Ah, the sweet taste of victory.
Really and truly there is nothing like it. Robbie McKewen, when asked what motivates him now that he's won three Green Jerseys in the Tour, and who has been a pro sprinter for ten years + , did not hesitate - "I still love winning, it never gets old".
I can understand why. Last night I nipped out to Midweek for the first time since last July, did the short, early race of 25 laps, and won it. It felt very nice, very nice indeed. Even though it was only the early race and early in the year to boot, it was a huge boost to the ego as I've never won there before in say, twenty races over the course of a couple of different seasons - about half of them the late race, i.e., elite.
It was criterium racing near its lamest, I admit. I think they skipped laps 10 and 8 just to get the whole thing done in the alotted 30 minutes, that's how tortoise it was. Its the same old same old: nobody wants to work off the front, and any breakaway attempt fails instantly, and anyone left at the front refuses to work at all so a 30 minute race seems to get progressively slower, all in anticipation of the final lap where carefully conserved energies will be spent of a sudden.
What this ultra-conservative racing strategy lead to last night was... a minor disaster. A fattish middle-aged guy in Brampton Cycle Club shorts, who I had spent the race keeping a close eye on (he was whipping the bike side to side for the most minor accelerations), started his sprint and cut off another guy hitting him and sending both down. I had a front row seat for guy number two, at 40 km/hour, as he flew head-first over handlebars, his bike jackknifing sideways, so that I was just able to avoid its back wheel. Then I decided to take leave of them all and bolted to victory unaccompanied as the other racers who'd had position ahead of me post-crash simply faded away.
They gave me #404 for the season. I love that - reads the same in either direction and reminds my of my number when I was in Little League.
I look forward to moving to the faster, safer late race.
Really and truly there is nothing like it. Robbie McKewen, when asked what motivates him now that he's won three Green Jerseys in the Tour, and who has been a pro sprinter for ten years + , did not hesitate - "I still love winning, it never gets old".
I can understand why. Last night I nipped out to Midweek for the first time since last July, did the short, early race of 25 laps, and won it. It felt very nice, very nice indeed. Even though it was only the early race and early in the year to boot, it was a huge boost to the ego as I've never won there before in say, twenty races over the course of a couple of different seasons - about half of them the late race, i.e., elite.
It was criterium racing near its lamest, I admit. I think they skipped laps 10 and 8 just to get the whole thing done in the alotted 30 minutes, that's how tortoise it was. Its the same old same old: nobody wants to work off the front, and any breakaway attempt fails instantly, and anyone left at the front refuses to work at all so a 30 minute race seems to get progressively slower, all in anticipation of the final lap where carefully conserved energies will be spent of a sudden.
What this ultra-conservative racing strategy lead to last night was... a minor disaster. A fattish middle-aged guy in Brampton Cycle Club shorts, who I had spent the race keeping a close eye on (he was whipping the bike side to side for the most minor accelerations), started his sprint and cut off another guy hitting him and sending both down. I had a front row seat for guy number two, at 40 km/hour, as he flew head-first over handlebars, his bike jackknifing sideways, so that I was just able to avoid its back wheel. Then I decided to take leave of them all and bolted to victory unaccompanied as the other racers who'd had position ahead of me post-crash simply faded away.
They gave me #404 for the season. I love that - reads the same in either direction and reminds my of my number when I was in Little League.
I look forward to moving to the faster, safer late race.
2 comments:
last year I had 88 for the season - I loved it, since it was impossible to pin upside down.
'88', one of the great numbers ever invented.
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