Boulder - Day 3

A nice double day on tap today. Boulder-Roubaix course recon in the morning (followed by a long nap) and then the Boulder Bus Stop ride. Went a little too hard at the wrong point, made a wrong turn, and that was that. Fun time though. Looks like a long ride tomorrow with a good group. I'm not sure if my legs will work or not, definitely having issues recovering out here, but oh well - this is training (as is everything I'll do this month), nothing more. Earlier this week we ripped down a long descent into Lyons and got it all on video.

Boulder - Days 1 & 2

Boulder's been outstanding. Felt disastrous yesterday during a 90 mile / 7500ft gain day, but felt much better today's ride (55 at 6500ft of gain). Tomorrow's a recovery morning ride, massage, and evening group ride which should be interesting. Anyways, a few photos from today's ride up Flagstaff and towards Nederland.

Lincoln Park Criterium

Our team’s true annual road kickoff was yesterday at Lincoln Park. The elite squad was almost completely represented with several guys looking to have some success, notably Austin Venhuizen and Ryan O’Boyle.

The Lincoln Park P/1/2/3 race is pretty simple at its core, but generally has a few consistent aspects each year. 1) The wind. Half the field generally DNF’s as they find themselves out of position or just not strong enough to hold the pace, particularly on the backside of the course going over the bridge and 2) generally a strong-man break wins the day.

Let’s start with the wind. Navigating this course can be a whole lot easier if you play it right through the corners. As the crosswind the past two years has come directly from the west (towards the lake) positioning yourself throughout the course is critical to saving some precious race-saving watts. Anyways, the way I navigate the course (to each their own) is I try to enter the first long swooping turn with no one on my left side. Once I hit the midpoint of the sharper left-hander I try to carve it off a bit, which keeps me on the leftside throughout the backstretch shielded from the wind. At this point, after cresting the hill, I start thinking about setting myself up for the frontstretch. As I make my way towards the 90 degree righthand turn that leads up towards the 180, generally (if the race is at speed) it will be hit single file or nearly single file and upon the exit of the turn I push myself right towards the gutter. As I hit the 180, this allows me to stay on the outside…thus allowing me to exit on the right which guarantees that I’ll be shielded from the wind down the front stretch as well. If I failed to stay outside upon the exit of the hairpin, generally I’d let the guy on my outside go past on the exit which makes way for me to squeeze in behind in a single file manner heading towards the finish - such that again, I’m positioned directly behind or just to the right of the rider in front of me, shielded from the wind. Repeat. (Also, staying up front helps significantly as it allows me to have more flexibility in where I want to go and it of course allows me to avoid the constant whiplash throughout the day which can quickly kill a race, especially once riders start peeling off in front of you).

Also, as an aside, the wind today actually made the race significantly less technical than it could have been. The day before, Austin and I previewed the course with the wind direction coming directly from the North. While doing a jump and hitting the right hand turn heading up towards the 180 we hit nearly 40mph which might have caused a few people to run into the fencing throughout the day had it stayed strong in that direction. But instead, it compacted the race at that point and naturally mitigated the speed through the 180. Anyways on to the race…

A few thoughts entering the day included trying to get one of our strong guys in the move (O’Boyle, Austin, etc) and trying to mitigate Sammy’s from launching people up towards the break - as they successfully did last year. Whenever several Sammy’s riders hit the front near the 180, our goal was to have a rider near them such that they could either disrupt the move or get in the launch themselves. So, back to that strong-man aspect of the course: Ryan O’Boyle. The guy has a serious knack for finding the right move and not surprisingly found the right move about a third of the way into the race. Austin had attacked several times early but eventually got off the front after the O’Boyle move was established with one other guy that went to the finish ahead of that pack but behind O’Boyle’s break-of-the-day. Given that Sammy’s had a rider in the break-of-the-day that was almost sure to be outsprinted by several guys with a solid kick, they stacked the front and slowed the peloton down (particularly around the 180) in hopes of allowing the O’Boyle break to lap the field. If it did, I’d assume they’d try to create a long leadout train for him as that might be the only way to take the W. It worked and the move lapped the field with about 2 to go. O’Boyle made his way through the field to the front with 1 to go. I asked him if he was looking to launch a move early or field sprint: field sprint was the answer which sent me on one-man one-lap-to-go leadout mission for him. As we crossed the start/finish I hit the front hard and looked back to make sure he was on my wheel. As we hit the riser over the bridge, I made sure to flush far enough left to leave a clean line for O’Boyle but no one else (as anyone who wanted to go over the top of me would have had to come through the wind on the right). Still on the front through the right hand turn and up towards the hairpin I started to feel it. We hit the 180 1-2 and I started giving it just about everything I had upon the exit. I heard Ryan say “1 More Tyler” which made me pause for a second thinking…wait, was this NOT the last lap??? At that point my effort slightly decreased and the sprint went off…and I quickly was reassured that yes, this was in fact the last lap…thank god…and I coasted through the line. Anyways, Ryan ended up sprinting for 4th which is a solid result. Had I given it slightly more for a bit longer heading towards the finish line maybe he gets 3rd, but oh well. Austin also attacked his man late grabbing a 6th place finish. Can’t be too disappointed putting two guys in the top six. A nice start to the season and hopefully a platform for many more results ahead!

