Steveston Sockeye Spin

[AdamD]

Yesterday I headed over to the mainland for the crit in Steveston. There was a bunch of people from the island in all the races, Raph Lalumiere, James Cameron, Doug Doyle and Alex Hui were in my race, Shailie Sanbrooks in the women’s and Vaughn Hildebrand was in the men’s 1/2. I thought I was the only person from Tripleshot there until I saw another guy who I had never seen before wearing one of the grey and argyle kits, turns out he had lived in Victoria for a couple years and riding with TS but had since moved back to Vancouver.

This was my first bigger race and I thought cat 4 was racing by its self however there weren’t enough people so they combined the race with cat 3 which made me a little more nervous. As I am sure anyone who did N2V knows it was a REALLY HOT day to be riding in and to add to that Steveston doesn’t have a lot of shade. The course was sort of strange it was 900 meters with two really long straights making the other sides super short which made the jockeying for position interesting. I believe there were 35 starters and ten primes in 35 minutes + 3 laps of racing equaled out to about a prime every three laps and made sure the field was constantly braking up.

The race started off pretty quick but slowed down by about the third lap. After corner two on lap 5 I decided I need to move up and hitched a ride from another guy thinking the same thing. As I got near the front everything was pretty tight with no room to get in, so before I was actually at the very front I increased speed and decided I was just going to go for a little attack, one guy from La Bicicletta tried to follow but ended up in no mans land. As I went past the finish line the prime bell went signaling a $50 cash prime so I decided to stick with it knowing what ever happened I would have $50. So I did another lap solo won the prime then let the La Bicicletta guy who was just behind catch up so we could work together. We did two laps together and then another guy bridged up to us because there was another prime coming up (which he won). Two more laps with the new guy before the pack finally caught us. I think I was off the front for close to ten minutes. Perhaps not the smartest thing to do in a pack of cat 3's but I still had fun doing it.

The corners were all sort of sketchy and I think there were two single person crashes (both behind me) and I managed to stay in the front half for the majority of the race. However with a bout 5 minutes to go before the 3 final laps I had a nearly disastrous moment. I was the farthest outside going into turn three and as I started my turn the guy beside me on the inside started swinging out. I attempted to protect my steering but he bumped my elbow which started me wobbling. As that was happening my pedal hit the ground hard and my back wheel hoped up and sideways, once my wheels was on the ground again I was headed straight for the hay bail and just managed to narrowly avoid it. During that whole thing I lost about 5 or 6 spots but the adrenaline kicked in and I moved straight to the front with out any perceived effort. but by the last lap I was somewhere near the middle again In the last lap everyone’s elbows got higher and two guys even had somewhat of a head butting battle. In the final sprint I managed to pass two or three people and not get passed by anyone else.

Not only was the island present but it didn’t do too bad either. Raph was second James was third Doug was somewhere in the top 10 I was about 15 and Alex was just behind me Shailie was second in the women’s and Vaughn lasted quite a while in the Cat 1/2 race where only about 10 out of 25 finished.
Defiantly fun to do a bigger race and looking forward to do bunch more next year!

[Roland]

Nice work, I like your style. Attack the pack!

PS: Are they no longer teaching about paragraphs at Oak Bay High?

[AdamD]

I knew someone was going to comment on that.
There i edited it!

[shawnc]

Too bad about the paragraph edit, I was really digging the stream of consciousness thing you had going on there.

Nice work yesterday. The course sounds really similar to the Tour de Delta crit. I bet you'll get at least one upgrade point, since some of the guys in front of you are cat 3s.

[Lister Farrar]

Well done Adam, and great report. Any thoughts on what you'd do the same and what you'd do differently?

[AdamD]

Well done Adam, and great report. Any thoughts on what you'd do the same and what you'd do differently?

Although moving right up in the last 5 minutes sounds great in the report it also meant that I had to take up pull which i would have rather avoided. In the sprint I think i should have moved up again and found someone like James or Raph to latch onto, but then again im sure thats whats in everyones mind.
I think i would not have changed attacking for the prime though, it was just so much fun getting cheered on while soloing away

[Lister Farrar]

Good thoughts. I think trying your legs in the early break is good practice; for staying out of trouble in the early laps, but also for learning the pace (how hard to go, when to wait for reinforcements) and judging your recovery in time to get back into the pace line without dropping too far back. Maybe also when you know the guys in the bunch better you can be aware of who is a strong sprinter, but not yet at the front, and watch for them to bring you up instead of doing it alone (although I can't tell from the descprtion, maybe you were on a good wheel for the last laps.)