False Advertising at College Station

Ready to head back home

Last weekend was another collegiate race weekend, and although those things usually take a big bite out of my own riding time, I was kind of excited about it because the weather forecast was looking so much better than the prior weekend. Granted, it was a pretty low bar, but when I started stuffing things into my travel bag on Friday morning I was expecting dry roads and temperatures in the 50s and 60s. Winter jacket?  Naaah. Thermal knickers? It won't be cold enough for those. Basically, I brought a summer kit, and then threw in a long-sleeve jersey and wind-front base layer "just in case." I know better than that, of course. I mean, after all these years of racing I should know better than to head off on a cycling road trip in February without clothes suitable for 35-degrees and rain.

Keeping warm at the Road Race

There was another reason I should have been less optimistic. On Tuesday I'd come down with a head cold. Scratchy throat, sleepless nights, stuffed-up head. By Friday I'd been on 12-hour pseudoephedrine for three days, but since I was so certain that the weather would be dry and relatively warm, I just knew I'd be able to do at least a bit of riding on Saturday and Sunday, salvaging a bit of the weekend and perhaps keeping me from getting fatter than I already was, having already skipped rides because of the head cold. Although there were only four TU riders making the trip, they had been unable to get a Tulane minivan from the motor pool, so Dustin and I were taking personal cars instead. I'd have one person and four bikes, while Dustin would have the other two bikes and riders. We hit the road around 2 pm on Friday for the long drive to Texas A&M at College Station. The drive was marred by a lot of traffic and a fair amount of road construction, but we still arrived at a pretty reasonable hour.

Cold and wet Time Trial riders

Early Saturday morning, after not sleeping very much, I stumbled in the dark over to the Super-8 motel window, pushed aside the curtain, and thought, "Crap." It was raining, and the temperature was in the 30s, all of which was entirely different than what Weather.com had led us to believe twenty-four hours earlier. It looked like the actual rain would end in time for the 8 am Time Trial, but they weren't offering much hope as far as the temperature went. It was going to be cold and wet all day, and, being only partially recovered from a head cold, there was no way I'd be getting on the bike that day. I hadn't even brought much in the way of warm non-cycling clothes with me, so I layered-up with what I had, and pulled the rain jacket out of my commuting bag for good measure.

Gavin ready to go for the TT

The Time Trial was the same as it had been in earlier years, a 10 km one-way affair at 30-second intervals with absolutely no course control. I don't know how they get away with doing this sort of thing over in Texas without having at least a couple of police cars around. Anyway, it was clear that I wasn't the only one who had been led astray by weather.com's false advertising. All of the riders were clearly improvising in one way or the other, although in some cases they were just wearing their skinsuits and freezing. At any rate, the TT went fine. Gavin, competing as a Cat. A for the first time, was 5th out of 19 with a solid time. Kaitlyn and Julia, competing in Cat. B, went first and second. only 9 seconds apart, and both faster than the 2nd place Cat. A woman. Julie finished 7th in the Women C.

Cat. B Women on the line

By the time the afternoon criteriums started on the A&M campus the roads were reasonably dry, but the temperature was practically unchanged. Riders were wearing everything from summer kit to full tights and jackets. As seems to be typical at collegiate races, they completely changed up the races and start times on the spot, with the result that the B and C women would be riding together. At least this was better than what was posted on the original flyer, which showed one criterium starting 5 minutes after the next. Julia and Kaitlyn were primed for this race, and after Julia put some pressure on the field early in the race, it wasn't long before Kaitlyn rode off the front of the group.

Kaitlyn attacks, Julia creates a gap - teamwork

That quickly split the pack and Julia tucked herself into a small 4-rider chase group where she could bide her time while the others tried in vain to close the gap to Kaitlyn, who somehow managed to stay out there all the way to the end, raising her hands as she crossed what she thought was the non-existent finish line where there was a Bike Barn flag. The actual finish was about thirty feet farther, but it didn't really matter. When Julia's group sprinted, Julia also sat up at the flag rather than the finish line, which was actually just a seam in the road with traffic cones on either end. I don't think that mattered, but she was definitely disappointed to finish 3rd instead of winning the pack sprint. Julie finished 9th in the C category. It felt good to get back in the car with the heater on, I must say.

Pensive Gavin

So Sunday morning it was still cloudy, but at least the temperature was up into the low 50s. I was feeling better than I had the day before and decided that I'd pile on some extra clothes to avoid getting chilled and pull the bike out to see if I could get in some easy to moderate miles without risking pneumonia. Confirming rumors from the prior day, the road course had been modified and shortened to cut out the advertised gravel section because just the day before the county had laid down a nice new thick layer of new and essentially unrideable gravel. I'm sure some were disappointed by this development. I wasn't one of them.

Cat. A RR Field

First off were the A men with Gavin. Dustin was tagging along at the back of that one. I waited until they started, then got my bike together, and jumped in behind them when they came around at the end of the 2nd 6-mile lap. I was still pretty concerned about stressing my compromised lungs, so the first time the pace kicked up into the 30s I eased off the back, stopping at the end of the lap to re-assess before continuing. I was wearing my thick commuting vest over a long-sleeve jersey and wind-front base layer, so despite the bare legs I was pretty warm and ended up with the vest mostly un-zipped and functioning like a parachute. I stopped again at the start before resuming when the breakaway came by, and then dropping off from them to wait for what was left of the field that included Gavin, and riding with them before stopping with one lap to go so I could see the finish. Gavin looked pretty well-toasted but still sprinted and finished 10th out of 21, which was pretty good for his first Cat. A road race.

Flying Feedzone Water Bottle

Next up were the women, and by then I was feeling a little more confident that I could make a few efforts without doing too much lung damage. Dustin and I started behind the B women, who were mixed in with the Cat. C men, which is really never a good thing but almost always happens with collegiate around here.  This race was obviously slower and shorter, so Dustin and I sat at the back for all but the final lap. They were probably only half-way through when the pack split with Julia and Kaitlyn unfortunately on the wrong side of the split. We didn't really know how many of the B women were in the lead group, which fairly quickly disappeared into the distance, and since we couldn't really engage in any coaching under the circumstances we couldn't ride up to Kaitlyn or Julia to ask. Well apparently there must not have been any B women up there because in the end Kaitlyn won the pack sprint with Julia 2nd, which is how the final results were posted.

Right after the women finished we loaded up the cars and headed out for food before hitting the road for home. Julie, who was in the car with me, was having intestinal problems from something she ate at lunch the whole way back. Luckily I had some kind of medicine to help with that in my first aid kit. By the time we left the sun was coming out and it was much warmer, but a few hours later we found ourselves driving through the same chilly wet weather we'd had on Saturday. Still, the drive back seemed a bit smoother and I was probably back home by 9:30 or so. All-in-all I was really happy that I'd been able to get in 50 miles or so without feeling like I'd done any significant lung damage.