…oh…and here’s the last lap…enjoy.

...And Looking Forward to the 2015 Season (April Edition)

Needless to say, while I've got the opportunity, I'm going all-in on 2015. I've hired a well renowned coach that I've been working with since the start of the year and although I don't feel fast yet (and it'd be a mistake if I did), I feel much more well rounded at this point than I ever have.  In addition, I've got an incredible new track bike heading my way shortly that should add some 'free' watts to my efforts during the year. If I'm giving it one all-out shot, I want to make sure I'm doing it right.

My primary goals for 2015 surround competing as well as possible at National Track Calendar events throughout the summer and the National Track Championships in August. But I don't want to get too ahead of myself, so I'll take it one month at a time here. The month of April will consist of local and regional road racing in an effort to get faster for the track season. In addition, I'm heading out to Boulder for a team training camp for a week next week to ride with some really fast guys which should be a great experience, especially since I've never ridden in Boulder. I've ridden several times out in the middle mountains of Colorado and anticipate the climbs to be similar in design, but riding them at the intensity with which this group will hit them will make this a completely new experience - plus I'm not a great ascender for whatever reason, so there's that...

So my April looks like:

• April 4: Lincoln Park Criterium (Chicago, IL)
• April 4-11: WIDC Team Training Camp (Boulder, CO)
• April 12: Boulder-Roubaix (Boulder, CO)
• April 23-26: Joe Martin Stage Race (Fayettesville, AR)

Hopefully our team can find some success at our home race at Lincoln Park this weekend. We'll have a ton of guys in the field and a few pretty strong guys that could get a result. At the end of the training camp in Boulder, we'll race Boulder-Roubaix as a team, so that should be fun seeing my average heart rate for that race above my non-altitude max. And at the end of the month I'll be using the Joe Martin Stage race as a really good training block while working for my teammates that have a shot of doing well while trying my best not to get time cut.

Had a nice active recovery (AR) ride yesterday on a divvy bike along the lakefront path in 60 degree weather - the best kind of training, even picked up Katie from work and divvy'd home together. 

So yeah, hooray for good weather ahead, the rest week I'm currently on, and the exciting month of training and racing ahead.

 

Recapping the 2014 Season

So I haven't really recapped last season yet. It was certainly the busiest season I've had with a full spring road schedule, a full calendar of local track racing, and the entire ChiCrossCup Calendar resulting in 89 races over 47 race days. Just to recap and have closure on last year - my major track highlights included:

• Illinois State Individual Pursuit Champion (P/1/2)
• Illinois State Madison Champion (P/1/2)
• Illinois State Team Pursuit Champion (P/1/2/3)
• 1st - Tomasz Pac 100 Lap Memorial Points Race (P/1/2/3)
• 2nd - Illinois State Points Championships (P/1/2/3)
• 3rd - Northbrook Rider of the Year (P/1/2)
• 3rd - Illinois State Kilo Championships (P/1/2/3)
• 4th - Illinois State Scratch Championships (Roger DeLanghe Trophy Race) (P/1/2/3)
• 4th - Illinois State Keirin Championships (P/1/2/3)

In addition, I had a decent year on the cross bike resulting in six Top 5 finishes, including 3rd''s in both the ChiCrossCup Standings and State Champoinships in the 3's earning my upgrade to a 2 at season's end. I also had a sandbaggers 2nd in the 36 mile Barry-Roubaix open category early on in the year (the same race that I just mechanical'd out of last weekend). On the road, I had a handful of Top 15's on the early season crit calendar, but mostly was happy with how active and good I felt throughout each race.

