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March 21 was the USA Cycling Road Race State Championship in Castaic Lake California. This championship level event marks the one year anniversary of earning my way to the pro ranks. In one year’s time I have racked up around 40 USA cycling ranked events under my belt which includes 27 top ten finishes, 19 top five finishes, 17 podiums and 6 decisive victories, as well as five non-ranked victories in TT (time trial), or specialty events, two K.O.M victories in two separate Granfondo events, and a large number of hill climb records in the Tehachapi and Bakersfield area. My current status as a bicycle racer is Category 3, and I have 23 of the 30 points needed for category 2-1 pro division. (With a first place in this race I would have a total of 33 points and be in the Pro category.)

A race of this size and nature would award 10 points for 1st place, eight for 2nd place and seven for 3rd, and trickle back to about five places or so. Once outside of those point paying places there is little hope for me to make any progress whatsoever. For those of you who are not familiar with the points system of USA Cycling, I’ll give you a rough outline. There are five categories in the ranking system used by USA Cycling which are numbered 5, 4, 3, 2 and 1. These categories, or “cats”, are placed as a ladder to help racers learn gamesmanship, gain fitness, improve bike handling skills, and sharpen your racing tactics. You are required to start as a category 5 regardless of your fitness level or prowess on a bicycle. In Category 5 you must complete 10 mass start races to earn your Category 4 status.

Once in Category 4 you have to complete 25 races, or earn 20 points if you are good enough to place well. Category 3 is where the serious racing starts because you have to earn your 30 points to progress. Once beyond the Category 3 barrier, that most cyclists get stuck at, you can expand into the pro division ranking Category 2-1.

The course I raced on March 23, the California Road Race Championship is located just a few miles drive up Lake Hughes road above Castaic Lake. It is a highly competitive race and a very challenging race course. As a racer you deal with cramp inducing high temperatures, leg crushing climbs, brutal paceing, grinding head winds, and the toughest competitors from all around. A race of this nature is not for the faint of heart and is filled with highs and lows of all sorts, insane attacks, breakaways and drama of every degree.

At sign up, the Cat 3 pre-registration list was insane, with over 70 guys entered – that’s a huge race! A group of this size is almost too big to manage on a single lane road without traffic closures, and would more than likely resemble one of those crazy SoCal criteriums that lots of people talk about, but few brave to race because of the carnage usually involved. [Editor’s note: A criterium is a bicycle race with a short course that’s usually run on closed-off city streets.]

The staging and neutral rollout of the race was tense, I could feel the adrenalin floating through the air. The road was jammed curb to curb with cyclists dressed in fancy gear and sports-car-like carbon bicycles. After a short riders’ announcement in the staging area, we rolled out. As soon as we crossed the starting line, and the neutral rollout ended, the pack’s pace surged forward. The race pace started off so high that I started surfing the outsides of the pack so I could see around the sea of riders to keep tabs on the race. No one was taking it easy, and it would be a miracle if half the group–or “peloton”, as it is called–didn’t DNF on the first lap.

Once we headed down the first down hill, people were wheel to wheel like NASCAR at 60 MPH all the way to the base of the second out-bound climb. The pace continued at a ridiculous speed all the way to the turn around, which was half way through the first of two 28-mile / 3,000-feet of vertical laps scheduled. After we hit the turn around, which is basically half a lap completed, we started to descend back to the start / finish line of lap one, it was then that we also hit the head wind which turned a nice gradual decent into a high effort and making a hard race even harder.

The wind continued to pound the group until we hit the first serious inbound climb on the way to the start/finish line. This is where it turned from hard to brutal. The group of 70 strong started dropping like flies from either legs and lungs giving out, or just not wanting to commit that much energy with 40 or so miles of hard racing still left. At a time like this, your positioning in a group can be just as critical as your fitness for survival in a race. With so many people dropping back or blowing up on the hill you can get clogged down in what looks like a traffic jam on the 405 freeway. Fortunately for me I had elected to spend extra energy to keep contact with the front group for safety purposes, its a bold pacing strategy but at this point in the race it proved effective.

The pace was still crazy fast for only half way through the first lap. At this point the peloton split in half due to the beating everyone was taking on the hill. I decided to slide gently off the front of the pack then use the draft to sling shot back, in an effort to save energy for later. I jokingly call this move the bicycling “rope-a-dope”. Just as I initiated the slide from 2nd to about 10th, a two man breakaway formed in classic style, and I was out of reach to answer the break. I sat tight in hopes the pack would rally and reel in the established breakaway of two riders before they could roll up the road from us.

