Jake's racing season started 2 weeks ago at Black Hills Circuit Race, but that ended mid race when his chain broke, causing much cursing. So, no report from there, but here are two videos from the first few laps
Yesterday, April 7, 2013, Jeff Cup.
The first really big race of the year. Everyone gets all worked up for this race.
Jake would be in the Men's Cat 3/4 race (he's a 3). BUT, the management at my firm scheduled a firm retreat in Arizona for that weekend. So....someone else would have to step in to play the role of SoigneurDad. Jake's race was not until 2:30. George Schultz and Dan Klaussen both offered to take Jake down, but G and Luke were doing the 15-18 race at 12:30. I didn't want Jake to go down there hours before his race. So, Loren was tagged. It would be "SoigneurMom."
I gave Loren & Jake detailed directions, in multiple emails: Lists of what to bring (lunch, bottles, clothes, etc), directions to the course (this was probably Loren's biggest concern). Then I flew off to Arizona, to "retreat"
Ok, so I went for a bike ride on Friday and Saturday while other people had spa treatments or played golf. So shoot me.
Sunday was nervous for me. I was able to talk to Loren and Jake very briefly as I was on the way to the airport and they were getting out the door. Otherwise, I would be on a plane until 4pm Eastern Time. On the plane, I got wifi for an hour and saw a few pre-race posts by Loren, so I knew they got there on time. Otherwise, I didn't hear anything again until 6:30. AT&T's wireless signal is non-existent at the feed zone (as I now remember from last year), so I couldn't reach Loren or Liam. I did talk to Doug Graham (Verizon subscriber) when the plane landed. Otherwise, I sat at home worried about crashes.
Loren passed the "pin on numbers" test
Loren & Liam in the feedzone
Jake well positioned at staging next to Jake Sittler
So, the race itself....Here is what I can piece together from Jake.
First, this is the email I sent Jake in the morning:
"This isn't rocket science. Watch Dave miller and jake sittler. They have
won the first two races in breakaways. Go with them. Mark them like you
did jimmy Pickard." That last comment was a reference to Jake's breakthrough second place last year when he followed former Div. 1 college runner Jimmy Pickard's breakaway move [reported at this Link].
Jake was well positioned in the front of the group for the first few laps (according to Doug Graham).
If you look closely Jake's 2 guys back in the middle (photo by Doug Graham)
Coming into the end of the 4th lap (out of 6 -- 62 miles total), when the group made the right hand turn to head for the start/finish, Jake Sittler went, and Jake Thompson went with him. this is a profile of the elevation from the right hand turn (so at mile 0).
According to Jake, Sittler proceeded to ride 3 other guys off his wheel, probably in the course of a mile to the finish line. According to Loren, when they came through the feed zone they had a 30 second gap on the field. The feedzone was probably about mile 1.5 on this elevation chart. Jake was holding on for dear life. Sittler asked him to pull through once and Jake had to decline and ask for time to recover. But then Jake did pull through. But, after the long climb past the start/finish (basically it's a slowly increasing climb for probably 3 miles), Jake popped. He had gone too deep to stay with Sittler and he blew up. He lost contact with Sittler, and I gather was fairly quickly overtaken by the group. He got back in the group. Now, this I'm confused on, but apparently they were pretty much immediately neutralized (ie forced to pull over) so that the 1/2/3 group could pass. According to Jake they then pretty much immediately sprinted up the main "hill" on the course, which was too much for Jake immediately after going so deep with Sittler. So, he and Andy Fleming finished out the lap, and were pulled off the course by the officials at the finish (not being allowed to finish the final lap). I gather that Shane and Ben Dinapoli (new teammate this year) finished in the group, but Jake didn't know where.
It was the right move. Jake Sittler solo'd away to win by who knows how many minutes (he's a Cat 1 for cyclocross, but god forbid that the USAC officials upgrade his road category until after he adequately rides away from enough Cat 3/4 races). Jake was disappointed, but he certainly read the race right. He just isn't in a place in his training cycle to go that hard and recover. But the effort was good training and will hopefully help him for Battenkill next weekend. Oh, that's right, big road trip this weekend.
