7/29 - 7/31/2005 by Denis Osowski
Denis Osowski, Jim Mullins, and Jimmy MacDonald represented the Allied Decals Racing Team in the men's category 3 points race at the Tour de Toona. This is their woeful tale.
Stage 1 - Martinsburg Circuit Race - Men 3
-
Martinsburg was a rolling course and not that difficult on its own but it's all in how fast you ride it. Fortunately, we didn't ride it that fast. There were a couple of climbs that may be similar to Quick road or maybe Truxel but mostly it was just rolling. If you sat in the field, there was very little effort required as it was not a "hot" race BUT you needed to be at the front for all the major corners if you didn't want to be chasing for like 2 miles since all the hard turns were at the bottom of descents or at points when the field was really moving....it was the usual scenario...the front riders go through at 20+ mph and the back riders come to just about a stop. The really hairy feature of the race was the 6 corners through town in the last 1km of each lap. If you weren't in front going into the first turn into town you might as well just ride straight to the parking lot cuz you ain't gettin' anywhere after that.
Now Tour de Toona...if you haven't been there...is unlike most local races in many respects. It's a big circus show with support that one has to see to believe. They must employ no less than 200-500 volunteers to pull this thing off and that estimate might be low! One huge difference is that you get a full rolling enclosure each day which means you can pretty much use the whole road....this is cool. Also different is that pretty much every one of the 80+ riders who starts is darn serious and is willing to take every risk known to mankind in order to get a result.
So the race that day was pretty much a really fast group ride during which only a few moves tried to get up the road. Given the sight lines of the course and wind, however, most anything was doomed. Also, there was no one team there with an overwhelming number of riders ... not enough to control the race single handedly anyway. Hence, there was always someone willing to chase breaks down since it was impossible to have a breakaway form with every team represented. Anyway, nearing the finish of the race that day everyone (and I mean everyone) wanted a piece of the front with 5km to go before we got back into town. Unfortunately, if you weren't up in front 10km before that point, things were hard and moving up required some acts of menacing danger....most of which involved riding the gravel shoulders or physically moving riders out of your way. One of many riders using the gravel lost it at about 30mph and caused a 10-15 rider pile up. Jimmy Mac had to run over some guy to get by, Jim M. had to ride into a ditch, and I came to the fastest controlled stop of my life narrowly avoiding getting sandwiched from behind. Jim M's and my race were effectively over but Jimmy Mac made it though with the front 1/2 of the field. Unfortunately he was nearly taken out by another rider in turn 4 in town and that cost him about 10 places loosing any chance of points placing.
Summary: Day 1 was mostly easy, somewhat dangerous, and without anything to show for it.
-
Stage 2 - Blair County RR
-
OMG. If ever there was an "epic" road stage for the Cat 3 crowd, THIS was it. The only thing of comparison for local Ohio riders would be the Savage Chicken RR but there were no 3.6 mile climbs there that ended with 1 mile of gravel on a 15-20% grade. There was also no 1-1/2 mile all gravel/dirt climbs at 10-15%. There were also no 7 mile climbs at 2-5% ending with a 1/2 mile at 15%. It was the Savage Chicken on crack.
The race started blandly enough over rolling terrain as the Blue Knob climb came at 26 miles into the race. Most races I've done this year were 26 miles total. Hmmm. I should've known this was going to be a long day. Anyway, it was the team's plan simply to expend Jim M and myself to make sure that Jimmy Mac got to Blue Knob at the front and we indeed found it to be a lot of work primarily because everyone else had the same idea ... and they meant business. For the 10 miles before the climb, there were about 4 guys doing all the work on the front and two of them were Jim M and me. If the speed slacked at all, then riders would swarm the front and it was necessary to drive the pace constantly. Nevertheless, we did succeed in keeping Jimmy on the front end of the action as we hit the climb and boy this climb hits you like WHACK.
