Seriously though, after a first season of having a significant number of teammates, we could actually do team things! Team talks! Team warm ups! Team tactics! Most of us haven't raced with more than a couple of teammates, so proper strategies were relatively new to us. This spring we tried some very specific plans with little outcome, so for this big race we agreed to "be ready" at two laps to go and try to string it out "at the right time." Apparently that was an exciting enough of a plan that Comrade_Zcientizt, having already raced in the amateur field, wanted to double-up in the semi-amateur field with us
Sound vague? It is in part because no good plan survives first contact with the enemy, and the enemy in this case is not getting dropped from the pack or crashing. A good plan covers and plans for every contingency. A _great_ plan has target primary and secondary goals, and capable people that improvise. Which is basically what I quick highlighted to Comrade_SweetSkills as all seventy racers lined up
Interestingly enough, Comrade_Sweet_Skills was the insulin pump kid I finished right behind back in 2015. Sometimes it's a wonderful small world
Whistle goes and we're racing. And racing. And racing. We hit a couple of speed personal records for the first few laps, and the pace settles a bit. These days semi-amateurs are more fit and have the internet to study up on race craft. It's no excuse for instincts or handling skills, but you could pick up some basics: everyone knew to coast the uphill hairpin and avoid brakes at the bottom. Today, it was clear that everyone's general plan was a similar sort of, "stay calm until later"
If you've never ridden in a criterium, there are a lot of great written accounts of what the experience is like. In a sentence, you can imagine it as a mosh pit concert with more harmony and a hell of a lot more confusion. And it's still physical exertion bit, so it's also painful and harder to focus. At the semi-amateur level, the overall skill level is enough at the basics to handle things when it's easy but it's not a guarantee of how racers will react to sudden shifts
Another day I'll expand more on what all of this means and a play by play of how a race plays out, but today this story and the team talk was all about "being ready" at two laps to go
And it's going well! There are some typical nerves that I get with racing, and I had extra because of so many teammates to be worried about. We're grown-ups - we signed up for worst, but nobody actually wants the worst to happen. Yet Comrade_Sweet_Skills, Comrade_Skimeister, Comrade_HuezLikeHup and Comrade_Zcientizt are all riding smooth and away from other troublesome riders. For a vague plan, it was looking nice
A little too nice though. The entire field is starting to look antsy. Nobody feels completely confident enough to drive a break off the front, and everyone feels too fresh. Riders start getting twitchy. A couple start yelling at each other as the front of field widens and we cram against into one broad strip. Comrade_SweetSkills draws next to me at the flat run and asks, "WHAT'S THE PLAN"
"THE PLAN IS-"
Wait
After these bottom two corners the lap counter will read two to go
Never before in a race have I had this many teammates. Who knows when I would have many again near the end of a race
"THE PLAN IS TO BE READY NOW. WE'RE GETTING YOU TO THE FRONT"
Comrade_SweetSkills moves in behind as the field funnels into the first corner, going from fifteen wide to ten. After spending the whole race relaxing on this section, I start ramping it up and we float up the street, moving past the back half of the field as it pinches from ten to five wide. Manage to maintain enough speed out of the last corner and the pack goes from five to three wide. Forty riders up I can see two teammates sitting near the front: at the most ready spot while doing the least amount of work
Start/finish line is about a half mile up still. It'll read two to go. Everyone will be in full fight or flight mode then
"STILL THERE"
"KRAMER, GO"
Moving up along a fast pack within the slipstream is simple enough. Towing a teammate at the fastest speed possible while not dropping them is an art: Comrade_SweetSkills has been racing about as long as I have, and it’s almost rehearsed as we do it . At one hundred feet to the line we're nearly at the front as everyone is strung out single file all along the stretch
Ten riders from the front I can see it's Comrade_Skimeister and Comrade_HuezLikeHup sitting staggered in fourth and sixth wheel. Perfect. I nudged a spot in the line to make space for Comrade_SweetSkills in eighth position. So many teammates, and they're exactly where they need to be
"KRAMER I'M GOOD"
The front couple of riders slow a bit, and without looking you could feel the rest of the field starting to come around. behind. In another moment we'll get swarmed and lose any advantage from moving up so far
Lap counter in the distance flickers from red hexideicmal three to two
"KRAMER I'M GOOD"
There's a bit more panic the second time Comrade_SweetSkills says this: he can sense what I’m thinking, he's trying to tell me to not do it
I'm aware. I'm also aware that as the biggest team here, five out of seventy was the best odds of winning for the day. Four out of seventy will be good enough
Thirty feet to the start/finish line and I move in front and for the first time all day I drive the pace. If someone has a picture of me here grinning and waving fingers for "two to go," I'd really appreciate it
At the start/finish line it's two to go and everyone starts panicking as for the first time all day we keep accelerating into the hairpin. This is new to everyone, and they don't know quite how to respond. I can sense a few racers jump in behind on my wheel as I keep speeding up the hill
"KRAMER GO"
No idea who's saying this. It’s thankfully not my teammates: they’re sitting smart and waiting for any suckers to jump with me. As for the random shouting, it's a common tactic to shout encouragement at someone in front of you in hopes of panicking them off their gameplan into doing extra work
Too bad that was the plan. Strava shows we're pedaling hard and it’s the fastest we've gone all day up and around the hairpin. Instead of coasting, I keep flicking through gears to find the best one to sprint on, and bobble my balance while standing on the pedals on top of Fitchburg
"KRAMER GO"
My favorite bit about this picture is Katie literally finds that perfect moment in my fifth Fitchburg race where I find the gear that feels right, seat myself back down and yell back to seventy screaming racers "BUCKLE UP" as we punch it into the downhill