In these sorts of rolling hills a small break like this one can be deadly effective. With everyone still feeling half exhausted from the first climb nobody wanted to lift a finger to pursue the breakaway. This the downside of being a “lone wolf” like myself with no team mates. When the team fights start you don’t have any leverage in numbers, all I could do at this point was wait it out. Waiting it out is something that can be very hard to do because you are rolling the dice big time. This is one of the difficult parts of bike racing. From the Grand Stands it looks simple, just peddle faster than every one else, right? Wrong! You usually learn that lesson the hard way in Category 5, if you’re lucky. Bike racing is about having the strength, but also having the wisdom to apply the right leverage at the right moment and some of these moments can be based solely on luck. Bike racing is also multitasking at an extreme.

You are constantly multitasking things such as your pace, perceived effort, gear shifting, cadence, hydration, nutrition, early warning signs of fatigue, breakaway status, wind direction, and your race strategy. All the while riding within inches of other riders, and negotiating technical road conditions, sometimes in speeds in excess of 60 MPH.

After the brutal hill climb the pace dropped slightly allowing the initial breakaway group to open up a two-minute-plus gap and it wasn’t till the second lap out bound that the pace was actually bumped up again to reel in the two man break. This way too late in my opinion, and this left us with a slim chance at best for catching them. Thus you have the nature of the peloton: A giant mob that is solely interested in survival, but can be turned in to a fire breathing machine if you know how to motivate it properly.

In an effort to maintain motivation in the peloton myself and a few others began to kick start the group’s pace. After a short pull out front, I drifted back to 10th to keep an eye on things, take some shelter and hydrate. It was then that a second two-man break was unleashed from the drop in pace and yet again I found myself in a bad position to respond. That’s the thing with these huge races, if you aren’t constantly moving forward, then you’re immediately moving backwards. Even taking a drink of water can cost you prime real estate.

After the turn around on the second lap the race status looked like this: There was the back half the peloton, which broke off on the climb and was a minute or so behind us pursuing; there was the group of 30 or so guys which I was in; then a two-man chase group 30 seconds up the road from my position; and, finally, the main two-man breakaway that stood 90 seconds up the road from my current position.

Confused yet? Just wait till you’re doing all the other tasks I listed above, then you will start forming a mental picture of bike racing.

As of now both groups of two were currently cranking down hill toward the only thing that stood in their way from certain victory, the hill every one was dreading in the back of their minds for the second time today.

It was now in the middle of the afternoon and we were seeing some fairly high temperatures, not to mention we had been in the saddle for over two hours at a race pace. For those of you who have never sat on a bike racing seat, let’s just say it’s not a Barcalounger. We had been carving the headwind descent from the lap two turn around, for a while now. It was then that we rounded the bend to face the climb that everyone was dreading for the second time today. If you squinted hard up the road you could see the chase group – that’s the sort of gap they had established and the initial two-man breakaway was still out in front!

Once we hit the base of the climb, I began to lead out and listen for attacks. Then like a flash of lightning the surprise attacks began. A solo attack was launched, and it gained a substantial gap on the field. I knew I couldn’t let this happen so I started after him. The trick with this situation is to not sprint up the attack, you want to ease into it or you will red line and blow yourself up early. Once next to him I glanced up and saw the chase group still a good 30 seconds up the road. I knew it was now or never, so I laid all the chips on the table and went for it! Once you do this in a bike race there is no going back. I glanced back, and the peloton was still locked on my rear wheel trying to drag me back in, so I swerved a few times to break them loose. It seemed like days went by as I sat 20 yards up the road putting in a huge amount of effort before the peloton pursuit caved, and I began gaping them. It was now that I could turn my full attention to the chase group still 30 seconds up the road. I was gaining on them but it wasn’t enough. If they went over the top of the hill before I got to them it was game over for me. I had to find a speed that I may or may not possess. In this situation there is only one way to find out, so I shifted to a higher gear and eased into it. My legs held up to the load, so I shifted again to a higher gear and they still held. Now I was closing, but I had no idea how long my legs would hold for, and we still had well over ten kilometers to the finish.

