Mike's Bike Blog

You might recall last year's Walburg Classic as I missed the winning breakaway group but instead of just sitting in I went for it at mile 30 and ended up placing 7th. This year's "Plan A" was to get into the winning breakaway. Plan B was to blow up trying to get away and to inflict as much punishment as I could in the process. During the week I talked to Enrique Varela (North West Cycling Club) and we hatched a plan after seeing which direction the wind would be coming from to attack right after the headwind into a crosswind.

The weather for Walburg is historically bad, it's usually raining with 30 mph winds. A couple years ago I had to actually stand up and sprint going downhill just to keep enough forward momentum going. This year it was just a bit overcast and the legendary wind was nowhere to be found.

From the start I tried to be in the front of the 75 guy pack yet it was still pretty touch and go. We'd get up to 21 mph then drop back to 18 so the yoyo was in effect. I was hugging the yellow line biding my time to move forward at the next opening when someone was trying to sneak around me on my left. I was already pretty close to the yellow line yet this guy wanted through. Typically in these situations the guy wanting through will put his hand out and touch your thigh or back to let you know he's there when it's a really tight squeeze.  Not this guy, he put his hand right on my ass and not just for a quick moment, it was there while he rode around me for a good 20 seconds. I wasn't sure if I should tip him or if I should receive the tip.

As we made the right hand turn out of the wind I came from about 20 guys back and hit the gas. Enrique was about 5th wheel back and saw me coming around and he jumped on along with 1 or 2 other guys. We started a rotation but with one guy that couldn't or wouldn't pull through anything faster than 23 mph it was futile as everyone was still right there with us. As we fell back into the pack Enrique said we should try again at the same spot I went last year.  I ended up pulling more than I should as nobody wanted to do any work and I didn't want to take my chances with the pack and their yo-yos and plus the groper was still there. The wind wasn't that bad so I stayed up front till mile 30 and I would unleash my attacks.

I guess you could say I was a marked man, I had a Team ALS-C3 in my draft the entire time. I attacked and he would just be right there, not pulling through just getting the free ride until everyone caught back on. So for the next 10 minutes I would try various attacks. I'd hit em on the hills, I hit em over and over but nobody wanted to pull through. I finally had enough of my shadow and wanted to make him suffer, I knew my day was done so I had to fall back to "Plan B" and make people know they were in a race. Between attacks my shadow would reach down for his bottle and as soon as he would raise it to his mouth I'd attack. I did this 3 or 4 times he'd go for a drink. That alone for me was worth the entry fee. I never did get away and in the end it was my undoing but "if you want to win, you must try" - Jens Voigt.

Into the wind the teams finally came up to the front to try and control it a bit. As we made the final right turn back into the crosswind the guy in the white Mellow Johnny's kit gave it a go and I grabbed his wheel, once again we didn't get any gap so I figured I'd recover as best I could for the final sprint. As we're coming down a small hill that then starts the rollers to the finish a guy upfront swerves and 2 others lock up their brakes and start fish tailing across the road in front of me. I slow up and lose all momentum and in the sprint to try and catch back on my last match fizzled out. I rode just off the back of the pack not being able to close the gap. At the end of the day I was 32nd. I didn't have any teammates in this race, they ended up racing the straight up cat 4 race, but I like to think I set them up for the Sunday race at Pacebend. I say this because out of the top 10 in the 35+ 4/5 race most raced either the Cat 4 or the 35+ 4/5 on Sunday but only 1 guy was able to repeat in the top 10 and only 2 others were able to squeak into the top 20. Congratulations to Enrique on placing 6th in our race and 19th on Sunday.

This was by far the most fun I've had racing, yes I've had better results but to be on the offensive and being aggressive was so much more enjoyable than sitting in and playing it safe.