Word up

So a lot has happened since my last post. I am back at the team house getting ready for some local race(s) this weekend. 

The stage race in Spain was freaking hard. It was a 2.12 race so anybody any age can show up. Several of the better amateur Spanish teams and a few Spanish (pro) continental teams showed up along with VC La Pomme Marseille and the juggernaut Russian Lokomotiv Team. My legs hurt just typing this. Some of the guys who did Isard the premier u23 climbing stage race in Europe said the climbs were harder at Tarragona then Isard. 

Lets give a short recap:

Stage 1 was a 134km ride with two very hard climbs in the first 40km and then lots of rollers to the finish. I thought this was the hardest stage of the race and I think everybody suffered on our team. Some Russian, a couple of ex Spanish pros, and an ex French pro attacked on the second climb (I cant hold 800 watts for 3mins unlike these guys). A group of about 40 formed after the two climbs then counter attacks started going. All I could do was watch. I set a new max wattage for 1.5hr and 2hrs racing. The only good news from that day. Carter Jones managed to get away with a group 20km to go and finished 29th 8mins down. 7mins later Chris Butler and I rolled in with a group for like 40th. Then 10-12 mins behind us rolled in the rest of the team.

Stage 2:

I dont remember it as it was pretty quick stage. I got into a big break of riders of like 30 guys off the front. I sat on as the Russians and VC La Pomme guys drilled it. The field caught the break after the last descent with like 4okm to go and we spinted for like 14th in the field as some of the break survived. I got 31st on the stage. 

Stage 3:

Frustrating day as I had pretty good legs. I missed the break. Then attacked the field with like 60km to go and sat at 20-30 secs for a good 10km before being reeled in. I made the front selection over the last climb but the remnants of the break stayed away. I finished 21st on the stage and 11th in the field sprint. Haha

Stage 4:

Rain greeted us for the start and much of the stage as I hung on for dear life up a 8 mile climb as we avg 14.5mph up it. The legs were 'no bueno'. At this time I would like to point out whoever made the course profiles for this race was drunk because according to the profile we have a slight descent then another climb then a descent then 30km later the last climb then the descent down into the finish. Apparently, we had the 8 mile climb, 15km of rollers, then the cat 3 climb, descent, 2 4km climbs then a descent then the cat 2 8km climb that killed me. 

Long story short, it was by far the hardest day. Right before the last climb I was not feeling too good (legs). Like it hurt just turning over the pedals. I got locked into last position up the climb and I almost made the front group over the top but got tailed off. The climbing in Spain is crazy. Everybody sprints for the first couple km or so. Yes, sprint. I think its a game. Who can hold 500 watts the longest? Everybody settles down once the group is thinned out at a hard but doable pace. Then at the top everybody freaks out and wants to be the first to the top (not because of KOM points but because of idiocy) so we have a 500 watt jump the last couple of minutes. At this time I would like to point out, that I black out staring at the wheel in front of me. Okay in better words, remember Space Balls? Remember when Lonestar and his goonies are trying to escape the clutches of Darth Helmet and the guy who makes fun of Harrison Ford's character says lets go to Hyperspeed, then the guy who is making fun of Chewbuccha says no we need to go to Ludicrous Speed! Well thats how I feel whether it be crosswinds in Belgium or climbs in Spain. Finished like 3mins down on the field in like 30th

Stage 5a. Notice the A, as Stage 5 has two stages (a & b). Stage 5a is a short 5km uphill TT starting in a small Spanish town and climbing to a castle. Now what I found out from preriding it is it is a stairstep climb. Every couple hundred meters or so it pitches up and over 15%. What is especially nice is on these steep sections while you are going 7mph at 450 watts there are signs telling you how steep the % of the slope is. Now just add 95 degrees, 20mph headwind, and an ex pro Spainard chasing you up the climb and thats what my TT was like. Oh I forgot to mention the last 300 meters of the TT is over 18%. Now preriding the climb the first time we did it in 16:30 with no wind. When I got done, I did a 14:05. 6 seconds off the fastest time so far. The official, my DS confirmed my time and the officials at the top even told the DS before he went down that I had the second fastest time at 14:05. So later on just before Stage 5b started we were finally handed the results, hoping to be inside the Top 10, I saw that I finished 16th in the TT 23 seconds back from my time. When we went to the officials they said that there is nothing we could do as the second race is about to start and they would have to change results or something like that BS. So I finished 9th with my time of 14:05. But the freak who won it (he is Russian) did it in 13:05. 1 min faster then me and 26 seconds off the record. One of the officials who spoke English said that's not normal as the guy who set the record in 2003 was implemented in Operacion Puerto and he had a tailwind when he set the record. Scary....