I'll try to keep this short (and will fail) although my head is still swimming from the weekend. My anticipation over this event had been growing all week.
The Plan:
I would pick the boys up out of school around 12 and go to BWI for a 3pm flight on Friday. We would see the rider presentation Friday night, then the Juniors race and Women's race on Saturday, then the U23 and Elite Men on Sunday. When I printed our tickets out Thursday night I noticed that they didn't mention both days even though I paid for both. So, Friday morning at 9:10, I called the ticket people to make sure it was ok, and ..... I was told that the Sunday races were cancelled and everything was moved to Saturday because the Ohio River was going to flood the venue on Sunday. Wow! Well, I was glad we were going on Friday. Loren & I got the boys from school and we were running a little late, and I may have exceeded the speed limit ever so slightly to get to BWI, but all was fine. Lots of people on our flight who were also going to Louisville for Worlds (the airport was also overrun with Ravens fans going to New Orleans for the Super Bowl).
Friday Night:
Flight was fine. We got there and Louisville was welcoming the event.
CX Hairs "Gettin Lucky in Kentucky" shirts
We had a minor hickup when we went to the wrong Marriott (the nicer one), but no worries. We had dinner with Justin Mauch and his dad, Larry, at Gordon Biersch. That was nice, and we ran into and chatted briefly with Adam Myerson at the restaurant. Then we went over the official race hotel, the Galt House, (first regret is not booking us in there; I remember it getting not great reviews but it seemed pretty nice) for a reception put on by Focus Bikes that Chris Mayhew told me about. It was winding down a little but I met Greg Keller of mudandcowbells.com and we got some free t-shirts that were nicer than anything official. We didn't see any racers because they were all in bed by then.
Parking seemed mysterious, so while at Galt House we saw a thing for a shuttle and I went ahead and paid for the shuttle passes for us. We would just walk the 2 blocks over to the Galt House in the morning then ride to the venue.
Saturday -- The BIG Day
Ok, so, did I mention is was cold as hell Friday night. Indeed, and they were calling for snow flurries all day Saturday. We woke at 7am to this:
An inch of fresh snow. Awesome!
Well, the boys & I put on multiple layers of clothes and our heaviest boots. I went with my LL Bean boots (that I got in 1984) because we knew it would be wet. But they have no insulation so I brought chemical toe warmers in case (also extra socks). Unfortunately, the old boots have terrible traction, which would be a problem.
We wandered over the Galt House and waited for the first shuttle with a group of Belgian fans. It was very cold.
I was really glad we opted for the shuttle so that I wouldn't be trying to figure this out in the snow. We got there, no lines, straight into the venue
Liam at gate
Juniors warming up
The venue was a snow-covered wonderland. It was beautiful (but cold).
We had time, and we wanted to go meet Edwin from Van Dessell to say hello in person and thank him again for his support of Jake's racing. So we wandered over to the expo area for a while. We found him.
Then we scored more swag. Hats from Shimano (that blue one that Liam is wearing in the rest of the photos) plus hats from Trek, and thanks to Mark Monnett the local SRAM rep that I met at Taneytown, we got a Tim Johnson and a Zach McDonald "big head" (Zach is even on a stick). Liam now treasures Big Head Tim.
Junior Race
We headed up to the start area for the junior race. American Logan Owen was a real contender for top 3, and really was the 2nd best hands down. We waited at the end of the pavement with Andy Guptil, Curtis Windsor, Chris Keeling, and Philip Rob for the start of the festivities.
Here's video of the start:
Owen had had an issue and was already way back. Jake went running off so Liam and I wandered around to watch the race.
This is a happy boy
Lots of people in Winchester Apple Cross hats from the DC area were there. It was incredible. Logan Owen worked his way forward and caught the 2 belgian boys who were in 3rd and 4th. Lars Van der Poel (spelling?) was long gone and another Dutch boy was in 2nd. Here's video of Logan about to make the catch:
He ultimately finished 4th after a bobble cost him 3rd.
