The Best Laid Plans

Plans do not always unfold the way we want them to.  The Folsom Criterium Elite 2/3 race was 94 degrees with light winds in the mid afternoon and I was looking forward to the competition.  I saw my good friend Michael Claudio at the start of the race and knew that he had just finished racing the 35+123 race moments earlier. His strategy was just to get in some more miles and stay away from any crashes or trouble.  We had also discussed that he would help me out at the end of the race if he could depending on how he felt and how the race was playing out. For those of you that are unaware, Michael has raced for DBC several years and recently started racing for Red Kite Racing.

From the outset the pace of the race was high (we averaged 27.6 mph for the entire race). Despite the fast speed there always seemed to be a break of riders trying to get away, some of which were other DBC teammates. I moved myself into the top 10 or so of the race (63 racers) with 9 laps to go on the ¾ mile loop. The pace had slowed a bit as we were close to catching the most recent break away attempt and I found myself bridging a gap of riders with 4 laps to go. I recovered a bit on the next lap and let a few riders move ahead of me still sitting in the top 15 but I found myself on Michael’s wheel and told him that I was on his wheel.

With 1 lap to go we were positioned in the top ten getting ready to move to the outside and position ourselves for the final sprint.  I had told Michael at the beginning of the race that I wanted to get to the last corner first today and that I would attack from 400-500 meters from the finish. I generally do not like to trust someone else to lead me out as things often do not work out as planned and if your trust is in someone else’s hands and they don’t come through there goes your race.  

Michael was looking strong as we were riding and we were communicating well, but we were swarmed by the pack and suddenly found ourselves boxed in and in about 20^th place. An opening finally developed 200 meters from the last corner and we were able to accelerate to the outside of the pack passing several riders hitting the final sprint in about 10^th.  I was feeling good and passed 4 more riders the final 200 meters to place 6^th in the race.  DBC teammates Daniel Kosykh (this guy is a Beast) was 1^st and Jeffrey Buscheck was 5^th for us to place 3 in the top 6!