I counted 14 wins and 29 podium finishes during 2014 over a variety of disciplines without having burned out mentally or physically at all - which is as much a win as anything else. So yeah, close the books on 2014! Time to look completely forward as we build on that this year!

CRUNCH

My annual trip to Barry-Roubaix ended in another mechanical DNF (also happened 2 years ago). Riding near the front over the first climb the chain over shifted into the wheel causing the derailleur hanger to bend in towards the wheel (no bike damage). Not a big deal - just mostly annoying to have to come home and log some hours on the trainer tonight to make up for the lost time. Much much bigger fish to fry this year. The focus shifts to an upcoming rest week and then the Lincoln Park Criterium on Saturday which I assume should bring out a field of 30 or so with good representation from my team, so hopefully we can find some success there.

Anyways, this is what it looks like...

To an Unwritten Future

I’m going to write a lot this year and I promise you, this is as deep as I’ll get.

Six months ago, after a little over a week where I was pegged to my office desk longer than I was home, filled with what I’d like to believe was a more than usual amount of ‘asap’ projects, impossible-to-satisfy requests, and an unusually high amount of the same corporate stress that many of us experience in our daily grind – the seed became planted to do something else. Over the last decade, I’ve been racing my bike. On the road. On the track. In the dirt. Wherever. I’ve come to be not half-bad at it and in recent years I’ve really refound my love for the sport. Last year, I experienced my largest performance-jump ever giving way to hope that I could have success at a slightly larger stage, especially given that I’m entering the prime years of my cycling lifespan. Which leads me to...

…today...which is the last day at my job.

I’d never thought about the difficulty of simply deciding to quit. There’s a laundry list of reasons why I shouldn’t, many of which likely may have already come to your mind – I’m aware – and I’m absolutely not 100% certain this is the right thing I should be doing, but I am. Whether its struggling to decide if I’m being fair to my wife (who’s more than encouraged me to do this), coming to feel okay with the certain derailment of my career path, or the obvious loss of income that we’ll feel (not that it was a lot). These things made it difficult to have a clarity of vision right up until the final day of this decision.

Right around the time the seed had been planted in my head about doing this, I learned that an acquaintance I had briefly known passed away in a car accident near the holidays. This shouldn’t have impacted me much given that we’d only had a dozen or so brief conversations in passing just under a decade ago, but it somehow, combined with the state I was in, timed up to awaken me to my existence a bit – likely akin to some level of mid-life crisis I’m sure. It brought to the surface those questions that seem to most strongly occur in times of tragedy or extreme emotion and helped reinforce that the true downside of doing something like this, really isn’t all that bad. I’d like to think that kind of thinking is more pure than insane.

Anyways, I’m going to rewrite my life path right here just a bit. My life as written progresses on a smooth corporate path towards a seemingly forever away retirement age at which point I'll sit in my rocking chair and rock as I do now, satisfied that my work was done, that’d I’d paid my dues and provided for my family. I’ll tell my grandkids that I used to race my bike just like them and I was halfway decent. I’ll tell them I maybe even could have accomplished something worthwhile had I not been prudent and stayed the proper course of a working career. But alas, today I pivot to answer that question. I move towards a future slightly unwritten, towards an answer I don’t quite have. In my mind - certain failure of accomplishing anything sustainable awaits, but with a tremendous amount of hard work, I’ll have complete success in creating an adventure that sees to it that I gave my absolute all in seeing how far I could take a life passion. For that I see little downside.

A lot of things here are working in my favor as well that it’d be unfair not to mention. Financially my wife and I have put ourselves in a fine position to be able to pull this off relatively unscathed for which I am extremely grateful. And from a responsibility standpoint, I have very few true things relative to many others in my position that would hold me back - making now a very good time to try something like this. I’m very aware of these things and realize this opportunity has been easier to take on for me than it would be for many others in my shoes. I am nothing but grateful for the position I’m in. In addition to going all-in on the cycling front, I’ve failed to mention that I’ll be pursuing many other things over the coming months non-cycling related, but given that this is my cycling specific news/thought outlet spot, I’m going to contain my scope to only things bike-related. But in any event, I’m looking forward to attacking the coming months as hard as I can. My focus is completely forward on what I need to do to be where I want to be. Looking forward to the adventure that awaits.

Until then, I’ll leave on a lighter note. A turkey attacking our team ride. Enjoy.