You go from a gentle grade of 2% or so, make a left turn, and WHACK, you're going up about 15% immediately for about 1km just to warm you up. From there you get some "breaks" where it merely feels like you're climbing say Boston Mill Road east or maybe Columbia Road. In between those sections you get like multiple Oak Hill segments. This goes on for 2.6 miles. Oh, and if you've made it to the front group, Jimmy says you'll need your big ring on the 300m flatter (<5%) stretches cuz you'll need to be going 23-25 just to stay attached. The special part is the last mile when it tries to finish you off with 1 mile of broken pavement and gravel at 6-8% which itself ends in about 2 or 3 consecutive Oak Hill climbs on gravel. Let me just say this. I don't consider myself a bad climber and I did a lot of work just getting to the climb but I was about 10th from the last to get over. Jim M. was about 2 or 3 minutes ahead of me so he did better. Anyone out there ever try to really test Jimmy on a climb .... you know what kind of nonsense that is, right? Well, even Jimmy got popped off the lead group at the very top. Well, dang, I guess it was fast.
Well, Jimmy did get right back on with the descent but for myself, I never saw anyone except two other riders for the rest of the day. I should've gotten on the bus. Jim M did well to get into a grupetto and had some company. We all three finished the stage to varying degrees of success.
The rest of the course was similarly as brutal. Bear in mind that once on top of Blue Knob, you've only ridden about 30 or the 71 miles. Hmm, only 41 miles, two major climbs and a half dozen minor climbs to go.
Oh, I forgot the descents. There's miles and miles of descending. While it was easily possible to hit 60mph+ on the descents, I never saw it as I didn't see the point in dying alone with only the bus to watch it. 51 was the best my computer recorded and I've done better in the valley at home but at home there aren't hairpins and blind corners like there are at this thing. And, oh, the crème de le crème going down Tunnel Hill is an actual tunnel you 'get' to ride through. If you're actually racing you'd hit the thing going at least 40mph and probably closer to 45 or 50. The great part is that as you approach it, it appears just as a black hole in the rock and you can't immediately see the other side. You gotta keep the faith and go. Just as you enter the tunnel you see the other end but in between it is blackness. You just hope there's no obstruction in there cuz you'd never see it. I can't even imagine what that thing is like in a sizable group.
Moving on .Since the rest of my day was horrible yet boring suffering, I will spare my details except to say I didn't get on the bus, caught all of two riders, got stung by a bee in my mouth at 50mph, finished the whole race about 45 minutes behind the leaders, and didn't even get credited with a finishing place. They didn't list me as dnf but I didn't get a finish place either. Thanks guys. I shoulda gotten on the bus.
Jim M faired better as he finished only about 20 minutes behind but, as was my case 20+ minutes behind him, still didn't get placed by the officials.
Jimmy's tale goes that he rode with the lead group of 10 all the way until the last 1km of steep climbing on Sugar Run Road. Apparently, people were throwin' the kitchen sink at it and Jimmy popped near the end of it. Fortunately, once on top of that it was pretty much flat and downhill from there. Jimmy wound up losing some ground but he did get capture 27th. A great result given the competition.
Summary: Brutal hard. 27th place by Jimmy. The team successfully executed the plan with which it set out.
-
Stage 3 – Altoona Crit
-
Okay 80 or so guys on a 1 mile 8 turn crit. Where do you want to start that thing? In the BACK of course. Aside from that it was a really great crit course and I would love to try it again .... maybe in the Masters 35+ field HA! The stories you may have heard that they put plywood over the sewers is all true and it's amazing how fast you can corner on wood.
Let's start by saying that this was no Tyler 3/4 crit that I've gotten used to. The first 5 laps went at about 30-35mph. Dang, are these guys actually Cat 3's?? Then it settled down but not before I got popped of the back off it 2 laps into the race. Even if I started in the front it would have only prolonged the inevitable by a few laps. Jimmy Mac made it to about 15 to go before being pulled. Today it was Jim M riding well and flogged his way into the top 15 with 5 or 6 to go and things looked good. Unfortunately, he used his last clip of ammo just to get there and didn't have anything for a sprint. Without a sprint and not wanting to spoil the streak of 3 days finishing with the rubber down, Jim backed of the frenzied sprint and finished 46th on the day.
Well one always says "it was a learning experience" when the results didn't go quite as hoped but really, there was a lot of learning. First, for me it was don't try to take your crit rat legs up Blue Knob and expect to get over with the group. Second, when you find that you can't get over with the group then get on the bus .... it'll spare your crit rat legs for the next day. Nevertheless three days of the worst stage racing are still better that the best three days at work! I had some fun and learned a little to maybe take back to it next year.