First podium for Don Dumaine, Team Revolution, Leesville RR, Williams CA,
Masters Cat 4 35+.
The weather was perfect. Once we hit the "cobbles" of Leesville
Rd. the pace shot up along with my HR. The guys up front did a good job
of holding the pace high over the rough roads.
The gradient gradually increased and at the base of the climb I had moved
up to the front 1/3. Ben was right behind me. We both settled into the climb
and held a strong steady pace. A group of 5 was in the lead, 30 seconds ahead,
and Ben, I and a Body Concepts guy chased. The rest of the field fell off
behind us. Ben started to chase the lead group but I thought it was too
early and asked him to hold back. This may have been a mistake because we were
about 40 seconds behind the lead group at the summit but would never catch
them. Our 3 man group chased like pros. We had a nice rotation going for a
long time. The moto ref did a good job of updating us on our
position and the chase group behind us. The chase group behind us was about 1 minute away. This was fun and painful
racing! We muscled up the second climb and BC cracked just before the summit
with leg cramps. I thought water would be at the summit but I was
wrong. We descended at 45 mph. The feed zone was at the
summit of the last, steep little climb. We were right behind the
lead group...maybe 20-30 seconds. I "bottle shopped" and
grabbed a tall and short bottle of water. The chase was back on.
Over the next 10 minutes I felt my legs start to cramp. We had been
racing for 2 1/2 hours. Ben came to my rescue and pulled the
MAJORITY of the time for the next 45 minutes. I can't tell you how
much I needed this and could not have finished well without his
help. We did not lose or gain ground on the lead group.
The chase group got within a minute of us but finally cracked. Ben's
time-trial like effort held off our challengers.
I was very happy with my
climbing and overall fitness. I worked hard since my meltdown on the
Leesville pre-ride a month ago and it paid off.
PCG
Coach: Earl Zimmermann
