This past weekend, world time trial champion Fabian Cancellara won the E3 Prijs-Vlaanderen-Harelbeke race in Belgium. Fillipo Pozzato, Italian national road race champion and defending champion of the race, made a mistake in positioning and judgment that cost him the chance at a second straight victory in the blink of an eye. http://www.cyclingnews.com/news/mistake-costs-pozzato-dearly-at-e3 In a 203k race, 42k from the finish, Tom Boonen launched the winning move on the steep and cobbled Paterberg climb, flying up the gutter while his teammates blocked, forcing others to climb up the cobbles. Cancellara and Juan Antonio Flecha were in position to go with him, but Pozzato admits that he missed it by a split second. He was too far back in the group, thinking if somone attacked he could make the bridge and get up to the leader, but he judged it wrong. Eventually joining a lone rider left from an earlier break, he then dropped him and dragged himself to within 10 seconds of the three leaders, but they did nothing to help him catch up and he slipped back and had to sprint against a couple of other riders who had caught him and settled for fourth place. Meanwhile, at 1k to go, Cancellara attacked just before a tight turn, Flecha eased up and lost his wheel, and from there it was all over as neither Boonen nor Flecha could close the gap again. The moral of the story? One brief moment of stupidity/lapse in concentration/lack of nerve can cost you your position on the right wheel and your chance at a win will slip away. And, if you have managed to put yourself in the right place at the right time you need to stay alert and seize the opportunity to really turn the screws when it comes. I'll bet Pozzato, who bears a huge script tattoo over his back that says "Only god can judge me," was judging himself quite harshly after that.
I wound up 8th again in the women's race at Bethel this weekend. With 3 laps to go I put myself in the right place, on the right wheel, and I knew it, and I told myself to stay there. Then wheels shifted a bit, in a split second the next girl jumps in to the slipstream that was mine, and there I am, meekly slipping back to a place too far back to go with the jump when the winning move came moments later with 2 laps to go. So now what? Do the work to bridge the gap so you're toast when you get to the sprint and everyone will thank you as they fly on by? Or sit back and wait for someone else to be dumb enough to do it? Better to have stuck that wheel and not be asking myself that question in the first place.
An hour later I joined Justin and Rivers in the men's 3/4 race. I use the term "joined" loosely as I mostly just slung myself around the course in the draft near the back of the pack while craning my neck to see up front to keep assuring myself that those 2 other yellow and black Bikeway kits were still up there. With not too many laps to go, the pack slowed and fanned out coming into the hill and as I heard the clicking of gears coming from next to me, announcing that someone was about to make a go of it up the hill on the inside, I jumped in behind to drag myself up there for a minute. Gasping in the blast of headwind and turbulence at the side of the pack coming around the right turn at the top of the hill, I felt a tap on my hip and Justin pulled me into the group. OK good, he said, stay here with us. Ha. For many reasons (none of them valid or good ones), I failed to stay up there, and I was neither able to help nor see it when Justin put it down, survived a serious bump which forced him into the curb and over one of the plywood sheets covering the grates, and led Rivers out for third place, just the two of them together getting that result right behind two guys who had huge teams (Expo Wheelman and IRS Medic) working and setting things up for their designated sprinters the whole race. Awesome.
It was a weekend of lessons. Now, to take the knowledge learned, gain skill and confidence, and apply it next time: stay alert, hold your position, don't allow gaps, and GO when the time comes. That should be easy, right?
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