This race, the Tour of the CatsKILLs, is put on by Dieter Drake, who is also the promoter for the Tour of the BattenKILL. Are we noticing any kind of a trend here?
I had not done this race previously. Last year it was in late September, with slightly different road courses, and a short uphill opening time trial. This year, with the move to August, it fit into my schedule, and the longer, flatter opening time trial made it more of an attraction. The remaining two stages, however, would pretty much be a matter of pure survival. 6 days of the annual Cape Cod Rail Trail training camp on cross bikes with copious amounts of fish and chips, clam chowder and wine was not really the way to get ready to go up Platte Cove Road aka Devil's Kitchen. But what the heck. I decided to go and shelled out my $145 entry fee last minute.
Friday August 5 Time Trial; 12 miles of an out and back course on Route 23A, rolling to flat-ish, but not really flat, and windy.
Woodsy was kind enough to loan me his disc wheel for the time trial, since Justin was using the shop wheel for the NYC tri. I picked it up from him on Wednesday, and Rob re-glued his tire and put the wheel on my Slice. With my 808 front, I would at least not be lacking in the equipment department. Looking at the start list, which as usual for local races lately, was sort of short on participants (35 pro/1/2/3 women) but long on talent (multiple time Canadian national TT and RR champion and 4 time (!) Olympian Susan Palmer Komar, the whole Farm Team plus Kristen Gohr who can climb like crazy and was last year's winner as a guest rider, a whole contingent from the Canadian RE:FORM team, Fabienne Gerrard, Andrea Myers, Yuri and Martha from Wheelworks, Christine Schryver from Full Moon Vista, Marti Shea, 18 time winner of the Mt Washington hill climb or something like that, etc etc.) Based on the entrants, I was hoping for a top 5 result, but this would require me to turn the tables on riders who were well ahead of me at Killington earlier in the year. It was a hard effort, the whole time I worked to keep my upper body as still as possible, turn the cranks well, and keep that disc wheel sound going strong. I finished 6th, :59 seconds behind the winner Christine Schryver. A little disappointing to not have pulled out a few more seconds for a top 5, but OK. There were climbers below me, and those who TTd faster than me could go uphill too, so I had my work cut out for me to hold my GC spot.
Saturday August 6, Stage 2 - 65 miles, 1st KOM about half way and Devil's Kitchen at mile 55
So I drove back and forth from home each day. Advantage: getting to sleep in my own bed. Disadvantage: time spent cooped up in the car with screaming legs. Saturday morning came quick after the 6PM time trial, and my head and neck and legs were still pretty sore from the effort. But everyone was in the same boat. Nothing to be done about it. I had pre-ridden the course a couple of weekends earlier, so I wasn't afraid of the climb. I knew I would make it up it, the question was how much faster everyone else would. I went with my Zipp 101s and Rob put on a 27, so with my compact crank and the climb coming late in the stage with already tired legs I'd be able to keep spinning more easily. I went with the 101s instead of the 404s because there was a huge long descent on the course, and the 404s have been feeling a bit like they catch the turbulence too easily in a relatively small group of riders going downhill at 45-50 mph. We started 20 minutes late, minus Marti Shea (who apparently left to climb Mt Washington) and rolled out for a little bit of neutral. REFORM girls started attacking early. Nothing stuck. On we went. When things got too slow I went to the front. There's nothing worse than going 13 mph in a pro 1/2/3 women's race. The first KOM came and went, we lost a few, but not too many. Again, things slowed, and I spent some time on the front. As the climb neared I tucked in to wait. As we rounded a bend and the wall appeared I just put it in the little ring and kept turning the pedals over. Some who started too quickly dropped behind. The pure climbers moved ahead, The 3k to go sign came, and I knew that from there to 1.5 k to go was the worst part. Every once in a while I could still see the tail lights of the pace car, so I knew I wasn't doing too badly. I was climbing with Fabienne, but over the top she gapped me a little bit. She caught Yuri and a REFORM rider, and I worked to catch them on the run in to the finish. Eventually I did, and our little group of 4 came in together, and I was third across the line for 10th on the stage. Kristen Gohr won it, but with Susan Palmer Komar just sitting on her wheel. She took the yellow jersey, Kristen got the climber's jersey, and I slipped to 7th on GC. I saw George at the first KOM - go Bikeway! And thanks Rob and Beth for the fresh bottle in the feed zone!!
Luckily, the rain started just after I crossed the finish line.
Sunday August 7 Stage 3 - Twin peaks; 59 miles, rolling, two KOM, including going up the huge descent from the day before and a monstrosity called airport road.
I don't think I recovered too well for this stage. Rob came along to be in the feed zone, and we had to set out relatively early to make it up to Windham for the 10:30 start (which I actually thought was 10:00).
I switched to 404s and back to my 26 for the day. I wanted my legs to have what they were used to. Plus I figured I'd be doing some chasing and could use the aero wheels. Little did I know.
Another bit of neutral start, and more attacks by RE:FORM. Finally, a break got away which contained the yellow jersey's only teammate from PK Express, a REFORM girl, and my friend Jenny from Farm Team. We rolled after them for a while, and the moto told us they had about 1:45. Then came the first real climb and everything blew apart. I was barely hanging on to a shrinking front group. Somewhere in the middle we caught RE:FORM and PK Express, with Jenny still hanging out there. I eventually got gapped off, and through the feed zone I was alone chasing a small group with Jenny still in it with Kristen from Farm Team, two Kallisto girls, two Wheelworks girls, the yellow jersey, Andrea Myers, Christine Schryver and the REFORM girl from the break. I got a fresh bottle from Rob and went to work. After what seemed like an hour of huge effort I caught them! But the road immediately went back up and off I went again. More chasing. Screaming down every downhill I could. I saw the follow car taillights again. Finally, on a relatively calm and flat stretch, I caught them again.
And then came Airport Road. Not as long as Devil's Kitchen, but equally steep. I kept my eyes on the road and just concentrated on pushing and pulling on the handlebars and pedals. When I looked up, they were blown apart. The yellow jersey took off, soloing in 5 minutes ahead of Kristen and Christine. I rode the last 15 miles by myself, every once in a while passing some guy who had been blown out of an earlier starting group. I finished 11th, and lost enough time to Yuri and Martha and one other to slip down, but still held on for 10th on GC. Jenny moved up to 11th, for her efforts, which was great.
All in all, it was a good race. The courses were very difficult, and needed some special equipment to be able to eliminate any disadvantages. It was well run, and the venues were good. Yeah, put it on your schedule for next year.
Thanks for reading. -A
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