http://bit.ly/16Xq7hk

Race weekend started at 6am Saturday morning for me as we pulled away from home and started the long 4+ hour drive to Galena. The horror stories about a couple of the climbs on the road race course was on my mind the entire trip up. This was a race I was trying to peak for in my training so I was pretty pumped to get started.

When we arrived in Galena it was still a couple of hours away from the start time for the road race. Joe, Ryan, and myself used that time to do a little pre-ride on the start and the end of the course. After spending a little while warming up we settled in down by the start line and waited for our 1:20 start time.

It was finally race time, and as per usual with road races there was a neutral start to get us out of town and on to the country roads. The neutral start took us about 2 miles into the course. One weird thing was having a decent sized climb during the neutral start, right off the bat the field was getting broken up and it was hard to keep everyone together. Finally as the neutral start ended the pace picked up to a pretty good clip. This race was hammer time right from the get go, a stark contrast to what I experienced in Hillsboro. I’d attribute it to the fact that everyone is in mid-season shape right now as opposed to late March where nobody wanted to go hard unless they had to. The group stayed together for the most part through the first half of the race. It wasn’t until we hit the big climb about 14 miles in that the group was split up for good. This climb was a good one, a 20% grade at one point near the top. I broke away with about 10 other riders in the front, after the climb a few break away attempts were made, but immediately chased down (including my own). As we got within a couple miles of the finish I could tell that the race had taken a toll on a few of the guys in the pack and tried to push the pace up to see who would drop off. We wound up shaking off a couple more riders right before we got back into town. I had a lead out going into the final turn with about 200 meters to go and a few riders right on my tail. I wound up being out sprinted by the 1st place finisher, and another guy just barely squeaked in front of me by half a wheel at the finish. 3rd place would be where I would end up, which was a little bittersweet after being out front with 200 meters to go.

All in all about 1500-1600 feet of climbing over 22 miles with a pace of about 20.7 mph. Here’s a link to the strava data from my race.
http://app.strava.com/activities/59116044

Jeff Turner

On Saturday, June 1, I raced the inaugural Toughman Indiana Half, a 70.3 mile, half-iron distance triathlon (http://www.americamultisport.com/toughman-half). The venue was in Richmond, Indiana, just a few miles from the Ohio line. The morning weather looked ominous. We were under a tornado watch until 5:30. Heavy storm clouds rolled in around 6:15 and dropped heavy rainfall for about 15 minutes, but it mostly blew over by the 7 am race start, save for an occasional spell of light rain. The conditions were excellent for racing.

The water temperature in the Middle Fork Reservoir was 73 degrees - cold enough for performance-enhancing wetsuits. An elite wave of about 10 overall contenders started with a cannon blast and the rest of us lined up for a time-trial start. I settled into a comfortable rhythm on the 1.2 mile swim and exited the water in just under 31 minutes, besting my only other half-iron swim by over 6 minutes. (partial swim profile at http://app.strava.com/activities/57581012 - Garmin lost the satellite signal early on.)

The bike and run courses each consisted of 2 loops and both started with a couple of long, but gentle climbs. The rest of the course was undulating, but had no serious hills. I kept close tabs on power and heart rate to dose my effort on the bike, and used gearing between 39-13 and 53-11 to “flatten the course.” My splits for each loop were within 4 seconds of each other! (bike profile: http://app.strava.com/activities/57581333) In a first in 6 years of racing, I even passed an Amish buggy.

The 2-loop run course started with the same climbs as the bike course for the first 2 miles, then turned onto a beautiful, shaded multi-use trail that followed a small stream. I took it easy on the first loop. The youngest racer, a 15-year old who posted the top swim split (with no wetsuit), passed me on the first hill. I thought, “either this kid is a prodigy, or I will be seeing more of him.” I passed him back on the same hill, 6 miles later. The sun came out on my second lap and it started to warm up, but I felt strong and pushed the pace to the finish. (run profile: http://app.strava.com/activities/57581019)

I finished in 4:53:10, a personal best by just over 17 minutes. I was 10th overall and 5th on the bike. (results: http://tinyurl.com/n2g2ql6) The overall winner posted a very impressive 4:22, with the rest of the field bunched up well in arrears. Unfortunately, 3 of the 9 athletes that beat me were in my age group, so I placed just off the podium. There are a lot of tough middle-aged racers out there.

Ron Hoyne:

I raced in the Thunder in the Valley Olympic Distance Triathlon (800K swim/40K bike/5.0 mile run) in Terre Haute, IN.  I finished 40th out of 136 overall and 3rd out of 10 in my age group with a time of 2:01.46.  I was seventh after the swim (8:17), 20th after the no draft bike leg (24.8 miles @ 21.6 mph) and 40th after the 5.0 mile run (40:42).  The 25 year old professional winner completed the race in 1:39.02.  I was rocking the Wildcard colors and will forward a picture if any show up on the race website.

