Saturday was the UC Santa Cruz Road Race. Most of the team was at Snelling. I really wanted to race but i’d much rather ride hard than have to fight 100 other guys that are like twice my size at Snelling. Finished 13th out of 38 in E4/5. This is one tough race. A 5 minute climb up the 350ft hill with a 14% kicker at the top then a 3 minute decent down the backside hitting 40 mph. Then repeat 10x. The elevation graph looks like this ^^^^^^^^^^. You better hope you’re with the pack on the decent or you get no recovery time as I found out on the 4th lap. I was able to chase back with 2 others by the time we hit the bottom but I was toast for the start of the climb again. I lasted 5 laps with the leaders. There were only 8 guys left in the lead pack when I cracked. I joined the 1st chase group of 4 for another 3 laps. Wasn’t any easier but we were working together more as opposed to attacking each other like the group ahead. We could see the lead group battling it out about 300m ahead. 1 by 1 they were dropping as well. I cracked again on the last lap but was still passing lapped riders. Finished in 13th. 3500ft of climbing in 27 miles with a 20mph avg. Major props to Matt Brant for racing with me even though this wasn’t his type of race. Matt fought hard and helped me on the decent on the last lap when I caught up to him again. And thanks to Marci as well for all the cheers! It was a blast!
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| A gorgeous day in Santa Cruz. Great view of the Monterey Bay. |
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| The start/finish line halfway up the climb. |
Garry
Mike,
thanks for posting. bill and I did that race a few years ago the day after racing San Ardo.It is a very challenging circuit, so you did really well to stay with the contenders.