Myles Standish State Park Road Race — Cat 4

by Ian Sutton

What was supposed to be a cool and overcast day transformed itself to perfect cycling weather with temperatures in the low seventies and abundant sunshine. This coupled with a very civilized start time (Men's 4 at 11:50AM) sweetened the pot even further.

With such a short race of only 20 miles (32km) we knew it would be fast from the gun without the usual chit-chat that seems to make the first few k's go by faster. With Ken Han, John Naegle, Eric Martin and I representing Quad for our field we formulated a simple plan of shutting down any breakaways and trying to set it up for a sprint finish.

Right out of the gate we tore off up the first hill past the start/finish and down hill into a sharp, sandy right turn which would make quite the nightmare if you weren't the first few wheels through the corner having to brake hard and then chase up the next hill. Almost immediately, one kid rolled off the front and after a quick chat John and Eric went up to cover the move and after a moment I found myself up there as well. I guess the first Jens Voigt of the day didn't want a Quad sandwich for lunch and he sat up immediately and went back the field to think about what he had done. Wanting to stretch the legs and help drive the early pace, I kept it rolling at around 25mph (40kph) while John and Eric slowly sat up and went back to the field to try and slow them down. With such a short race and a rolling course, I didn't have the strength nor the intention of trying to TT my way to the finish but simply to keep the pace up and maybe if we were lucky, force a selection and split the field up (This seemed to happen in all the finishes we watched previously). After just under a lap of this pace I was swallowed up by the field and spent the next ten minutes recovering about ten or twelve guys from the front. The benefit of being off the front on this course was being able to apex every corner as well as picking your line over the pothole riddled course. Of course the downside is that you're taking all the wind and trying to pace yourself so that you're not going flat out but just tickling your red zone - something I still need to work on.

The next lap went by without too much excitement and of course positioning was key to staying near the front and by lap three, you could really feel an uneasy, nervous energy throughout the field while a few sketchy moves by other riders in the field forced me back a little further than I would like and it took some work to get myself safely back up to the front. It was not uncommon to be on the side of the ride trying to keep it upright in the fallen pine needles etc. (Cyclocross skills pay off here). At this time another attempt at a solo breakaway happened and the lack of organization from other teams compounded with what seemed like a lack of knowing how to paceline made this move especially nervous and frustrating. By now Eric is driving at the front setting tempo to keep the breakaway attempt in sight and get him back to the field before our next Jens Voigt gets too much of a gap and sticks the move. Eric signals the next rider through to take his pull and he declined touting that it was someone else's responsibility to do the work. Sensing Eric's frustration and my thin patience I opted to burn through a few matches and just drilled it up the right side of the road, dragging the field right up the breakaway up one of the few hills on the course. After going full gas for about 30 seconds, I went into the red and needed to head to the shelter of the field to recover but had successfully put John and Eric near the front. In hindsight it probably wasn't the smartest thing to do, energy wise, but sometimes the quick and dirty is the way to git 'r done. Coming through the turns to the start finish the field seemed to be soft pedaling, perhaps gassed from all the accelerations that had been happening since we rolled out of the parking lot 40 minutes before.

On the fourth and final lap, the nervous energy was at an all time high while people who have been sitting on are trying to get near the front for their shot at victory while the group already at the front were trying to keep the pace high and then it finally happened. The sound of carbon hitting the ground. What sounded like a pretty big pileup happened near the back likely due to a touch of wheels and some sketchy group riding, of which there was plenty to go around. I conducted a quick headcount to make sure none of our guys went down but didn't see Ken (dramatic pause…). Thankfully he was in front of the crash just behind me but unfortunately he eventually had to abandon with a loose headset - not the type of mechanical you can live with on this course, not with the condition of the road surface.

With about 2km to go I was fourth wheel hoping that the three guys in front of me were willing to keep the pace high and take turns pulling. Of course this would provide a safer finish and discourage attacks from the field. Unfortunately the lead wheel wouldn't pull off and his pace consistently slowed into the final km. By now we've been swallowed up by the field and I was unable to find a hole to get back up to the front when magically what seemed like the entirety of the field folds over to the left side of the road and I promptly thanked Charlton Heston for the timely move. With the whole right side of the road open I upshifted a few gears and took off up the side of the road. Sadly, I was caught almost immediately but not to worry, John and Eric were near the front of the field where they would hopefully be able to organize themselves into a sprint. We head into the slight downhill right before the uphill finish and things started getting very dicey. Some riders punch drunk, others just appear crazy, thinking they can still win from 50 spots back start sprinting it out for 30th place. I just sat up and let them all fight it out for the finish. John slotted in 9th place, a fantastic result on top of his brilliant 4th place, just off the podium at Saturday's Ninigret criterium while Eric finished in the top 20 and I was about 25 guys back.

Overall it was a great early season race and it was apparent that Quad was one of the only teams that was able to ride as a team and execute a plan to the best of our ability. With that in mind, it's not hard to notice our results are becoming more consistent and I am confident that they will only get better as the season progresses. Very nice work everyone!


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