Pedal for Proceeds Road Race
April 27, 2002

Going into my season opener this year, I knew that I should not expect much out of this race. Today was a test and a learning experience above anything else and with weather conditions with air temps at high 30's, low 40's and winds from the east at 17 to 20 I knew this was going to be an interesting first experience. All week long the threat of heavy rain hung over head, but come race time, the clouds produced very little water. Just enough to make the roads wet, but nothing to bad. With the temp so low and a not so friendly high wind we were all pretty glad we didn't have the added "benefit" of rain.

Since this is all Citizen level racing we didn't have different waves of cat 1, 2, 3, or 4 going out at different times. Every rider both male and female all start at once with inclusion of the tandem groups and recumbent riders if there are any. This makes for an amazing amount of people at the start line once the buzzer goes off, and you can imagine that the faster riders kick it up right from the start to quickly separate the field of riders. Every rider fits into one of about 8 different category based on age. I fell right at the end of the 25-29 age category which seems to be a smaller group compared to the 30-35 and 35-40 age groups. Could be good based on the size, but I'm imagining that most of the 25-29 riders will be pretty strong.

So the start buzzer is sounded and I found myself toward the middle back of the pre start line group, a place that seemed appropriate for my talents. As promised the group in the front takes off like they had rockets strapped to their frames. I attached myself to a smaller group that included 2 other Atkins riders and a total size of about 9 to 10 riders. One thing I should note is that for some reason or another my cycle computer stopped working right from the beginning, so from the start I had no idea how fast we were going or my distance. From time to time it flashed the speed for a minute or two, but nothing long enough to be of any use.

UPDATE: After talking to some teammates, and reviewing the results it appears that the route was about 25.9 miles with a finish time of 1 hour, 16 minutes. That makes for about a 20.3 mph avg speed.

I stayed with this group for some time and was pretty happy that even though I was fading slowly I had kept up with them. Since I had no way to judge distance I can't tell you how long I stayed with this group, but if I had to guess I'd say that it was around two thirds of the race. We made a turn into that wind and I fell off the back and didn't have anything left to catch back up. I rode for about a mile solo, then attached to another group of about 10 riders. I hung with them till the end where in the final small incline at the end I launched off the front and made for the finish line. I had thought I was the only one that spit out the front, but about a foot before the line I noticed a rider to my left that came up along side of me. I don't know who got to the line first, but that little rush at the end was amazingly enjoyable... Even though this was never a sprint for first place, the rush felt as equal. In the end I was 44th place out of maybe 84 or 85 riders overall and 5th in my age group (out of 5 riders). Feel free to check out the final results.

In the end I was really happy with my performance. I was able to ride with a few of the Atkins riders in both groups and I really enjoyed the sprint to the finish line. Next time I'll position myself toward the front of the start line and see what that is like. Since this was one of the more flat races in the series, the hill races later in the summer should add a certain amount new elements. Thanks for reading and I'll catch up with you at the next race. Maybe I'll have a little better idea how fast I'm going next time! Big time thanks to all the Atkins folks, both the folks that offered very helpful advice over email, and to everyone at the race.

Results | Photos of Clint Group 1 | Photos of Clint Group 2 | Other photos during race