Women's Race
Very quickly up next was the women's race. We had found Jake, and Liam and I had discovered a place along the sand where you could see a bunch of different parts of the course, so we hung out there (second regret is maybe not wandering around the course more, but we were afraid of losing our spot, from which we had several good sight lines). Just like in the junior race, Katie Compton had some sort of horrific start and was way back. Ugh. She did come back to get 2nd. We were yelling ourselves horse. Marriana Vos rode away with it. The Dutch were 2 for 2.
We went to grab some food after the women's race. The food tent was really inadequate for the crowd (we do better at Super8 races). We waited a long time to get a burger and coke
In line behind us at the food tent
The Crowd was growing
Crowd on the hill behind us
U23 Race
We went back to our spot by the sand for the men's Under 23 race. It was a good race between a Belgian and Dutch rider. The Dutch guy caught the Belgian with about 2 laps to go and carried it home. The Dutch were 3 for 3. The snow was giving way to mud. We cheered for Zach McDonald and I waived my Zach-on-a-stick at him.
I just found this photo from Greg Keller, thanks (www.mudandcowbells.com) that he took right across from us as Zach went by; we're right there, crammed against the fence (Jake has on the orange/yellow scarf I have the white sleeves and Liam is between us)
It was incredible to be so close. We could really see a lot of this guys were suffering badly.
Elite Men
We had an hour before the Elite Men's race, but didn't want to lose our spot as the crowds were really getting bigger. (probably should have wondered around, oh well).
waiting for the next race
Liam held Big Head Tim the whole time
Here are some videos of the men's race. They're a little darker than I had hoped. The sun had gone behind the clouds and it started snowing during the race, which was just incredible. First lap:
This was the crowd around the sand and then Sven comes through with 2 to go
I was pulling for Lars Van der Haar. He got 3rd and was literally foaming at the mouth at one point.
This was the last lap. Sven Nys had taken the lead. Do you think Liam was into it!
We couldn't possibly get to the finish, so we watched on the jumbo screen across the field, which was another advantage of our location (if they had 1 more of those, maybe 2 it would have been perfect).
We watched the podium, my boots slipped and I fell on my butt in the mud, the crowd boo'd Pat McQuaid, and it was all over.
Saturday Night
Saturday night we heard there was a SRAM party at 4th Street Live (a kind of open mall area with restaurants and bars). We didn't find it but we ran into Andy Guptil et al, and we were able to score a table for 12 at Gordon Biersch (again, that's fine). It was nice. During dinner we saw Jonathan Page with his family; he walked by our table and I congratulated him. Then someone tweeted that Lars Van der Haar was at Smash Burger across the street, so after dinner we walked over but he was gone. Then as we walked back to the car, Jake says "that was Sven Nys." I yelled to him, but he was on the phone & the other belgians looked like they were going to kill me. But we followed him into Gordon Biersch and said hello and I got a photo of him and the boys
Jake said he had a minor heart attack when he first saw him.
Sunday
What the heck to do on Sunday. "Stalk Euro Racers" was the boys' desired pursuit, but we hung out in the hotel in the morning. Then we went to the Frasier History Museum (yes we were desperate) to kill some time, then we wandered over to the Louisville Slugger Museum.
Supposedly Ryan Trebon was somewhere inside but we didn't want to just wait for him. And of course, shortly after we left Tim Johnson tweeted that he was there -- damn.
We made our way to the airport. Getting Big Head Tim and Zach-on-a-stick through security was a concern, but they made it (and we were those people with way too many shoes but because Liam was 12 they sent us through the metal detector rather than the scanner to move us along).
Photo by JD Biladeau of us with the heads
Liam held Big Head Tim on the plane.
And then we were done. We got home a little after 10. Tired.
What an emotional whirlwind of a weekend. I know the boys had a great time. We could have done a few things better (hotel), but all-in-all it was great (but cold).
