Historic Riverton Crit
Tough day in Riverton for all of us that raced I think!
I raced the 3/4, and having done this race two years ago, and also confirmed by Mike Black before the start, I knew it would be full gas right from the gun, so I staged very early to make sure I was on the front and didn't miss the first splits. There were 85 racers.
There was supposed to be a neutral lap at ~20mph but everyone sprinted off the line so there essentially was no neutral lap. Fortunately this didn't really surprise me much so I was in the top 15 or so riders right away and stayed there as the laps ticked by. The pace was brutal, I set my all time power PR for all durations between 11 and 26 minutes (!!) and of course it was sprint, rest a second or two to corner, sprint, rest, etc.
Eventually I think the lead group had about 15-20 riders in it and we had a pretty good gap to the chase group (which also probably had about 15-20 riders), probably about half a lap. We had started lapping riders after only a few laps and there was a lot of shouting for them to get out of the way. They should have been pulled off earlier in my opinion as there is just no room to get around them safely on this course.
I did get the sense that everyone was really starting to struggle after 15-20 minutes (I certainly was) but the pace did not slow down at all. We were doing about 1:40 per lap, 27-28 mph every lap.
At minute 26, I am sitting in about 5th position I think, two spots behind Kevin Rice, and we are going into the sole right hand corner (turn 4), fast, when all of a sudden Kevin is on the ground and so is the rider behind him/directly in front of me. I almost got through safely by going out wide but at the last moment the bike from the rider in front of me got flung out wide and I hit it and went down. I count myself lucky as I didn't even tear up my kit at all, just got some very minor road rash on my elbow and knee and a few bruises. Kevin definitely had more serious injuries - hope you are okay man!
My saddle was pointing off at a 45 degree angle and my chain had come off, but otherwise no damage to the bike either, so I put the chain back on and slowly got through the lap to get to neutral support for them to straighten out my saddle. Unfortunately, after my saddle was straightened out, they sent me back in with the chase pack, which was pulled before we had even completed a lap, so I really had no chance to chase and the day was done.
I was very frustrated as I feel like I should have been sent back in with the lead group, not the chase group. To rub salt in the wound, it looks like the winning group did finally slow down after another lap or two, doing about 1:45, even 1:50 per lap for most of the rest of the race until the final three laps, so I am pretty sure I could have stayed in that group and had a solid finish position even though I was really suffering just before the crash. That's bike racing, I suppose
I'll be doing the 4/5 and the 3/4 at Smoketown this weekend, hope to get back on track with some good results.