So the sun is just beginning to show itself, we are rolling south on I-5 and a few words from familiar NPR voice wake me out of my grogginess, "temperatures tonight will be in the single digits." Single digits?!?! Based on my ride yesterday I knew that it was going to be cold today, but this was ridiculous. After a week of riding in 85 degree weather in Santa Barbara I was spoiled, and after 450+ miles in the saddle the previous week my legs were shot. I was trying to use this fact to downplay expectations, to myself and others, and it was working with moderate success.

It was Sunday morning, February 19 and I was on the road to Harrisburg, Oregon for the first road race of the season, Cherry Pie - fitting I guess since it was President's Day weekend. The course was three loops of 22 miles with a solid 700 foot climb about ¾ through the lap. I figured this is where the action would occur, and I was mostly right.

Cherry Pie is always interesting because it is the first opportunity to see who shuffled around to what team, what the team kits (race uniforms) looks like for the new year, and who looks to be on good form. Since the temperature was in the mid-thirties I didn't get to show off my Santa Barbara tanned legs, but then again who am I kidding? My legs would never be tan, even by Oregonian standards. I did, however, apply a copious amount to Vaseline to my face and was wearing 3 layers, plus my jersey and vest. I made the decision at the line to shed the warm hat in favor of some light ear covers, and it turned out to be a good decision. Despite the cool air temperature, the sun was out in all of its winter glory, and there is amazing warmth in the peleton, not to mention when you are sustaining your heart race around 150 for three hours.

Roll out was 12:10pm for the Cat 3 riders and by quick estimation there looked to be over 80 riders in our field. (For those of you who are not familiar with cycling categories, they generally break down as follows: Pro/1/2 ride together, then Cat 3, then Cat 4/5 are the more beginning categories that sometimes ride together, then there are a similar breakdown of categories for women depending on the size of the field, as well as masters, juniors, etc.) The roll out was slow and the speed was fairly casual for the first lap, probably just shy of 22 mph. As we approached the turn before the straightaway to the first hill I decided that I needed to make a break. I knew the pack would attack the hill pretty hard and I truly did not know how my legs would respond after my big efforts the previous week. I figured that a little distance would not hurt so I launched. Since it was so early in the race and I was not a particular threat nobody wanted to go with me and I found myself rapidly approaching the two other riders who had broken away a few miles back. Unfortunately one of the two was pretty spent and the other was not interested in doing much work, and the burst of effort had thrown my heart rate over 180, which was not particularly sustainable. The fact that my legs were straining was not a surprise, but I was a little disappointed that I did not have a bit more gas. About ¾ of the way up the hill the peleton caught up with me and I dropped like a stone, but was able to hang on shy of mid-pack at the crest of the hill.

Now, if you remember from my last entry one of my concerns was getting back towards my race weight. It was not something that I needed to do immediately, but every pound kills you up the hill, and at this point I was feeling it. I had gotten close to my goal, around 193 lbs. by the end of January, but the free pass I gave myself in February was not helping. Even though I had put in 30+ hours of training in 5 days in Santa Barbara, I had gained more weight with the mass of food I had to eat to keep myself fueled. I was rationalizing that it was muscle weight, and I knew it was still early season and would come off especially as the warmer weather came and I would be putting in more hours, but right now I was struggling. Actually, after the crest of the hill I was in pretty good shape for the descent, and the rest of the lap was pretty innocuous until we came around to the hill again.

This time I did not think I could afford to go out on another flyer so I stuck in the pack up near the front. I was able to sustain the effort reasonably well and bridged back the ground I had lost by the end of the descent and the few rollers that followed; and it was a good thing that I did. As we approached the flat section into the headwind near the start/finish line the attacks came and I quickly found myself separated. The effort I put up the hill had taken its toll and that frustrating feeling of watching a gap of a few feet in front extend to multiple feet in seconds was replaying itself right in front of me. I alternated between just sitting up thinking my race was over, and getting down in the drops and putting in a sustained time trail effort in the hopes of gaining ground. The only consolation was that there were a few others in front of me in the same condition. I was able to get together into a small pack of three rotating efforts (you conserve up to around 30% of your effort when drafting -- following right behind someone in front of you). We then picked up a few more people and after a few miles of this effort were able to bridge our way back up to the lead pack. By this time there were only about 25 of us left as the rest had all turned in for the day, but the continuous accelerations were starting to push me beyond my limit. In fact, as we were just about make the turn before the final corner I found that I had reached my limit. I sat up and quickly watched the remaining group move away.

Though I did not finish with the lead pack in this race, I felt relatively good that my fitness was building and I was generally getting myself where I needed to be. It felt even better just to be enjoying a clear Oregon weekend on the seat of the bicycle with views of the Coast Range to the South and Cascade Mountains to the north. It was also nice to keep myself off the pavement this year and avoid the finish line sprint wreck of last year. So all in all it was a good day and a good week.