race report: Wells Ave. "B" race, 5. April 2009

Sunday's Wells Avenue training series marked my first attempt at the B Race--hooray!

Despite the extra half hour of sleeping in (just one more reason I'm happy to no longer be doing the C Race), when I woke up it was much colder than it had been the previous morning. After spending the last few weeks of 'cross season scrambling up icy runups and trying, frozen-footed, to find my pedals again, I'm not sure why I was being such a fraking baby about 43 degrees Fahrenheit. Even though I had wool socks and shoe covers (new ones! pink ones!) I embrocated the hell out of my feet--twice.

Once I was finished with round two of embro, I threw on an ungodly amount of ugly warmup layers over my tights and skinsuit (under which I had, miraculously, stuffed a ridiculous amount of base layer material without making myself look that chunky--have concluded that skinsuits are, in this respect, much like clown cars) and began to roll aimlessly around the Wells Center parking lot. Time flies when you're being passed by rabid dudes on Zipps, and soon enough, I found myself waiting at the line with Kathy, Geoff, and Loraine. Matt, Natalia, Katherine, and IBCJulie were also racing, as was my teammate Sean. I was glad to be in a pack with friends and familiar wheels.

Said pack turned out to be pretty fast the first few laps. It was as if everyone who had forgotten to pre-reg for Marblehead was out for revenge. We were coming through corners at 27mph, and I got spit out of the back a LOT. I was touched that fellow racers were trying to help me hang on. One guy dropped back a little so I could catch his wheel and get back on; another put his hand on my back and pushed me through the front (read: attacking) corners, in which I was struggling. It was an amazing level of camaraderie.

Watching and working with Loraine, who also fell off the back, I learned some tricks about merging back into a pack. And, best of all, I managed to hang on to the pack for the final 15 laps... consecutively. My average, when I rolled across the line, was 21.5 for 24 miles, which was not too shabby considering several slow, lonesome, windy laps, and considering that in my third race LAST year I was happy to spend 5 out of 15 total laps with a pack.

Afterward, a few of us chilled out on the lawn while Loraine's dog attempted to make out with Geoff. All in all, a good day at the races.