Stage 5b.

As if the Russians did not have enough fun beating everybody senselessly in the TT. They decided to team attack with 2 and 4 in GC on a short 87km stage. The stage was raced alongside the beautiful coastline which meant wind. After 20km half the field was gone. Only Larry Warbasse and I made it. The yellow jersey's team frantically chased the breakaway group containing 2 and 4 in GC as they were less then 40 seconds off to win the GC. On the last climb which was a nice 7km climb at about 4-6% was steady. I started feeling pretty good and we rounded a corner and bam there is the 1km to the top marker and right above that is a pitch that says 11%. The field went crazy as 25 of us made it over the top of the climb. The yellow jersey frantically chasing all by himself now with 24 riders in tow. Mono e mono (something like that right?). However he pulled the gap way down and they finished just 7 seconds ahead of us. I finished in the yellow jersey group at 29th or something on the stage. 

So I finished 31st overall. (30th if you cant the TT blunder) haha

But an awesome race. I hope to come back next year and improve upon my results. 

Tomorrow a local kermess,

David

Legend of Kermess Racing

Last post I promised to update everybody with a post on Kermess racing. Well here it goes...

Kermesse in French and Kermis in Dutch mean carnival so when a kermess is raced its basically a carnival with a bike race around the town. Kermess lengths usually range from 100-130km on 3 to 15km laps often on technical circuits or up a steep hill or, my personal favorite, cobble sections. Unlike UCI races which put on the other races, Kermess racing is put on by the local townsfolk. In other words, the Belgian Mafia run the kermess racing scene. To go along with the Belgian Mafia is the racers who are usually retired or ex-pros. So they have quite a bit of time to train and race practically all week long. Next thing, the Kermess racing is divided into two categories: Elite/without contract/u23 and Pro/with contract. In the Elite kermesses, there is no anti-doping control, if there is somehow anti-doping control then the fields are a lot smaller. Now the best Kermess racers are the best because of the following: no anti-doping control, they know a bookie (people can bet on any kermess races), and they are in a league or alliance together with one another. In each race, there are about 10-12 kermess kings sometimes more or less depending on the size of the payout. They all know each other and know what the odds are on that rider to win. So they ride to make the break and when they do they decide which rider is the most beneficial to ride for (who can make everybody the most money, or if that rider is racing in his hometown). If one of the kermess kings does not make the break, they immediately drop out and drive to the next kermess race (races are held at 2pm, 3, 5, 6). So if he misses the break in the 3pm kermess, he has time to drive to the next one and make the break in the 6pm race. A very regular occurrence.

Let's say that you make the break with those riders. You will be approached and asked to not sprint or to not win for $x amount of euros. If you agree then you get the money if you play it right. If you dont agree, they either ride you off the break or crash you and you will never be allowed to make the break again. 

These Kermess Kings do not claim the prize money because they receive unemployment checks from the government. They make the real money (and quite a bit too) from the betting as the bookies are aligned with the racers. In other words, its a fixed race. It is a freaking hard fixed race though. I have raced kermesses and watched the Tour de l'Avenir winner, Jan Bakelandts get dropped from a break. Our directors would come up to us before the race and point at the Kermess Kings saying this guy beat Boonen last weekend in a pro kermess. Or this guy dropped Devolder in a kermess last year. It is scary...

Okay so I am back in Luxembourg training for Tarragona which starts June 2nd. Promise to try to give updates. We should have internet there...

Later,

David

Found this on a cycling forum. Looks pretty interesting talking about the wattages at the Giro.