So, as a final -- small world -- note, early Saturday I saw Meg Biladeau, who was from the Mid Atlantic but moved to New England 6-7 years ago. She was an early Cross Blogger and supporter/racer/etc. She remembered us, and she even remembered a picture of her and Jake at Granogue in 2006 (when Jake was 9). So, funny thing is she and her husband JD were on the plane home with us, sat behind us, and so we did a picture of her and Jake to re-create that photo from 2006. Here are the 2 photos.
Well, our season is done. Jake decided back in October to focus on spring road races rather than try and have peak fitness for cyclocross nationals in mid-January. So, cyclocross season ended last Sunday at the NCVC Ed Sander Memorial at Lily Pons.
Sander Memorial CX
As I mentioned in the last post, the end of cross season can often be a matter of milking form on fumes. Well, my luck ran out and I got a bit sick on late Friday/Saturday. Nothing crushing, but just enough to where Sunday morning I really couldn't get up off the couch. I'm sure I could have powered through, but the race would have sucked. And then my Soigneur Dad part kicked in and started feeling guilty about dragging Jake out to Lily Pons 6 hours before his 3pm race just for me to suck. So, I decided to let him sleep. This left me feeling a bit unfinished, but c'est la vie.
Jake & I headed up there at a reasonable time. We had reports of some mud but nothing horrid. We parked next to Doug and Dawn Graham, big supporters of Jake's. I bummed a spare gu off of Johny May for Jake, thanks Johny. Jake got a decent start in a field of 18, but he clearly didn't have the same snap that he did a month ago.
He needs to work on not getting shuffled back in those early turns as well.
For much of the race he dangled between 5 and 20 seconds behind Tanner Browne and Calleb Ingram, but just couldn't close it.
He also had a little trouble with the barriers. NCVC had them inside the beer tent, but by that time of day, with the clouds, it was pretty dark inside the tent and Jake said his glasses were fogging up again and he couldn't see the barriers and was having to go by counting steps between them. So he tripped twice, which just knocks you off.
He finished 13th, which isn't bad, and he fought hard the whole time. But he wasn't satisfied and was a bit frustrated by it. I understand that. But that hour was good training for the upcoming road season and next year.
Season Overview
So, it's tough finishing on a "down" note, as our form faded away. But it was clearly a great cyclocross season.
Liam did 8 races, his most so far. And he would have liked to do more but they conflict with Sunday school. Next year, more than likely, he will join the NCVC junior squad. He went to some of their Saturday cross practices and they have a decent number of boys Liam's age and a more organized structure. The highlight for Liam was definitely Hyattsville. Flat and muddy is what Liam likes. Liam is the family mudder.
He's not as serious as Jake, but he has fun at the races and that's great. It's great to have him with us.
My season was largely devoted to support for the boys. I had terrible fitness going into August, but Sue Hefler helped me bring it around. I was bad bad bad for the early races. But then I had a little glimmer when I did well at the Psychocross B Masters. So, chasing the Sportif Cup 45+ Cat 3 gave me something to focus on. It was great winning that and the MABRA Cat 3 45+ race. I had a couple of good races, like at Winchester (love you) and AACX (another big hill) and was happy to be able to open it up at a bunch of races. So that was good.
King of the old B-Masters ;-) (photo by Doug)
My Soigneur Dad skills were Elite. We could pack that car with every wheel, glove, towel, bike and shoe that we owned like a well oiled machine. A separate entry planned on that one.
Jake's season was great. Even though the last few races in the Elites were not up to his demanding standards for himself, there is no possible debate about his season. His sole goal going into the season was to upgrade to Cat 2. He did that with flying colors. He won two Cat 3/4 men's races, he was 2nd in two Cat 3/4 races, he was 3rd both days in the Elite Juniors at Charm City, 4th in the men's 3 race at Rocktown, 7th in the 3s at Winchester, and 11th in the 3s at Tacchino (which, based on the field and the strength of the guys who beat him, USAC still ranks as his second best race of the season). He finished 4th in the Super 8 Cat 3/4 series despite skipping Hyattsville with injury and then not doing the 3/4 at the last 2 races of the year after upgrading to Cat 2. Not bad. Hopefully, his "off" races were learning experiences as well.
