Steel City Endurance Racing

Barbour deTour

July 3, 2010

Philippi, WV

Fourth of July weekend brought a familiar race to the SCE team calendar: ABRA Barbour deTour. Remembering how fun this race was last year, Stacie, Jim, EJ, Dustin, and PG headed back down to Philippi to race. The team had a ton of fun, and both men and women raced well as a team.

Women’s Race Report by PG

It had been nearly a month since Tucker, and I was looking forward to racing with SCE back in West Virginia. This time it would be Stacie and me, and given Stacie was in the running for the overall classification in the Women’s Cat 4, we made the race day decision to race this one as a team. Our priority was to get her across the line and onto the podium. I was totally psyched to play domestique, chase down any breaks, and work together to get the job done. This is what cycling teams do, and racing more together as a team has been an ongoing goal, so today would be the day. I would be the climber, and she the sprinter. Fun fun.

At the start of the race, the women were mixed in with the Master’s men, and people took off up the hill. According to this particular race’s rules, women were allowed to mix it in, work with and draft off the men, so we soon lost Betsy Shogren up the hill. Behind her was Tina Taylor Kirk, who looked fantastic, and climbed very well. She rode super strong, and became our rabbit, as we could see her working with someone down the road for quite sometime. Eventually, though, they were off and out of sight. On this day, this would be Tina’s great race.

Meanwhile, at the start of the race Stacie and I rode steadily up the climb behind another Laura Kelley, a climber, who was climbing strong but by herself. We caught her and worked together the 3 of us, for much of the race. I was so impressed with Stacie’s legs just one week after the decimating ride at the Hilly Billy Roubaix, and noticed that she seemed to get stronger as the race went on. She took nice pulls, and we kept to the plan where I would try to be on the front on the climbs, and work together through the race. One super key element was our communication. In order to work together, we discussed ways to communicate during the race so the rider in front would know when to hit the gas, when to let up, and when to get off the front. A few simple words and really talking during the race made all the difference.

On the home stretch, Laura seemed to get a little impatient and went off the front. We kept her well within reach and let her ride out there. We didn’t slow our pace, but just kept riding steadily. With 3 miles to go, then 2 miles to go, we closed in, picking up speed on the final descent into the town and towards the finish line. Prior to catching our opponent, we strategized and I told Stacie that when I led her out I would bear to the right, so she could get around me to the left. All that work, some 30 miles and now we would see if our strategy paid off in the final mile. Would Stacie have the legs for the final sprint? Would we time it right? If we went too soon, Laura would certainly latch onto Stacie and get a sweet lead out from both of us. If we went too late, it would just be over. Ah, the excitement of the approaching sprint was almost too much to handle. I motioned to Stacie with my right hand to slow and wait, slow and wait (but admittedly this gesture was more to tell myself to slow and wait, slow and wait).

As we approached the finish, the 3 of us took a right, then the final left, and things got a little frantic. I worried my leadout was less than optimal, but Stacie slingshotted to the left of Laura. We all picked up speed heading toward the line, and in those last few feet, I saw Stacie edging her out in that final sprint. I was on the right and gave it my best to get a bit of my wheel in front of hers just after my teammate.

All in all, this was one of the most fun races I’ve been in this summer. The joy of working with a teammate toward a team goal was unparalleled. To me, this was a big victory for us, not because of the race itself, but because we set a goal of working together, achieved it, and had a TON OF FUN. Way to go Stacie at that final sprint!

Men’s 1/2/3 Race Report by EJ

Jim, myself, Stacie, PG, Ben, and Dustin ventured to Philippi, WV this past weekend to race in the Barbour De Tour road race.  Dustin did the CAT 4/5 race, the ladies did the Women’s Open, while Jim and myself did the CAT 1/2/3 race.  Ben was there snapping photos like a man possessed by the demon of Fred Jordan since he is still recovering from a nagging Achilles tendon injury.  There was a large contingent of racers from the Pittsburgh area in all the races, but mostly  in the CAT 1/2/3 race with CAT, SCE, IRMC, and Freddie Fu teams well represented.

The CAT 1/2/3  race was a two lap, 62 mile journey through the beautiful and slightly hilly West Virginia countryside.  The roll out for the CAT 1/2/3 race was 11 am, so we would be racing in the heat of the day.  As we left town and the race began, the field was in no mood to race straight out of the gate.  We climbed the hill out of town at a fairly reasonable pace and when the field made the first left hand turn onto route 38, the pace quickened slightly.  Jim and I positioned ourselves about mid to upper front of the pack just in case the attacks came.  We averaged a fairly social pace the entire first lap, riding it at about 27-28 MPH.  The Moto official actually rode up to the group and said that we needed to “Speed it up as the CAT 4/5 race was catching us!” After that warning, there were a few attacks launched by the IRMC team and a few other riders, but the CAT team worked together to bring them all back into the fold.

Lap two saw the attacks come thick and fast, to quote Phil Liggett.  It seemed like anytime there was a slight rise in the road Steve O or Andrew Seitz from IRMC would throw down a hard dig to try and break the weaker riders.  Jim and I were able to cover the attacks and stay with the group.  The group did split a few times and shed riders, but for the most part the mood of the race was to all stay together and decide the outcome in a sprint finish.  On the last climb before the long, steady decent back into town, Steve O threw down a monster attack and split the group again into a pack of 15 or so riders.  This was to be the final selection of the day and the winner was going to be decided from this group.  The pace slowed just a bit and Jim asked me how I was feeling and I said I was feeling “good.”  That’s all I need to say as Jim launched himself from the field and quickly had amassed 20 or so second gap.  He was able to hold that gap for what seemed like an eternity to me, but the CAT team took up the chase and we caught him right before the downhill into town.

The run into town was very fast and people were getting nervous because they knew the finish was pretty technical with two 90 degree turns before the sprint finish.  We came into town at full bore and took the two 90 degree turns very fast.  John Cotter and Sampson McHugh actually locked handle bars at one point during the sprint, but John was able to break free and get the victory.  I ended up finishing in 7^th place and Jim in 10^th place.

Overall, I think that the entire team raced really well and kicked some serious ass this weekend. Stacie placed 2^nd in the CAT 4 women’s race, PG was 2^nd in the CAT 3 Women’s race, and Jim and myself did well in the CAT 1/2/3 race. Dustin represented SCE well in the CAT 4/5 race and Ben snapped some killer photos of all the races as usual.

Full results can be found here.

All photos courtesy of Ben Stephens. More photos can be found here.