Introduction

The return of two famous riders in this centenary Tour of Italy. 
van Basso and Lance Armstrong this year trying to return to the highest level. 
Before they stopped racing in 2005 and 2006, they were the two best grand tour racers. In 2006, Ivan Basso won the Giro, flying with 440 watts of average climbing power

He had, in particular, an astonishing performance at the Monte Bondone with 460 watts average for 45 minutes, better than Miguel Indurain in La Plagne in 1995. 
Before his first retirement, Lance Armstrong won for the seventh time the Tour de France in 2005 with 425 watts of average power standard. [and regular performances at 450 watts]

Ivan Basso also presents his physiological data on the sitewww.mapeisport.it. 
Shortly before the Giro, he developed 412 watts in the Giro del Trentino during the ascent of Alpe di Pampeago.

For Lance Armstrong, this is an interesting challenge and a great unknown. During his mini retirement, he kept in shape by participating in marathons and mountain bike racing.
Over the past two years, Alberto Contador took over as the best specialist in stage races in three weeks. 

He won three major national tours, but with a much inferior level of performance in the mountains: 425 watts average (435 maximum) in the Tour de France in 2007 and 410 watts average (425 maximum) in the Giro 2008. 
Contador did not defend Giro title. On the contrary, Carlos Sastre, Denis Menchov and Levi Leipheimer are the ones facing the two "ghosts from the past".

Stage 4: PADOVA-SAN MARTINO DI CASTROZZA

The first serious confrontation between the favorites of the race took place at the end of the fourth stage on the climb to San Martino di Castrozza. 

During the stage, the first pass of the Giro, the Croce d'Aune, was been climbed together by the pack at 393 watts average. 
It is a relatively high value that has not really cracked the peloton with 80 riders still in the peloton at the top of the first pass.

Voigt, De Bonis and Bellotti started the rise to San Martino with a lead reduced to 2'10 "on the pack of favorites. Voigt dropped his latest escape companions, but would be caught and passed by the pack at 2 km from the arrival.

Several teams (LPR and Acqua & Sapone) take turns on the final climb's modest 6% slope. At the end of the climb, Basso of the Liquigas team took the race in hand. Soler attacked twice, but he was cauht by Di Luca in the last fifty meters. 
Danilo Di Luca won the stage in a sprint of 30 riders. Lance Armstrong was dropped in the last kilometer and conceded 15 seconds. 33 riders came to the top of San Martino at a 430 watts average. 

This calculated power is a valid one [by "valid" they mean it's not abnormal for a group this large], because starting from 25 km / h, riders placed in the middle of the group can benefit from drafting wheels.

We thus had 33 riders who have developed more than 400 watts for 26 minutes. This shows that the overall level is high and conforms to recent years. For a first contact with the mountains, Lance Armstrong has been very resilient.

Croce d'aune
Peloton: 393w
Voigt+Bellotti+De Bonis: 373w

San Martino di Castrozza
Peloton: 430w
Armstrong: 425w


Stage 5: SAN MARTINO DI CASTROZZA-ALPE DI SIUSI

The riders of the Tour of Italy must this time climb at the end of the stage the long climb to the Alpe di Siusi. The rise of 24.9 km was relatively easy until 7km from the finish.

Breakaways of the day Voeckler, Serpa, Ochoa, Visconti, Pietropoli had 1 minute advantage on the peloton at 15kms to go. In front of the peloton, the Liquigas team set a fast pace on a rapid pace. The advance of the escapees rapidly decreased. Bunch packed () at 10 km from the finish.

A peloton of about 80 riders arrived together at the last part of the climb to the Alpe of Siusi. Cheula attacked, then was joined by Devenyns but took only 5 seconds and the peloton came back to them quickly enough. 

The Liquigas team powered on at 410watts for the first mile. Armstrong was dropped at 6.5 km from the summit. A little further forward, Garzelli and Cunego were dropped from the pink jersey group.

The top group contained only 25 riders at 5 km from the summit. It was still led by Szmyd, teammate of Basso. The latter then took over and accelerated gradually. He maintained an average power of 430 watts. Only 7 riders could follow: Di Luca, Leipheimer, Horner, pink jersey Lovkvist, Menchov, Sastre and Arroyo. 

Arroyo was distanced, Lovkvist yielded but then came back. Basso slowed somewhat in the last kilometer, Rogers returned and Menchov won the sprint.
The first six of the stage, Menchov, Di Luca, Lovkvist, Basso, Leipheimer and Horner have developed an average power of 425 watts for about a little over 26 minutes. 
The stage was short (125 km) but with a very long final climb and a partial recovery in the middle. 

