True Grit at the Tyson’s Corner Crit

Three races in four weekends, an almost perfect trifecta of road cycling: a time trial, a road race, and a criterium. After a week that left me restless, yet preoccupied with thoughts and deeds, I confess that I spent very little time on the bike.

When Sunday arrived, I was rested and taking the morning in stride. A little NPR, some last minute packing and I loaded up the trusty sag wagon. As I reached for the trainer to carry out to the car, it protested this very act and bit me. Not unusual for the trainer, which I can only imagine despises being carried from destination to destination, only to serve as warmer-up and cooler down, while the actual bike has all the fun. I pulled my finger back expecting a little nip. To my surprise, the trainer’s teeth had bitten off a crucial bit of skin necessary to fulfill the obligations of being a finger.

It wasn’t a lot of blood. Just enough to make me a little nauseous. A few band aids later, I piled back into the car, trainer, finger and all.

I arrived with much time to spare. I hydrated. I ate. I listened to Garrison Keillor. I registered, pinned my number, changed and started my warm up. It was warm and windy, an odd combination that proved the zipper on my warm up jacket a necessary function.

At the start line, I found myself a good place. We started masochistically on an uphill, which made my start less than stellar. I had a good position. I started in my middle ring to gain advantage of the hill. And though I thoroughly checked my front derailleur before the race, I was thrust into a state of panic as I was unable to shift up into my big ring. Puzzled and panicked is not a good combination at the start of a race. Thus, as a result, I saw the pack slip away before I could say “hey wait for me…”

I caught the back of the pack and stayed on for half a lap, cursing my derailleur which by then had finally shifted into the big ring and rode well for the remainder of the race. An Artemis woman and I decided to work together. But it was clear we had different uses for each other. As a conditioned endurance cyclist, I prefer pacelines consisting of long pulls, rather than quick, short blasts. The Artemis woman definitely was the alpha female and took control. I blindly followed, thinking at least that it would distract me for several laps. I never got to pull or to draft more than 30 seconds, which wouldn’t have been so bad had she not flew like a bat out of hell every time she pulled. I was useless to her, as I worked viciously to stay on her wheel only to have to work that much harder to get in front of her. It eventually back fired for both of us, because I couldn’t stay on any more and she lost an opportunity to have someone block for her. Anyway, there I was again, alone at the back of the pack.

Twenty minutes into it, I felt like quitting, which is exactly what many of the cyclists did. They got dropped and figured what’s the point. I never could understand this reasoning. It’s not like we’re on the pro circuit or anything. We’re category 4 women just trying to improve our skills. If I quit every time I got dropped, I’d have a negative ranking. However, I didn’t quit and started to devilishly conspire and almost begged others to quit, if only to move me up from being last by a lot, to last by a little. And anyway, I don’t really think I was last. There were women behind me, unless they quit, too.

To make a long story, short (too late, I know). I finished. I finished strong. With 20 minutes left, I got a second wind and climbed my way around and down the course as if I was in the lead (which is the cool part about being in the back, because there comes a certain point, when spectators must ask themselves, is she in the lead?).

After the race, I meandered down to the EMTs for them to inspect my prerace calamity. They were eager to help as there had been no crashes all day. When I saw them take the hydrogen peroxide out I cringed. I asked, "this is going to hurt alot, huh?" They stared back and asked, "how old are you?" as if to imply that pain is ageless. I told them I'd rather race again and then they poured it all over my skinless finger, wrapped a fresh band aid around it and sent me on my way.