Aaron Higley:

Black partridge,Mountain bike
I started off strong as I went into the woods 4th wheel with Jason Rassi and Aaron fader.  I went to grab a bottle off my water feeder and I realized it had fallen over. With 90 Degree temperatures and no water I started to cramp up. Finished 7th in Cat 1.

Scott Dahman:

The beginning of the 2013 May Madness Sprint Triathlon at Lake Sara was chaos. 84 participants started the swim in a single wave. I was badly positioned as I heeded the starter’s instruction to stay on the beach. A lot of other athletes waded into the water before the starting siren. I spent the first half of the 400m swim just trying to find open space and avoid kicks to the face. I often like to draft at the start of the race, but I was surrounded mostly by slower swimmers and received little benefit. I probably should have lined up to the outside of the first turn to reduce the commotion, but I was a little rusty on tactics as this was my first race of the season. I was in the clear, but out of breath after about 200m. I exited the water in 7th place, but was passed just as I crossed the transition mat. It was a slow swim compared to past performances, but not a disaster.

As I started the bike, I did not know how many people were ahead of me. I passed a few in the early going, including two that were in my age group. Approaching the turnaround of the 13-mile out-and-back course, I counted 4 riders ahead. I passed the leader 1/2 mile before the turnaround, meaning he was a full mile ahead of me on the course. I caught 2 more riders on the way back into a gentle headwind, so I knew that I was on the podium if I could avoid getting passed on the run.

As I headed onto the 5k run, the last guy I passed on the bike was entering the transition. (It was the same guy that pipped me into the first transition.) I kept my eye on him as I ran around the “circle of death” loop that begins the mostly out-and-back course. As I rounded the corner onto Beach Road, I could see the 2nd place runner ahead. The leader was long gone. After the first mile, the landscape opens up, allowing a view across most of the next mile. I tried closing the gap to 2nd place, but it seemed to grow slowly with each step. At the turnaround, it seemed that the guy in 4th was closing. Would he keep accelerating in the second half? Would he run out of road before he caught me? Would he blow up? Would I blow up? I seemed to hold a steady pace through the finish and peeked over my shoulder as I approached the last 400m. No one was in sight and I cruised to a 3rd place finish. (Full results: http://www.cuttingedgeevents.net/results/MAY%202013/May_Madness_OA.htm) I also managed 2nd in the bike split, trailing only the overall race winner.

John Betenia raced the MATS series at Kankakee, results have not been posted yet.

Great job all.

While the criterion racers are busy in Champaign-Urbana, the ultra racers are not holding back.  Paul Dunklau, Martin and Jay headed east on Friday night.  Temperatures were nice, but Calvin’s Challenge 2013 was a tough loop on the south and east stretches, with 16-20 mph winds blowing all day.  About 200 racers reported to the start line at 7:30 AM, including favorite Collin Johnson, who wields a dangerous combination of youthful acceleration and mature stamina.  Within minutes, the pattern of accelerate-decelerate whittled the race from 200 to a lead group of 6, including Jay and Martin.  Paul wisely chose to find another group to ride a more sustainable pace.  After 140 miles of acceleration-cruising, usually pushed by Collin at an average of 23 mph, Martin had enough and dropped to his own pace: even a pull from a friendly recumbent in the lead group was not enough to keep up.  After 180 miles, Jay did the same.  In the meantime, Paul was working steadily with various groups, but many were too slow for him and he rode alone quite a bit.  Jay was riding a strong and steady pace, and would eventually come within 3 miles of Collin, who got a bit tired from his own devices at the end of the race!

The usual little mishaps occurred during the race: Jay forgot to restock his water bottles for one 50 mile loop.  Fortunately, Collin had a spare, and ultra-etiquette was to go into a neutral roll while Jay refilled at the aid station.  Both Martin and Paul wasted about 10 minutes missing a turn while laboring alone in the wind.  Towards the end of the race, while Martin and Jay were zipping around the shorter loop, Martin rode over a discarded swiss army knife blade that cut his tire in half and embedded itself 1” into the rim.  Fortunately, extraction of the blade and replacement of a new tire took only 20 minutes because Calvin’s has a neutral support crew that got to work on the wheel.

In the end, Paul and everyone in the lead group (including the recumbent and another strong young racer in 20-25) won first place in their age group: Collin at 258 miles (overall win), Jay at 255 miles, Martin at 234 miles, and Paul at 212 miles.  Jay came in 2nd, and Martin 4th among the standard frame riders (the race also had HPVs, recumbents and even high wheelers in it).

Photo: From left to right: The 1st place 40-44, first place 25-29 and overall, 1st place 45-49 and first place 15-19 winners.

The Sylvan Island race in Moline, IL was yesterday. Unlike last year the trail conditions were nearly perfect. There was lots of tough competition at this race because it was combined with the Iowa series=lots of very fast and very skilled riders! Aaron took 12th, I took 8th. Both raced cat 1. We both had great races.  I could not have ridden any faster or better--29er was awesome!! I think Aaron feels the same although was not happy with his tire choice in the relatively dry conditions.