Basso appears less strong than in 2006. We believe his real power to be 417 watts (69 kg). Armstrong was dropped and achieved a worse climb than the previous day. With 375 watts of average, he was 80 watts from his maximum threshold (between 2000 and 2005 at the Tour de France).


Alpe di Siusi
Menchov, Di Luca: 425w
Lovkvist, Basso: 424w
Leipheimer, Horner: 423w
Sastre: 420w
Arroyo, Rogers, Kessiakoff: 419w
ten Dam: 418w
Soler: 412w
Pellizotti, Simoni: 411w
Cunego: 381w
Armstrong: 377w

Stages 6 and 8:

The analysis is boring. all you need to know is that Garzelli's failed attack in stage 6 (not 8) was insanely powerful for a solo man.

Stage 10: CUNEO-PINEROLLO
The only climb done at speed is too short (under 20 mins) for conclusions to be drawn.


Stage 12 ITT
Comparisons to usual climbing performances cannot be drawn easily due to the riders using time trial equipment to improve performance. Still, the strongly prevalent idea is that Menchov and Leipheimer's performances were quite superhuman.


Conclusion (AKA the important part. If you skip all else, read this)

What is the trend after 12 stages? Menchov, Leipheimer and Di Luca appear in the mountains to be just above the others. Menchov has just completed perhaps his finest achievement as a cyclist in his absolute show in the Cinque Terre time trial with a climb of 21 minutes at almost 470 watts (again, time trial equipment used). 

Leipheimer is in a very good year, better than the Tour de France 2007 and Di Luca has regained his form of the Giro 2007. However, the road to Rome is still long, nothing says that the trend will continue.

Sastre is currently at the same level as the Tour de France 2008. Garzelli was a great animator [of the race]. He has not won a stage but currently enjoys fabulous fitness.

Basso does not have the same potential as at the Giro and the Tour in 2006 and 2005. It would be about 30 watts above what he's shown this year.

After a period of 3 seasons and a recent fracture of the clavicle, Armstrong was already a surprise. He's improves over time. The american probably does not have the same weight as when he won the Tour. 
His relative climbing power is 415 watts maximum, or 40 watts less than in 2004. 
To be among the favorites of the Tour de France, he must in a month and a half lose a few kilograms and improve 20 or 30 watts (absolute) power.
Armstrong is able to improve this way in such short a time, as he has already proved in the past. 

Other riders have already been in bad shape in the Tour of Italy prior to shinin in the Tour de France (Greg LeMond, Jan Ullrich ...).

-----

I am doing well. Just getting warmed up for Tarragona in 8 days. I did do some races Thursday and Saturday. Thursday was really sketchy but I came out okay. Saturday is a local kermess. Got shoved into a ditch with 30km to go. Dont worry I am okay. I well try to make a post dedicated to kermess racing in a little bit. 

David

Europe...

So I imagine a lot has changed since my last post. I guess I could write about swine flu or whatever its called now. Think I will go with bike racing in Europe instead...

Short recap what has happened since Valley of the Sun: training, racing local races, winning a crit (stop laughing), almost dying of hypothermia in the road race, crashing 4 days before Redlands and spending some time in the hospital and a weekend trip on lortabs, then racing in Bisbee, AZ (weird town) with crazy Mexicans (they wear armwarmers and legwarmers in 100 degree heat, and team attack in feed zones). Now I am sitting in Kautenbach, Luxembroug getting ready for the first series of my races.

Now I have been over here for 8 days so I will recap the first week for you:

Flight started off well, I flew from Chattanooga on a pack of gum with propellers. The flight attendant would speak into the intercom like the plane was a 747 when she could have just turned around and told all 12 people the pre-flight safety instructions. The dude sitting next to me, looks like Hulk Hogan with hair starts laughing as he looks at his phone, he leans over to me *I cower in the corner as I thought he was going to beat the crap out of me* and says, "I get my horoscope everyday (points at his phone) and says, "Be very careful today. Stay away from all sorts of transportation" He laughs after this and says, "gotta love this." I proceed to laugh and cry at the same time. Crying because I might die on this pack of gum. Laugh because Hulk Hogan with hair is wearing a pink shirt and comments about his horoscope. 

