Monday, July 14, 2008

Trigger shy

I must be getting old or something. The past couple years after a very nasty crash, I've found I have been losing that 'in your face, aggressive' streak needed to do well in crits. I went to one of my nemesis races, the Hagertown MABRA crit championships. It's not a particularly hard course, nor are the fields really large. It's just that something always happens when we race downtown for me. One year, it was an allergy attack. Another, it was overheating. Last year, I had a guy get his bike sideways thru the sharp off-camber 2nd turn. He did manage to keep it upright which was pretty impressive to watch though it unnerved the pack behind him for the sprint. This year, I had a rider (the promoter, no less) decide he was going to move to the right going thru the left handed sweeper to set himself up for the previously mentioned off-camber left hander. I got forced into the curb and was feeling the tire rub and then our bars lock for a second. After yelling at him for a second, I got back to the matter at hand. Then the tire that rubbed the curb blew out a lap later going thru, you guessed it, the 2nd turn. I kept the bike upright but dammit I was now getting annoyed. This turn claimed about 30 people to wrecks this day. I at least escaped that fate. It seems people don't understand that if you are on a turn like this, DON'T PEDAL THRU IT! Unless you are using pedals like mine (Classic Sampson Stratics from the mid 90s), you are going to clip the road and wind up going down. After getting a wheel exchange, I jumped back in the group and tried to get settled into the pack. I'd worked my way thru the back third of the pack, when again, the race promoter almost caused another crash. Jesus, where did this guy learn to ride, the KMart school of bikeracing? Then after another close call a few laps later, I decided, I wasn't feeling that great anyway and I had a mountainbike race the next day, I called it quits. Mainly I called it quits because I was really wanting to throw an elbow on someone or run them thru a grate. Unfortunately, I know him and he's generally an ok guy. He just can't handle a bike. Beyond that, when you have thoughts like that going thru your head, it's probably best for everyone that you just pull off and go cool down. I did say something to the officials about it but they were not that receptive of even saying anything to him. Hmmm, I would say that there being a safety issue out there might cause some concern on their part. Even if it isn't anything official, they could at least say 'ummm, *****(I'll leave names out of this), there have been a couple people who've complained about your bike handling. You might want to do something about it. Thanks'. If nothing else, it might be food for thought for him. I let him know how I felt out there on the bike. Others did as well. We all want to keep it nice but if we're in the firing line, when do you stop being nice? After hanging around to watch the women's race I hit a nice BBQ resteraunt with Judd and Melanie. We all had days that could've been better, but the food was good and we got to get caught up as we hadn't seen each other since the cross season, which is coming up in 9 short weeks from now. Damn, this year is going a bit fast for me.

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