GP of Gloucester Day 1 Race Report/Bar Cam

GP Gloucester Lap 1 UCI from colin reuter on Vimeo.


Over here at UTSE we are running a week behind on race reports. You know how it is! In fact, this one is mainly a video report.

For some reason we did a downhill start on Saturday at Gloucester which was INSANE. I actually ran out of gears (44x11) on the hill, you can see me clicking the right shifter in the video until it clicks no more. So that's a bit fast to be going in a cross race when you have a 90-degree turn coming up.

Sure enough someone hit a hay bale and someone else came together with Justin Spinelli, and Spinelli got all f-ed up, and a bunch of guys got held up and BOOM, GOOD START FOR COLIN!

I was definitely into the top 30, which is pretty awesome in a race with 85 starters or so. There were legitimately fast people blowing by me as they tried to rectify their poor starts, but it's all good. Man, it's so much nicer to casually slip 10 places back to 35th on lap 1 and 2 than it is to try to claw your way up to 35th from 50th...

So anyway. Things get sorted out eventually and I ended up in a group with baby Myerson, er, Shaun Adamson. I decided he would be my buddy for the next few laps and set about mercilessly drafting him until we hit the 45 minute mark.

But! Then a fast Canadian came through (Thierry Laiberte) and I was feeling SO GOOD that I decided to leave Shaun and chase him. I was "drilling it" like I could race a bike and everything. Closed up to Thierry's wheel, started trying to recover, and... THWACK. Rock, meet carbon. I thought I had all the rocks on the course dialed, but this was a hidden one on an off-camber, and 30 seconds later I was FLAT.

Worst of all I had to ride past club row, descending like a total puss on my flat tire, while everyone wondered why I was being such a wimp.

Eventually I made it to the pit and did my own wheel change, which went about as well as these things ever go. 38 seconds later I was back on course (thanks, bar cam!) about 15 places lower. And ANGRY. SO ANGRY. Because there were no wheels to suck and I had to try to get back to the front.

I don't remember much after that, except slowly working my way up, even seeing Cary a few turns ahead, and then JUST BARELY getting pulled at two-to-go because I was 81% back or something. Josh Lehmann made it through and he was not more than 15 seconds up the road. Argh!

In summary, good starts are good, smashing into rocks is bad, that's bike racing.

Comments

Anonymous said…
I feel your pain, Colin.
10/11/2010 8:40 PM
Anonymous said…
Out of curiosity, how is the video so smooth? Is it post-processed or do you just have good camera? Would you care to share some technical knowledge? :)
10/15/2010 9:47 AM
Colin R said…
There's no trick. The key is a rock-solid camera mount and a wide-angle lens (I think the GoPro HD is 170 degrees?), so that the small movements of the bars/camera don't move the FOV as much.
10/15/2010 9:51 AM
Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Sam Anderson Cheats at Mountain Bike Racing

Image
Note that this is NOT the 24 Hours of Great Glen   Race Report. 24HOGG delivered another AMAZING race weekend that reminded me how much I love this event and why it keeps going strong in its 19th year, long after the 24-hour craze of the 90s has faded.  I will be back in 2015, and you should be too! ---- update:  I made a second post  that answers some questions and has some more info. The only individual prizes you can get at a team 24 hour race are the "Fastest Lap" and "Fastest Night Lap" prizes. If you're a serious racer (which most people at this race AREN'T), you pay attention to this stuff. Back when I used to do the race on the Back Bay Team, we'd fight over who got to ride 2nd because it was the "hot lap spot" -- the first rider on the course who didn't have to do the Le Mans start. This was better than going 3rd or 4th on your team because lapped traffic quickly started appearing -- your best bet at taking "fastest
Read more

Do-It-Yourself March Cycling Blog Post

So, are you a cyclist? Do you have a blog? If you answered "yes" to both of these questions, I hope you've already written your March Training Blog Post . You know what I'm talking about. To make it easier for those of you who haven't yet written the required cycling-blogger March Training Post , here is a handy template. Just cut and paste the text and then choose whichever option from the brackets [option1|option2], or add in the details [something vague] for whatever fits your training more accurately, and BAM, blog post DONE! Early Spring Training Post Template Just a [quick|surprisingly detailed] update about how training is going this year, in case any of the [joke about small number of readers] care. This week I've done [15 hours|30 hours] in the saddle, [getting up at 4 am|returning after 8pm] each time. It's been pretty chilly out there-- 5 below [celsius|fahrenheit] when I [started|finished] yesterday, but I'm toughing it out because
Read more

US Cyclocross Nationals Travesty Report: Junior Girls

Image
Note:  if you're a USA Cycling representative or Austin 2015 representative, and want to add a comment, rebuttal, fact, or perspective to this discussion, feel free to email me at colin.reuter@gmail.com and I'll post it here verbatim.  I fully accept that I wasn't there and don't know every issue that may have contributed to the decisions that were made.  There may be an explanation for these events that I am not aware of, and if so, I would love to hear it. Important Facts Update and Hyperbole Correction - The Junior Girls 15-16 race was supposed to be 30 minutes long, so the 7 girls who made it 2 laps were not "pulled" from the race, they were removed from the course after the finished their race.  Without firsthand testimony it's impossible to know how clear they were on their race duration being 2 laps shorter than the boys race happening simultaneously -- based on Turner Ramsey's quote to Cyclocross Magazine, it was certainly not a straightforwa
Read more