Being from Chicago's south suburbs made racing the Richton Park Criterium especially fun. I haven't visited the area for a while but I completed graduate school not far from the race venue so everything around there was familiar and comfortable. The area has changed a lot since I was last there but as a new race location for Superweek it gets my thumbs up - a good, fast course through a residential area with smooth pavement and shady places for warm-up.
I was totally stoked to be racing with Anne, Kristin and Amy who respectively traveled in from Canada, Wisconsin and Boston to represent for Kenda. Other teams present in numbers included Team Revolution, HUB Racing, Verducci-Breakaway and HPC/List - all of them very strong criterium teams. In fact, Teresa Cliff-Ryan from Verducci was our national criterium champ a few years back and (I believe) has been part of the US team for some track events - she's pretty amazing. I think there were maybe 50ish women on the start line - I didn't actually count but it seemed to be that many and pretty much all of them were very strong riders which would surely make for a fast, hard race.
We were scheduled to do 55K and things rolled off the line pretty hot from the gun. There was a fair amount of activity at the front and an early crash in the second turn but it appeared that everyone was pretty much put back in a lap or so later without much harm done. We decided as a team to just observe what the strong teams would be doing and sort of feel things out before being very active. Amy and I stayed closer to the front third for most of the race and sort of got on the train whenever things got animated. Kristin put in a couple of strong attacks along the way and Anne did a good job of moving around through traffic and staying safe. The larger teams mixed things up a lot and attacked quite a bit so we just covered moves and helped other teams bring breaks back in or control the speed at the front. I wasn't feeling particularly 'snappy' after a 40K TT on Sunday so contesting the points sprints was not really something I was up for.
55K on a 4-corner course starts to wear on you after a while and I found myself with empty bottles at about 15 laps to go. I knew I'd start to cramp eventually as the temp was in the 80s with some humidity. As the laps started to wind down I decided to just try my luck in the field sprint from whatever position I could achieve without totally cramping. As it was my hamstrings and quads were locking up every time I had to accelerate - and I'm thinking I was probably not the only one experiencing that. In the end Amy crossed the line 13th, me 16th, Kristin 19th and Anne 34th. It was definitely a good race - difficult, sometimes twitchy but that's just part of criterium racing.
I sat out Tuesday's Bensenville Crit #1 in favor of work and was sorry to hear that Jim Scott was hurt in a crash just past the finish line. Jim (otb4evr), I hope you feel better soon.
I was totally stoked to be racing with Anne, Kristin and Amy who respectively traveled in from Canada, Wisconsin and Boston to represent for Kenda. Other teams present in numbers included Team Revolution, HUB Racing, Verducci-Breakaway and HPC/List - all of them very strong criterium teams. In fact, Teresa Cliff-Ryan from Verducci was our national criterium champ a few years back and (I believe) has been part of the US team for some track events - she's pretty amazing. I think there were maybe 50ish women on the start line - I didn't actually count but it seemed to be that many and pretty much all of them were very strong riders which would surely make for a fast, hard race.
We were scheduled to do 55K and things rolled off the line pretty hot from the gun. There was a fair amount of activity at the front and an early crash in the second turn but it appeared that everyone was pretty much put back in a lap or so later without much harm done. We decided as a team to just observe what the strong teams would be doing and sort of feel things out before being very active. Amy and I stayed closer to the front third for most of the race and sort of got on the train whenever things got animated. Kristin put in a couple of strong attacks along the way and Anne did a good job of moving around through traffic and staying safe. The larger teams mixed things up a lot and attacked quite a bit so we just covered moves and helped other teams bring breaks back in or control the speed at the front. I wasn't feeling particularly 'snappy' after a 40K TT on Sunday so contesting the points sprints was not really something I was up for.
55K on a 4-corner course starts to wear on you after a while and I found myself with empty bottles at about 15 laps to go. I knew I'd start to cramp eventually as the temp was in the 80s with some humidity. As the laps started to wind down I decided to just try my luck in the field sprint from whatever position I could achieve without totally cramping. As it was my hamstrings and quads were locking up every time I had to accelerate - and I'm thinking I was probably not the only one experiencing that. In the end Amy crossed the line 13th, me 16th, Kristin 19th and Anne 34th. It was definitely a good race - difficult, sometimes twitchy but that's just part of criterium racing.
I sat out Tuesday's Bensenville Crit #1 in favor of work and was sorry to hear that Jim Scott was hurt in a crash just past the finish line. Jim (otb4evr), I hope you feel better soon.