First day in Europe I get picked up, drove to Izegem, then hope in a van and go to Luxembroug as the Izegem house is too full. First not in LUX, I got food poisoning. enough said. I lived near the toilet the first night. 2nd Night, still sick. Third night, first day downstairs. Stomach still messed up. Fourth day, I am told I am racing Tryptique Ardennes. Great. Tryptique Ardennes is an awesome race but I just wasnt healthy and unfortunately I got the short end of the stick and had to start TA. Start of TA, first time on my new road bike (I had been riding a 58 size frame the day before, dont ask why), its raining = a bad day for me. Seat post dropped with 50km to go and we couldnt fix it. I got dropped big time and got pulled in the local lap. They told me I wasnt starting again the next day.

Fast-forward a couple of days and I am just now starting to get over this stomach bug. I finally feel normal and I can train reguarly now. My next races are some local races in Belgium the 21st, 23rd, 24th. After that, its open in the air. 

Thats all for now. Not an ideal start, but I still have some days left. 

David

Valley of the Sun

Alright first race of the year!

Sean Mazich, Scott Stewart, Carter Jones, Kevin Soller, Larry Warbasse, Stevie Cullinan, and I lined up for the Valley of the Sun. Rock Racing, Ride Clean, Bissell, Ouch, Livestrong, and a Mexican team showed up among several others.

First day:

TT: uhh not much to report. I didnt have a TT bike so barney King (Our ds) told me to soft pedal it. My cool down was putting it in the small ring the last 2 km. It was a strict tailwind out and headwind back which obviously helped my TT bike (or lack there of). Now I would like to bang a few nails into the table (w/e that saying means) and say: in cycling especially bigger races, we have designated riders (aka leaders) who we are working for. Since I was the only who did not have a TT bike, I was obviously out of the hunt to be the leader for VOS. Whoever did well in the TT was going to be the leader. Carter got 11th, Stevie 12th, Soller 14th or something like that. Therefore we worked for those guys. When there are big races you conserve your strength. This isnt a local race. There are legit guys here. The guy who won (the TT and the overall) is the current Elite National TT champ (he crushed everyone there). Then at the OUCH camp, John Chodroff dropped Landis on Palomar (or that's what i heard). If you noticed there were a couple of "slow" pros out there. You think they actually tried? Not at all. Its a hard concept for people to understand to sometimes for racers to back off a bit instead of giving 110% each race. Dont get me wrong I am by all means not some master of tactics or w/e in cycling.

RR: Perhaps the most frustrating ending. I will start with about 7km to go. Our whole team is on the front leading out Sean Mazich. I am second wheel behind Soller. Soller takes an epic pull to the base of this little roller. I take over and sprint up to the top of the hill (around 5km to go). I pull off and Scott Stewart attacks. 2nd place in GC, Ben Kneller, follows and then cracks as Scott lit him up. Then the Bissel guys chase it down. So with about 3km to go, there are two or three Bissell dudes, some other riders, an Ouch guy or two, then Carter, Sean, and Me, behind me Soller and Stewart then 10 other riders. So like 25 guys left. 3 of us in the top 10. then the motor slowed down and came up to us and told us the race is stopped. Everybody sorta ignored the official until the lead car dropped back, everybody finally figured it out that we were actually neutralized. I couldnt believe it. An uphill finish in the headwind, and we had like 5 guys in the top 15. I usually never say things like this (may be it is the fact that I am lying in the airport at midnight in Denver) but I am CONFIDENT in that one of us was going to end very near if not on the top spot of the podium.

*The crash was a pretty scary. Apparently a guy in the cat 3 race went over the bars and cracked his skull, broke his shoulder, and another dude broke his shoulder.

