Here is Katheryn Curi Mattis’ race report from the Herald Sun Cycling Classic a week and a half ago - somewhat belated but still a good read! This was the tune-up race in Australia before the Worlds. Katheryn placed 4th against some of the best riders in the world.
Here is her report:
SEPTEMBER 26, 2010
Buninyong, Ballarat - The first addition of the Herald Sun World Cycling Classic in Ballarat Australia was to be a warm up race before the World Championships in Geelong.
The field was a mixture of National teams and some regional Australian teams, with about 80 or so total women starting. Several nations made the decision not to do the race at all, as well as, some riders who were doing the time trial. Both Evelyn Stevens and Amber Neben from the US team chose not to do the race as the TT was on Wednesday. That left Carmen Small and Theresa Cliff-Ryan (Colavita), Shelley Olds (Peanut Butter & Co/2012) and Amanda Miller (Tibco) to represent the US in this 90km race.
The race would be four laps of a big rolling circuit, followed by one loop of a smaller rolling circuit. What made the race a bit confusing was that the promoter wanted the national teams to wear their trade team kits, and some did, while others wore their issued national team kit. With Canada having both Erinne Willock and Joelle Numainville in the race, I had to remember they were not my teammates for this race!
With an early start, which meant an early wake up call because the race was about an hour and a half away from where we were staying, I was a bit bleary eyed and felt still half asleep when the gun went off and the course took us up a gradual, stair step climb. It had been a while since I had done a race and found myself farther back than I wanted to be and had to work my way up towards the front. Near the top of the climb, I noticed two riders off the front - one in a Cervelo kit and one in a German national team kit. I had no idea exactly who the riders were. Not ideal, and we did not have radios so could not radio back to Jim Miller in the follow car to find out. As the course was not hilly enough to shred the field, our plan A was to keep things together and work for Shelley for a bunch kick but if breaks went up the road, we had to be represented. I don't think any of us thought a break would go so soon, but the field seemed complacent as the two riders quickly pulled away.
On the back side of the course, Carmen and I sat on the front to keep the gap manageable but realized that we did not want to tow the field around and needed to have one of us bridge. She suggested I wait until we hit the climb just after the start/finish again and attempt to bridge. I waited patiently, making sure I stayed near the front of the group as we rounded the corner to start our second lap. About half way up the climb, I attacked hard on the left side and put my head down and kept the pressure on. I did a quick glance back at one point and saw that I had a good gap on the field and there was a rider who was chasing just a few meters behind me. I eased up to allow Carla Swart (South Africa and races for Vera Bradley) to come up to me and immediately the two of us began working to make our way up to the two riders up front. It took us about half a lap to reach them and it was Trixi Warrack (Germany) and Lieselot Decroix (Belgium/Cervelo), who were the two escapees.
The four of us worked well together until about half way through the last lap of the big loop, when we got word that there were three riders bridging. As soon as the gap got to over a minute, Jim was allowed to drive up behind us - this was good as I would occasionally drop back and chat with him. At this point we had just over 3' to the field and I knew the break would most likely stick until the finish. Judith Arndt (Germany), Grace Verbreke (Belgium) and Sharon Laws (Great Britain) were the three riders bridging so, as Trixi and Leiselot had teammates coming up, they sat on. That left Carla and I just rolling through.
We started the small lap and I had the impression that there would be a hard, short, steep climb in it so I kept waiting for the road to pitch up and take advantage of my strength on the climbs. Unfortunately, the road just rolled and the next thing I knew we were turning onto the road that led us to about 6k to go (which was the same as part of the big loop). Crap, it was pretty much all downhill from there. This is where knowing that small loop would have been helpful and I could have at least tried something.
Now anyone who knows me, knows I am not the greatest of sprinters and now this would come down to either sprint between the four of us or seven if the chasing three caught us - not ideal. I knew I had to keep a bit of pressure on to hold off the the three, but did not want to lead out the sprint. Carla pulled through with about 1k to go and I knew that I could not jump too soon, but had to go a bit farther out and play to my strength over a longer distance. Unfortunately I waited about 5" too late as Trixi was the first to jump, followed by Lieselot and Carla and that was how we finished, me 4th. Bummer, 4th out of four. But, I was happy with how my legs felt and it was a great warm up for Worlds.
We barely held off the group of three and Shelley was able to win the bunch kick for 8th. Overall, a good showing for Team USA.
:)
thanks for reading
Technorati tags:
Webcor,
Cycling News