Boston Beanpot Classic, Part 1

Today was a weird day...

At about 10:45 we were ready to head off for the 26 miles Road Race. I had my leg and arm warmers on, and an under armour shirt. It was in the 30s, maybe 40s. About halfway through the first lap (13 miles per lap), the temperature shot up to, I would say, the 70s! And it wasn't like it went from 40-something to 50-something, and so on... it literally went from cold to hot in a matter of minutes! I was ripping my arm-warmers and gloves off, and roasting in the under armour and leg-warmers. oh yeah, I also had my toe-warmers on over my shoes, which was affecting me!

Anyways, the start was weird... the pace car kept speeding up, then slowing down, repeatedly. it was confusing everyone. Also, some of the riders still don't know how to ride in a pack, there was constant breaking, shifting of the bikes from side to side, etc.

I kept up with the whole field pretty well. A few riders have dropped every now and then but I stayed with the pack for the first, I'd say, 7-9 miles. Then I just started dropping back slowly with a few other riders. I've got to learn to increase my pain tolerance, because one thing I know is that once I get over the initial pains that I feel towards the beginning of the races, I'm good for the rest of the race. I noticed that the hill climbs were a lot easier the second time around... is it just me or does this go for many people?

Anyways, so I get dropped and I'm constantly picking several people off to chase after and then pass. I caught up to a guy from Yale towards the end of the first lap, I pretty much rode with him the whole second lap. We kept together, working to catch several riders, and then usually they were going too slow so we would just draft off of them for a few minutes and then take off after the next guy. We did pretty well. However, Yale got tired or something on the one climb that I was going too fast for him, so "oh well" I thought and proceeded on my own after the next guy. Caught up to him with about 3-4 miles left before the finish, and Yale caught up to us on a downhill. I rode with these two guys until about a mile left, when I was leading the line of the three of us. I was leading and at about a mile left, I looked back to see they weren't with me anymore, so I just took off making sure they weren't catching me. At the finish I almost got hit by a car because the idiot cop/traffic-director had no clue what to do. He let this car, that I was about to pass, go ahead of me, so he cuts me off to get around this car that was turning left at the final intersection before the finish, and I shout out to the cop "what the heck, I'm trying to finish" then I thought "IDIOT!" to myself (not me, the cop is an idiot).

I finished 73 out of 79 that finished, 88 that started. I know I usually have complaints, or I start pointing the finger at people and/or things that happen, but this time, the finger's pointing at me. I should have tried to fight through the pain to keep with the peloton. Nothing else happened that made me drop off the pack. Other than that, this was one of my best road race performances. When I got back to the car after the race, there were no helmet thrown, no bike being shoved into the ground or anything like that... I just got back, put my bike on the trainer, and did my cooldown with a smile. Yeah, my results weren't impressive, but I felt really good at the finish, because I had a personal best.

Tomorrow is the Crit, results when I get back to school tomorrow night! Thanks for reading!