Ravensdale Cumberland Road Race (87 miles)

By Galen Erickson,

Attending from the Gin Optics Cycling team were Colin, Dux, JOD, Jamie, Ian and I. This was the second to last Washington Cup race with Jamie leading Dave Richter by 85 points. Ideally Jamie would gain some points on Richter but in the least, we wanted to make sure Righter didn’t gain any on Jamie.
The race began with a blistering attack by Ian. Jamie countered and strung out the pack further. Riders pummeled themselves to catch Jamie and as they did Ian countered. He got a nice little gap off the front with a few others. But the pack was still hungry, a couple tried to bridge then a few more, then the pack was chasing them down hard.
I felt a sigh of relief as we caught them and the pace slowed up. I was getting pretty worked just trying to hang in as others chased and it was nice to have the speed drop below 30. But I figured if I was feeling worked so was everybody else so it would actually be a good time to get away. I decided to do a Stangeland signature, seated acceleration and it worked like a charm.
It’s funny how so much of racing is instinct. I guess it has to be when you are riding so hard that your brain get’s depleted of all oxygen. When riders see someone standing up attacking, they attack too. But when someone is just sitting down moving up, that knee jerk reaction is not triggered.
So I rolled off the front and settled into a steady grind. Within a mile I was joined by three others, Mike Hone, Dan Mensher (Ian’s brother on the Gentle Lovers team) and Trevor from the Valley; all strong riders. I figured this break was good. We rotated for a while but when our gap was staying well below one minute we switched to doing 30 second pulls, team time trial style. Drilling it like so we pushed our gap up a little over a minute where it would stay for the next 50 or so miles.
At about 20 miles to go the lead care informed us that there was a chase of two coming up to us. I was pretty sure that if two people got away from the pack that one of them would be a teammate. I considered sitting in and waiting for them, but I could not be sure, so I continued to rotate through. A few miles later we dropped Trevor. Shortly thereafter I looked back and could make out two light colored Jerseys. One of them had to by Gin. I looked again and saw the arms of one of the riders waving at me. It was Gin. So I sat in and told the others that it was my team chasing.
Sure enough, it was Ian with Patrick Stanko. Apparently they had been pulling for a while and, as we would hear when the race was over, Jamie was solo chasing the two of them but couldn’t quite catch them. Number one item on the team grocery list: Race Radios.
Once Ian and Stanko had caught us we settled into a rhythm again to make sure we kept our lead over the pack. But I soon ran out of food, then water, then, at about 7 miles to go, my legs began to cramp. I sat out a couple of rotations. I asked Ian if he had any extra food or water. He gave me a chocolate Agave gel and some water. That helped a little but my legs were not getting any less tired.
With two of us in the break, it made sense for us to do the attacking. As we approached the hard left turn at about five miles to go all other’s stopped pulling through. Ian looked over at me, “Are you ready?” I nodded. I cruised through the corner and as always happens when I am riding my Challenge tires, I carved the turn faster than most everybody else. I had a little gap so I figured I would get these attacks started and punched it up the short hill.
Just as I crested it I was caught by Mike with Ian on his wheel. I jumped onto Ian’s wheel and tried to rest a little. The pace slowed, and Dan and Stanko caught back on. Ian attacked. The others chased, I sat in. We caught Ian. My legs, at this point, were on the fine line between mushy uselessness and contorted cramps but there were two of us in the break and the others were probably tired too; so I attacked. Either they would tire themselves out working to catch me while Ian could sit in or they would decide that they didn’t want to pull Ian to the line and let me go. So I went and it hurt.
I stayed off the front for a few miles as tears began to form in the corners of my eyes. The others were not going to let me get away and they worked together to reel me in. As they caught me, Mike attacked. Ian jumped onto his wheel. I let them go. Stanko powered forward and I got on his wheel. We dropped Dan Mensher. Stanko and I caught Ian and Mike just as we approached the turn for the uphill finish at one Kilometer to go.
As I knew I could take the corner faster than anyone else, I went ahead and attacked in the corner and got a good little gap. It is quite possible I went a little too hard at the base of a one Kilometer climb because my legs filled with lactic pretty quick. I soon saw Hone ride by with Ian close behind. Apparently as I attacked, Stanko came by Ian as he was accelerating, they crossed wheels and Ian almost went down. He had to clip out both feet but stayed upright. Clipping back in, he hit the throttle and caught Hone who was charging ahead but the surge at the beginning of the climb loaded his legs as well. Mike Hone, who was pedaling smooth and hard, pulled away for the win. I caught Ian and the two of us rolled in second and third followed by Stanko and Dan Mensher.
The next group to hit the base of the climb included Richter, Ongars (first race back?) and Jamie. There must have been some kind of demons at the base of that climb because, at the same place were Ian almost Went down, Jamie Dropped his chain. Dave and Shawn rolled in one after another with Jamie a ways back looking a little pissed off as he crossed the line. Dave, in the end, would make a couple points on Jamie. Colin and JOD would roll in shortly thereafter in the small finishing group (about a third of the pack did not finish).
All in all, it was a strong performance by the Gin Optics Cycling Team. With a few radios we might have been able to have three men in the winning break. But still, we raced a good race and, in my opinion, stepped up the caliber of racing in the northwest.