In this sort of situation some riders prefer electronics to read there estimated power output, heart rate and other vitals on an LCD handlebar display in an attempt to manage their race power, much like gauges in a race car. As for me, I am old school and don’t like the distraction of music or electronics. All my friends think I’m crazy, but I like to feel what my body is telling me, and, believe it or not, there is quite an art to doing it with deadly accuracy. Even so, if I had had a wattage meter at this point I wouldn’t have dared look at it, because I was definitely in an unexplored red zone region of power, and I had no idea how long it would last. The peloton, like some monster waiting to catch its prey was sitting a few hundred yards behind me and slowly giving way to my go-for-broke pace. I gave it one final sprint and caught the chase group of two right at the top, and just in time! They were all but thrashed, so I took it upon myself to be the commander and get the troops in formation; a pace line formation that is. Three is stronger than one, so we hammered down the descent to stretch our lead over the peloton that lay ominously on the other side of the ridge. It was there on the decent that it happened again. I saw the initial two-man breakaway, first and second place as the race stood now, about 45 seconds up the road from us. The two of them were in a full-tuck, single file, trying desperately to regain the ground they hadlost to us and the peloton on the return leg to the finish.

Once at the bottom of the hill I could see the faces of pain on the two other guys with me and soon realized they were all out of juice and had no pursuit left in them. Races are full of many unforeseen challenges, some of which you are prepared for and others not. So, the decision in this situation was to either stay as a group of three and get a possible third place, if we didn’t get caught by the peloton, or I could throw down and go for a single man pursuit, with just over six kilometers to the finish, and risk blowing up with a possible DNF. Both ways it was a big risk and I needed my points.

I still had a time deficit of 45 seconds and head wind to bridge the gap up to the lead group of two riders and I wasn’t exactly fresh. The road racing hand book would tell you this move is suicide, a solo attack with a headwind against a larger force, but for whatever reason, I didn’t see it that way. What I did see was a repeat of the last few weeks of racing where I ended up losing valuable positions and points due to a wrong decision at a critical moment. It came down to a simple discussion of patience or aggression, so I opted for the latter and dropped the hammer. The two guys clung to my draft like a lifeline, but a couple good swerves broke them loose. As bad as I felt, in this situation I couldn’t afford to take anybody with me. Road biking at times can be a team sport with honor and loyalty, but at times like this, it’s more like being a gladiator. Survival of the fittest and most ruthless, and these times are where I shine the most.

Once free of the two-man chase I immediately set my sights on the two-man break just up on the horizon, first and second, as the race currently stood. The terrain was fast and rolling, littered with short gut-punching climbs and headwinds for the next five kilometers, with a penultimate leg-crushing 500 meters finish climb. I knew I had to catch them before the finishing climb started or I was finished! One of my favorite venues in cycling is the individual time trial (TT) and this was a perfect setup for a TT guy like me, so I dropped low and began my pursuit. I sliced through the wind in a wicked big gear and started carrying momentum like a freight train. I was reeling them in slowly, but I needed more or they would hit the finishing climb without me. I was closing on them with about two kilometers to go and a sizable gap still when it happened; I saw them booth look back at me. In a TT race you never look back, once this happens you know you have the guy, because mentally he is caving under your pressure. Much like a shark, I smelled blood in the water. I continued to turn my peddles, and hunted my prey.

Perfect timing! I caught both of them right at the bottom of the hill. If I would have missed a beat anywhere in the last 10 miles I would have missed them completely. I gave them both one look as I drove around the outside of them at the 500 meter banner and jokingly said, “See you at the top ladies,” with a smile. They both looked back at me with a half smile like, ya right! Immediately they responded with a sprint. I could hear the rapid fire up-shifts from behind, but with the brutal climbing pace I was laying down, it would mean they’d have to red line and drive around the outside of me. Now was the time to see if I really could “see them at the top”, or if I was about to eat my own joking words. I kicked it into high gear and went for my standing sprint, putting all my winter-time weight training at the Fitness Zone, with my friend Geo Zacarias, to good use. I could hear their breathing accelerate, so I rung it out the rest of the way and then, all at once, there was silence and I sailed across the finishing stripe the winner of the California State Championship for Cat 3 division and a new Category 2-1 Pro Division ranked rider in the span of one year’s time.

A big thank you to Lawrence and the guys of Black top Cyclery of Bakersfield, Calif. for all their help.

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