Yeah baby...better than a pack finish!

Yesterday I headed to Gig Harbor for the second race in the Lake Washington Velo Circuit race series and my first non-PR race on the new bike. Not only did I get my first pack finish ever, but I very nearly ended up in the breakaway!

The course was outstanding with a 1/2 mile 5-6% hill climb followed by a few rollers, a few descents, and a few fast turns. The Cat 4 women had a great turnout with 25 riders. I showed up very late about 20 minutes before the start and was worried since I had no time to warmup. I lined up in the back of the field and promised myself that next time I'll work on my starting position.

I motored up the hill easily on the first lap and used it to move up to the front. For the remainder of the lap I mostly stayed in the front third of the pack, which is a first for me. On the second lap 5-6 girls broke off the front up the hill and I was shortly behind them. I forgot the 2nd lap was the interseries sprint; hence the fast hill climb! At the top there seemed to be a false flat and I tried and tried to catch the breakaway but just couldn't quite get there -- damn! I was that close to being there! I ended up getting stuck between the breakaway and a small chase group behind me so I decided to soft pedal, save my energy, and work with the three girls behind me.

Our paceline had a rider from Starbucks, TiCyles, and TGH and the four of us did a nice job of staying away from the rest of the field but we never did catch the breakaway. We pacelined together the entire 2nd lap until the TiCyles rider lost her chain on a corner. What a bummer! I never know what to do in those situations. I hate to ride on but we were ahead of the rest of the field and had to leave her. When I sprinted back up to catch the other two girls I finally saw the rest of the field behind us and it dawned on me that we were ahead of most of the field. Wow! It was surreal realizing that half of the field was behind us. Sweet!

After the 3rd and last pass up the hill three more girls caught up to us and we had some extra help for the rest of the lap. Jill Talcott from Starbucks is great and kept shouting at everyone to keep us motivated. The only bummer in the entire race was that we blew right through one of the right-hand turns because the corner marshall was up the street and not at the turn. Luckily we realized it right when we missed the turn and were able to get turned around without losing too much time. Once the guy saw us miss the corner and we yelled at him that the Men's 3s were coming he quickly got back there.

It was curious to me that when we finally hit the 200m mark no one really seemed interested in sprinting to the finish. Points were being given out 10-deep and I was pretty certain there weren't 10 girls in the breakway, which meant some of us would get points. I felt strong and really wanted the opportunity to sprint, but when everyone finally pushed a bit I got blocked on the right side of the road and couldn't get anywhere. Ah well. I've never finished with lots of other riders before so I'm not really used to paying attention to my position for the sprint.

Results aren't posted yet but I think I ended up somewhere around 12th or 13th, which is the best finish I've ever had in a race! Too bad it took me until the end of the season to get there, but at least there's a few races left. It was exciting to finally work with a great group of riders and be up front. I was so excited I felt like I was on speed the rest of the day. I can't wait until next week's race!