Seward Park Crit

It was crisp and clearing after a hard rain when I woke up way too early on Sunday morning for the Seward Park crit. After a good breakfast, I headed out from Capitol Hill to meet the team at the race. Sunday meant the end of Spring Break, the UW-hosted criterium race, and returning to Eugene after five days of fun and bikes in Seattle. The streets were mostly empty at 7:20 AM as we rode down 12th Ave, across the Rizal Bridge (which afforded a gorgeous sunlit view of new snow on the Olympic mountains, across the sound, as well as downtown), and onto the I-90 trail, then down to Lake Washington Blvd. The ride to Seward Park took about 40 minutes, and I arrived at the scene of the race with 30 minutes to spare before my start. I found the team vans, dumped my backpack, and surveyed the area. Even though I'd been to Seward Park a hundred times before, I had never actually made it up the hill to the loop of road that served as the crit course.

After the Men's D field finished, I jumped on the course and did a lap before lining up for the start. Front row, right side. Rules, regulations, safety discussions, number-adjusting, roll-call, chatting with an OSU rider, and suddenly we had 30 seconds to go. 15. 10. 5. The whistle.

I jumped at the start, though my starts have never been super-explosive, and was probably 7th or 8th wheel coming into the first turn, a tight 140-degree hairpin followed by a nice descent. My heavy bike came in handy on the descent, and I passed a few women on the way down, and mashed it through the flat section on the other side. Next came a 200-meter climb back to the start/finish line. I was 3rd wheel at the bottom of the climb, and I gave it an extra kick to pass Rachel Hoar, a Whitman rider, to take 2nd. At the start of the 2nd lap, a bell indicated a prime. I held onto my lead over Rachel through the second lap, trying to keep the first rider in my sights. I managed to open the gap behind me, but didn't manage to close the one in front of me. And thus the rest of the race proceeded - riding by myself, not passing anyone, not being passed. The turn was always sketchy (and I was distracted by Ivar, who had positioned himself at the corner and was probably taking awesome pictures of me as I turned - I haven't learned how to ignore cameras) so I tended to take it pretty slowly, but mashed on the descent to try to not lose time. After two laps, the 5-lap sign came up, and then I just ticked them off in my head. Three more descents, three more climbs. Two more climbs. Two more descents, one more climb, one more descent. Bell lap. Final descent, mash mash mash through the flats, and push push push up the climb. As the finish line came into sight I kicked it up into high gear and laid it all out on the road - sprinting with everything I had to the line. Not that there was anyone nearby to sprint with, but it seemed pointless to save anything at that point.

2nd place: fully respectable. Now I think it's time for that upgrade, though... the C field is for people who don't want to or have time to train, and I shouldn't sandbag, since I have been working pretty hard all winter. Two of my other teammates have upgraded to B's, and another is putting in for an A upgrade this week. This means we'll have a women's A time trial team, which is fully exciting - if you do well in the A field, you have a chance at nationals! I don't think that's going to happen this year, but next year it will definitely be in my sights... and if we continue to work and grow our team, we could have a shot at it. I gotta say, the idea of getting a stars and stripes jersey is a powerful motivator... though it would take a lot of hard work.

Have I ever mentioned how much I love racing bikes?