For me, it was a roller coaster. I was beside myself when Jake came flying up through the field of 100+ to finish 2nd at DCCX. So exciting. And when he rode away to win at AACX, it was almost surreal. I didn't even have my wits around me to video it. His win at Rockburn was a culmination. A solid victory over a big field at one of the monuments of MABRA CX. But there were tough days too, when he didn't perform up to his expectations. My heart really bled for him then. You just don't want your boy to suffer those slings and arrows of self-doubt and failure.
But in the end, you can't argue with this:
Photo by Doug
Wrap Up
I was sad for the season to end. It was great to see everyone every
weekend. Seriously, there is nothing better than the traveling weekend
family party of MABRA cyclocross races. We'll miss seeing all of you.
Thanks to Loren for her patience and support. But I think the novelty having us around the house on the weekends will quickly wear thin, and she'll soon be asking "when are you 3 going to go race all day again..."
Thanks to our Sponsors. Thanks to Van Dessel for hooking Jake up with his Full Tilt Boogie. A great bike and a wonderful company. Thanks to Sue Hefler for training us to be in a position to succeed and for soothing our fragile racers' egos. And Vapiano for supporting Coppi and Bicycle Outfitters for supporting HPC. Check them out. Support them.
Thanks to all my Squadra Coppi teammates for their support and camaraderie. I will miss Wednesday morning practices.
A final special thanks to everyone who helped me juggle balls as Soigneur Dad and racer, including Doug Graham and my fellow SD Dan Klaussen in particular.
December, it's when real cyclocross racing happens. But in the Mid Atlantic, where we start cross season at the beginning of September, some of us are running on fumes after 16 races in 12 straight weekends of racing. Some days you've got good legs, but others not.
Capital Cross Classic
Last weekend was the Capital Cross Classic at Lake Fairfax. This is a monument of Mid-Atlantic cyclocross.
Me and the boys went out to Lake Fairfax on Saturday and pre-rode a bunch of
laps. The upper section was very very dry with hard ground covered by a
loose layer of little pebbles and stuff. And the gravel road was
thick. It was like riding deep sand. It was in many respects a very
technical course. Little things would make big time differences. We
spent some time trying to ride the stairs. I could do 2 but not get the
last one, so I wouldn’t try in the race. But it was also a
course with hard efforts followed by slow technical stuff where you could
recover. This was not a big ring pedaling course (opposite of Taneytown
last week).
The moisture from the fog on race day actually helped the course be a bit
more grippy. Lined up on the second row next to pete. I Got a good
start and maintained it ok all the way up past the run up then I lost
some places when I got shoved off the solid line into the deeper gravel on the
climb up the back ridge. Then I was behind Karl Kensinger of NCVC who was
way too slow through the technical descent and “chute”. On
the second lap I somehow ended up on Pete’s wheel. He could run those
stairs well. He’s a strong runner. So I used him for draft on the
road up through the start finish.
But I was stronger on the climbs. I don’t remember when but I rid
myself of Pete on the upper climb mid race. Same with Bill O’Keefe. Then
I was coming around a group with Knight Elsberry of NCVC, Ken Morris of
Winchester, Al Green, and Bill Wheeler. Now many of these guys have
beaten me a bunch this season. Again I could tell I could climb faster.
Ken had powered ahead on the bridge (I had been on his wheel and should
have followed, but he’s damn strong on a flat road) but was only about 50
meters ahead of us. With 2 to go I was sitting 2nd wheel going into
the little uphill back by the start finish. I tried to cut inside Knight
but instead he stalled and I ended up hitting his back wheel and having to jump
off and run. That let the other guys catch back up and pass me. I
was shuffled to the back of the group as we got the bell (I think we lapped
James coming onto the road that lap). But my legs were still good.