CRIT:

Think the Chattanooga course but slicker and faster. 6 turns, 5 left, 1 right. I got a good start around the 2nd row. the tactic was to just go up the road and line it out to shell all the extra baggage. Chodroff, who is super strong, but struggles in crits, was our target which aligned with Bissell's tactics. We sent numerous guys up the road and came close to winning all the primes. Yada yada (*Seinfeld joke*) There are about 50 guys left in the lead group the last 3 laps. Chodroff was dangling at the back. I bring Mazich and Carter up the front and jump around Rock Racing's leadout train for Justin Williams and Bahati. It was crazy bumping elbows with those guys. I was screaming at them to get out of my way (probably from the Red Bull and the caffeine Jelly Beans : ) Finally I got free with around 2 go to go and I waited for the last corner on lap 2 to jump. I jumped on the last corner just before but a Kenda Inferno rider grabbed my wheel. But I decided to keep going. I went through at the front on the bell lap and tried to keep the pace as long as I could. (Note: just before the first turn on the course is a median). I swung off on the left just before the first turn. Carter Jones and Chepe Garcia (rock racing) jumped away on the inside of the median. They were gone. Sadly, Garcia jumped out of the last corner with a bit of a gap to Carter and held it to the line. Garcia is a solid veteran and has been racing before Carter was born!!. had Carter not won 4 primes that day he might have had enough to get the win. But that is bike racing. He finished 2nd. But that time bonus and the gap to the field was enough for him to move up to 6th and solidify his lead in the best U23 rider. Freaking awesome riding by the team!

Hope I make it to ATL,

David

Kickoff with some good hard training

Not even going to apologize for my lack of updates this time.

Anywho, my writing well be off a little bit as I have just got back from a 112 mile WBL ride. WBL is Winter Bike League which is organized winter training with attack zones sprinkled in. Quite a bit of riders show up like around the 100 mark. Always strong guys show up. i.e. John Murphy, Frank Travieso, Nick Reistad, Matt Crane, Tim Henry, Bruno Langolois, etc. Apologize for all the misspelin's.

Today's ride was the 112 mile ball buster up to Mt Alto and back. The first attack zone started around the 42mile mark and lasted for 6 miles or so. The attack zone consisted of Mt Alto climb (a 3 stair stepper climb around 10-15mins long then a righthand turn at the top and another 2-3 miles to Alto City Limit sign. Not much too report Im afraid as I dont remember any :P Tim Henry, Nick Reistad, Matt Crane, and myself got away and pacelined it to the sprint where I got owned by Reistad and Henry after Matt's leadout. Got 3rd. My roomate, Nick Housley got 8th.
20 or so miles later was a short 800 m steep climb called Crackback hill. Tim Henry jumped early with the Jelly Belly duo and I just couldnt go and got like 4 or 5 or something.
Fastforward another 20 miles (that's 94miles) and the last attack zone took place. 9 mile flat to rolling stretch attack zone. I dont know what happened again. There was like 15 of us. And Tim Henry went off and benefited from the lack of cooperation between everybody. Matt Crane blew the doors off to get 2nd. I was pulling on the front as hard as I can and he just went around me like I throughout an anchor. I tried a couple of times to get away but I didnt have anything left after the attack. I watched the sprint from a safe distance. Rolled it in with the lead group and capped off the day with 112miles just over 5.5hrs. I need a beer (jk parents!)

Valley of the Sun in like 2 weeks!

David

2009

Well if your wandering (all 3 of you who read this) why I havent updated in awhile its because there isnt much to update about. Im being honest! School was fun and hard. I curse my astronomy teacher forever. Oh and I swapped teams to Waste Management based out of Phoenix, Arizona. Kind of far away but good news is that I will have some time in the sun for the training camp starting Jan 1st which beats rainy, 35 degree weather here. Last Saturday, I broke my rear wheel up a climb 2hrs from home (never buy a VeloMax wheel). So i had to pick which part of the wheel would rub, either the c-stay (aka the frame) or the brakes. So I rode 2hrs back home rubbing brakes in pouring rain. very fun day to say the least. I think I averaged like 13mph home. I swore a kid passed me on a sidewalk. But then again I dont think anybody is as foolish as a bike racer who trains in the rain. Now Christmas is upon us and I am starting to feel a rest week coming on before camp, which is going to be awesome. Hopefully more updates in the future as the 09 season starts to get rolling.

Go out and see some movies this holiday. Some good ones like: Seven Pounds or Jim Carrey's Yes Man for kicks. Valkerie (spelling??) is supposed to be good. 

David