FLCC> Tuesday night A's

[Matt Plumb]

    To be straight to the point, tonight's 2x Hurd, observatory finish Ringwood race was the most intense/prolonged suffering I've endured on a bike this season. With hardly a dull moment for the hilly ~27 mile course, there was a lot of solid competition out at the start and although a few notable locals were out of action Glenn, Andy, Danny T., Lawney, Ano and many others were out to break legs on an unusually lengthy and brutally undulating Tuesday night outing.    














      Things got started off fast.  After dawdling near the front for all of a minute or two I initiated an attack on Midline to get the mood right.  Predictably I got caught quickly by the now agitated peloton.  Very shortly thereafter I found myself again gasping on the wheel of and trading pulls with Brian Lawney with the field a fair way back.  Closer to the first turn onto 79 I looked back to see another riding attempting to bridge up to us and sputtered to Brian that we "uuugh...... ought to wait.... for Andy."  "Andy" actually turned out to be Glenn and the three of us continued along our merry way hammering down 79 only to be swarmed up to by the hard chasing pack near the top of Ellis Hollow.  Sensing that I had over-enthusiastically and somewhat idiotically drained quite a bit of my metaphorical gas tank for the evening in a reckless20move in only the first few miles of racing, I drifted to the rear of=2
0the group to suck some wind and clear some of the nasty metabolites from my legs.  Already uncomfortably close to my redline, I suffered miserably at the pace of Danny and Glenn up Hurd road, looking down to see spikes in the scary high 200s or what, for me, Joe Friel might call the CP4 ultra mega power interval "holy crap, you're gonna die" heart rate zone towards the top of the climb.  Things stayed relatively well together and the pace seemed to slow slightly with attacks coming now and again as we approached Ellis Hollow for the second time.  At this point  Andy M., who proclaimed to have great legs under him for the race, took a solo attempt off the front but unfortunately flatted and was forced to make for the parking lot before the closing festivities.  Ano heated things up at the bottom of our second ascent of Hurd and I spent the first 1/3 of the climb pacing myself and a few others up to his wheel.  Upon latching on I took a few breaths and hit the front doing what I could to make everyone (myself included) as miserable as possible.  By the top of the climb the group had thinned down to only 4-5 riders including myself, Glenn, Brian, Ano, Danny (who, naturally, was up the road a bit) and another rider from Cortland. I put in one last weak, hypoxic acceleration to agitate every one a bit more and traded pulls with Brian and Glenn along the flats before 
the final short bump before descending where each of had to bury ourselve
s out of the saddle to match Danny's freakish, although mercifully reserved speed.   The next few miles passed rather uneventfully with Glenn and I launching several unsuccessful solo stabs at the other few battered souls still in contention. Don Sproul popped up out of no where for the final ascent of Ellis Hollow where Glenn towed us up at a, umm, mildly bothersome space before Danny decided to force us all to draw from the pain bank once again on the approach to the bottom of Ringwood.  Executing the tactical gem of the night, Ano burst up to Danny's wheel maing the remainder of us to hesitate and look to each other to give chase.  Eventual we got somewhat organized and closed the gap some before the long grind up the finish. On the lower slopes of Ringwood Glenn and Brian set the pace, shelling Don (who, in his defense, has some variety of the flu and was still riding very tough.) and another Cortland rider.  On the steep sections of the climb Brian, were he a character from Mortal Kombat, pulled what would his special move, the skinny man climber trick, and teleported faster than Johnny Cage up to the Ano/Timmerman duo leaving Glenn and I with some work yet to do over the final parts of climbing before some flats and making the turn onto Mount Pleasant.   I, in far less majestic and aesthetically pleasing way, matched Brian's move via a late application of the bulky dude, stand up20and slam on the pedals until you hopefully get to where you wanna go=2
0technique which is otherwise known as the "Melynchenko."  Glenn, as always, evenly paced himself and smoothly spun up to join the rest of us for the last showdown over the first wall and the up another to the finish at the Observatory.  For my efforts, I was pretty blown by the first wall but took a gamble and accelerated towards the top.  Followed only by Brian things were looking good for a few moments and then I, bewildered, was forced to sit down as I screeched backwards to a near standstill, my quads eerily tightening and contracting painfully and involuntarily.  I've heard of this happening to other people but had never experienced it until that very inopportune moment, possibly giving testament to how brutal the night, I think, had been.  I met my limit one hill too early and could do little but watch and grimace as in a very small span of time I went from a full on attack to what felt like careening backwards down the hill as I helplessly got swept up and passed by Danny, Glenn, Brian and Ano.  With my legs clocked out I could do little more than noodle up the last pitch in my 39/27 without being relegated back into my saddle by spastic electrical events in my quads.  I crawled at 4 mph up to the triumphant 1/2/3/4 group of Brian, Glenn, Danny and Ano, respectively, feeling a little dejected and still occasionally feeling ripping tightnesses in my legs but pleased to say that I'd gone down shooting heavily (although maybe excessively) in one of 
the hardest Tuesday nighters I've had the pleasure of riding. Thanks and way to go dudes, you're all flying.









Drink gatorade, be at peace. 









Matt          






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