So I moved up to second wheel on the little climb up to the bridge. I
followed Al across the bridge and up the run. It was full gas. I
knew that I would make my move on the gravel road climb up the back then
recover in the turns. So as soon as we hit the gravel road after the run
up, I drilled it, full gas seated. Only Bill could get to my wheel, but I
knew I could be faster through the turns and descent. I had a little gap
when we came out of the chute and I punched it hard again on the gravel road
through the camp grounds opening the gap more. I punched it full
again up the little climb off the road. At that point I was closing on
Ken. I put it in the big ring to sprint and try to catch Ken (maybe this
is when I passed James, not sure, but thanks james for sliding out of the
way). I sprinted at the start of the road but couldn’t close to
Ken. But Bill was far enough behind that I didn’t have to worry about
him, so I cruised across.
I was 14th, but that was ok. Cross results had me predicted
to be 20th, and I beat the guys that I want to beat and the guys who
beat me are, with only 1 or 2 exceptions guys that I’m not going to beat (about
8 of them are career Cat 1-2s that I’ll never beat). It was fun to be
able to open it up and attack when I wanted. I’m so much happier when
there is a climb or two, per lap ;-)
Photo by Jay Westcott
Jake lined up in the Men's Elite race. With no series points he was on the back row, and in front of him a bunch of Cat 1s. He had a bad day. A learning experience.
Luray Caverns CX
So today Jake and I drove out to the mountains to do the Luray Caverns cross race. You'll remember it as the scene of our big father/son showdown last year. I beat Jake last year, but in the words of Apollo Creed "no rematches." Since Jake's race was at 2:30, I decided to do the Cat 3/4 race at 1:30 instead of the 45+, which was earlier in the day. This year, Luke and Dan Klaussen would face off in the 3/4. And there was some talk of me helping Dan with some old man tricks. At the starting line, Doug Graham had the official mention their battle and warned me "no bullying." It was fun.
Doug Graham was loving this
There had been rain over night and drizzle and fog today, so the course was very slippery with greasy mud.
mountain shrouded in mist
Luke and I got a good start up the steep road. But boy are those boys more willing to risk crashing than me. So I was a little more "risk averse" in the slick turns. I was in the top ten for the first 1/3 lap. Coming out of the gravel road U turn Andy came by me, but at the top I passed him back on the other side of some guy.
The 180 gravel turn (photo thanks to Jay Westcott)
Photo by Doug Graham
But I didn't have good legs. I felt bad after the first lap and lost Andy, who went on to a strong 4th. At some point, 13 year old G Schultz caught up to me. He was turning really well and my glasses were fogging up so I could barely see. G is going to Nationals and is looking for a good result in a 3/4 race to help his national ranking, which will dictating his starting position at nationals. I lead G for a bit, figuring I'd help him get forward. At some point G came around me so I figured I'd follow him and make sure no one came by. I still wasn't feeling great, but G was riding well. Kudos to him.
Doug catches me laughing?
I still wasn't thrilled with my handling. I finished 12th. That was a tough course and my legs never seemed to open up. But it was fun.
Jake lined up in the Elite Men's race immediately after. Not a big field, only 9 guys. He got a good start, right with the group. He lost some places in the opening turns, but after the climb back out of the gravel 180 turn, he had moved past some guys and was not far off the lead group.
He was doing well. but he said the first lap effort hurt him. The guy in the Trek MTB kit caught him going up the road. Jake stayed with him for a while, which was good.
But then that guy's giant quads created a gap. Plus HIS glasses fogged up and he gave them to me (of course his were prescription so he couldn't see)
Jake was then being chased from behind. Here are a couple of videos from following laps. I told him to put in a big effort with 2 laps to go.
photo by me
Jake did a good job. The guy behind him was trying hard to catch, but Jake ultimately put a big gap to him.
Jake finished 7th. He wasn't thrilled with it but it wasn't bad. He's had a long season, a strong season. It's a big jump up to the Elite race. Not just the extra 15 minutes, but the brute strength of the men involved. And with small fields it can be hard to ride alone
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