured I would bide my time for a while until she was hopefully more tired and I could make an attack that stuck. The finish was a dirt single track with a kind of tricky, loose turn about 200m before it, so I did not want to take a chance on a sprint finish if I didn't have to.
On the 6th and last lap, Sarah pulled in her usual spot at the start of the climb. I attacked as hard as I could as soon as it started getting steep. I was hurting every lap on that climb going Sarah's pace, wondering if I would be able to really attack her, but the funny thing about short climbs is that while going hard hurts, sometimes going harder really doesn't hurt all that much more! I had a decent gap by the top and just rode the rest of the lap as hard as I could. I won by 18 sec. over Sarah. Stella was 3rd a little over a minute back. This puts me in the lead of the series with 3 races left.
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