Well, it's been a week, which means it's time for another race update. Last weekend there were two races to choose from on the NorCal calendar. The race at the Folsom Cyclebration, and the second LARPD. I decided to do the Folsom race because it would give me the chance to see my Dad, in Sacramento, and I could race a short track mountain race on Sunday on my CX bike and get two races in. This would also serve as a good warm up to the following weekend, which would be back to back UCI (Pro level) races in Seattle.
So I got there early, signed in, and started warming up. I felt pretty good, coming off a normal training week, aiming for 19 hours total come Sunday night. Late in my warm up I noticed an odd creaking noise in my bike. I thought it was the bottom bracket I had just installed the night before. But that seemed odd because I knew I'd installed it properly and with plenty of grease. Strange, but no big deal, on to the race.
I lined up front row, knowing that with the competition that was there I could definitely be in the top five, and if I was feeling good and racing smart, the top three. Well, the guy that started to my left stuck his bars in front of mine off the line, then missed his pedal. Luckily neither of us crashed, but this put me around 12th, a long ways from where I wanted to be with a lot of turns before any real chance to move up. But I stayed calm and collected and moved up one spot, here, one spot there, all in the first half of the first lap. We hit the run up and I powered up it, passing two guys with ease and drawing a few impressed comments from spectators. I leapt onto my bike and immediately started sprinting out of saddle to try to get up to speed and regain some of those lost spots.
Suddenly I heard a loud cracking noise, something like a spoke breaking, but a touch louder, and my bike became very wobbly. I thought it was a spoke, but no, my brakes didn't rub. A broken chainstay? Nope, it was my down tube. Broken frame, on lap one, with no B bike to swap to. OH MAN!
Well, I got off my bike, jogged the remaining 200 meters to the start/finish and yelled, "Anybody got a bike I can borrow? I just broke mine." A few spectators spotted the break and "Wowed," but no one had a bike. I went to the tent of a local shop, only to be jokingly offered duct tape. I remembered a guy I know that rides about the same size as me had a spare bike. I ran back to the start/finish area.
"Mike! What size is your bike?"
"Oh, it's a 52. It'll fit you."
"Sweet! Can I borrow it?"
So I took his bike, a single speed with a gear suitable to Mike, who is 60 or so years old, and my broken rig, and went to the pit, where I took his pedals off, took my pedals off and put them on his bike, and jumped back in the race, now two laps down. UGG. I rode strong, spun my legs off trying to make up ground. I finished 11th out of 12 thanks to a DNF. The DNF was the guy that hooked my bar at the start. At least I got a good workout.
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