By Amanda Eaken -- Memorial Day Crit (W1-3) -- 05/28/07
Summer Crit season has officially begun! After spending a spectacular three days at the Four Points Sheraton in Bakersfield with my favorite ab-crunching, secret-sauce making, non-snoring roommate MaryAnn Levenson, and racing every day for three days with unprecedented Metromint success across the board, I was in serious withdrawal during what was meant to be a “vacation” the following week in Big Sur. Know what I have to say about Big Sur? Big Deal! The riding was mediocre on Rte 1, the food was overpriced, and the # 1 recreational activity in Big Sur? Scenic driving! Oh yes. Make me nauseous on Rte 1 in a car. After spending two days bouncing off the walls of our motel room in Big Sur – I realized – I needed a race!
I rallied all available troops to race with me – Alison Krasnow, Laurie Simonson, Sarah Lightfoot and MaryAnn Levenson. I have realized you can’t tell a thing from the pre-reg list for these races- I think 10 girls had registered, and I was pleased to find 40 on the starting line.
The main girls to watch for were going to be TIBCO’s Stacey Marple, Brooke Miller and designated sprinter Alexis Alexander, and ProMan’s Shelley Olds.
The announcer also teased us with a bottle of Champagne for the most aggressive rider.
And we were off! Fresh back on US turf after a period of racing in Europe with the US Team, Brooke Miller was not surprisingly, quite aggressive. She and Marple countered a bunch of times and every one of my teammates was right up there covering moves and shutting them down. It was amazing – there goes Brooke, and Ali is on her, Brooke looks back and sits up. Then it’s Sarah shutting down Marple – then Laurie covers a Los Gatos attack. MaryAnn checks in with me a few times asking what she can do, and every time she gives me a nice little ride up to the front of the pack.
At some point, the attack and counter gets really predictable, and I notice the pack is reeling back in Brooke Miller, so I get right behind Stacey and wait for her to shift up, make a break to the left side of the pack, and make her move. Anticipating her timing makes it much easier to stick right on her and I don’t even have to work very hard to cover her. When we are off, I ask if she will work with me, but she cannot. She is otherwise committed to work for a teammate. We stayed away for a little while, but were soon caught. After this, I don’t chase much of TIBCO’s attacks since they are not interested in staying away anyway.
This is a fairly short 50 minute crit and before I know it – it’s time for the lead out train. With a little more than 2 laps to go, Marple gets on the front and starts stretching it out. At some point, she falls off and with a little more than 1 to go, Brooke Miller is on the front, Alexis is on her wheel, and I’m on Alexis’ wheel. PERFECT! We round the corner into the start/finish and they’re ringing the bell, the one lap to go card is up and, suddenly, out of nowhere, Alexis starts to sprint for the line. Brooke yells, “NO Alexis, not now, not now!”, but it’s too late. Alexis sprints, thinks she has won, throws her arms up in the air, and turns around to me with a little point of her finger, and smirks “Gotcha!”
Now I am seriously confused. Was that somehow the last lap? No, the lap card clearly said one to go. Was TIBCO’s entire team plan based on confusing me into sprinting too early? No that’s impossible. Was Alexis just hopelessly confused herself? Turns out, if you guessed option C, you were right. So Brooke comes around Alexis and screams, “Hope you got another one of those, Lex!” Brooke starts the lead out again, and a Morgan Stanley girl is now vying with me for Alexis’ wheel. Seeing that I’m out in the wind too much, Sarah Lightfoot comes up and sits right in front of me, giving me a little break. This is classic Sarah Lightfoot – she is an excellent teammate and can anticipate exactly what you need and has done it before you can ask. Then the typical last half lap jockeying begins in earnest. Everyone is moving around trying to get good position – I think Tracey Ford from Proman does a little attack to try to mess up the flow of things, and Alexis and I both respond. Now Brooke is gone, and it’s just Alexis out in the wind, and coming into the final corner, I think I am positioned perfectly, on her wheel. I plan to sprint right out of that corner, and then dangit, Shelley Olds comes flying from my right to my left and I cannot respond to her speed. She gets a good gap through the last corner, I come around Alexis at the corner and sprint all out and cross the line for second.
I am grateful to all teammates who rallied and did an excellent job chasing down attacks and making sure nothing stuck. Thanks also to Metromint’s Cat 4s – Melissa Frost, Janelle Gunther and Julie Baird for sticking around to cheer us on all race! I look forward to a long summer of crit racing in Northern California!