Chris Thater Race Report

The Chris Thater is a big deal, National Race Calendar criterium in Binghamton, NY and for me always seems to mark the culmination of a racing season. To that end, I trained extensively for the high-power output efforts necessary in a hard criterium. In the 27 days leading up to the race, I took one 50 mile tempo ride and two easy to moderate spins of about 30 miles each on my road bike and rode my mountain bike about ten times with groups of small kids. When it came time to race, man, did I ever reap the fruits of my training program! (They were mealy and tasteless.)

I woke up that Sunday morning early but not quite early enough. It was starting to spit rain as I bolted out the door. Once on the road, I realized that, even if I sped between state trooper radar traps, I'd reach the racecourse with about twenty-five minutes to go before the race. The rain was alternating between sprinkles and moderate showers when I arrived. I quickly threw the bike together, tossed a helmet on my head, said a quick hello to my dad who'd come to watch, and took off for registration. It was great to have my dad there, but I felt bad knowing that he'd driven half an hour, early on a Sunday morning to, unknowingly to him, watch me have a very mediocre performance in a rain-soaked race.

I signed in quickly, and then got dressed with enough time for a couple warm-up laps. Usually I like to warm up for crits with about 40 minutes on the trainer, so I knew I was in for some pain right off the get-go. I picked a nice place center front, said hello to some guys I knew, and waited in the rain for the starting whistle. Starts in crits can be a little hairy. Everyone takes off like a rocket to be the first to the first corner, and you don't want to be behind the guy who can't get his foot in the pedal. Worse yet, you don't want to be the guy fumbling to clip in while everyone else disappears down the road. I've learned over the years to just stomp on the pedal and take a few revolutions to get up to speed before worrying about clipping in. Today, a good start would be especially important. When the roads are soaked, it's nice to have a few corners at the front to settle in without a big group around. The slide-outs always seem to happen early before guys get a feel for the available traction, and I knew the strong boys in the bunch would be pushing hard just to thin out the pack for safety. I got lucky with my stomp and clipped right in and found myself leading into the first corner and up the hill. The PT read 500+ watts and no one wanted to go any faster, so I was first into the first two corners before I let off the gas a little and let myself drift back a few places.

I could see guys' rear tires sliding a little in the corners and I could feel mine doing the same. We started the hill on lap two and I glanced back to see the peloton stretched way out with lots of little gaps already. By lap three, the gaps were becoming significant, and I was beginning to suffer some, my excellent month of training starting to show.

I switched over to survival mode pretty quickly. The prime laps were tough on the hill, and I didn't feel comfortable in the corners, so I was always chasing hard after turns. My brain just wouldn't let me hang it all out on the wet corners in the last race of my season in a race I had little hope of placing in.

A few more laps into the race, a guy rode past and told a teammate of his that he'd been in a crash. It appeared to be pretty minor, but combined with the wet roads and the efforts to thin the herd, it broke up the peloton very quickly. A third into the race, we were down to about 20 guys of the original 50.

I hung on to the back of the little pack until about 8 to go, when I finally got gapped for good coming out of the last turn. There are two little manhole covers there plus some crosswalk paint, and I was probably being overly cautious there. My trepidation through that corner finally took its toll and I couldn't get back on after a surge.

After a couple more laps alone, the ref signaled to me that I'd been pulled. I waved and departed the course to join a couple of my teammates who'd been pulled earlier to watch two other teammates take a solo second place and ninth. Officially, I ended up in 19th place, four places out of the money. It's been several years since I've been pulled at any race. It's not a terrible feeling. It's a bit disappointing, but it ends the hurt early and since I knew I didn't train at all for the race, getting pulled was not a surprise. I thought fondly for a moment of my glory days of getting 5th at Thater in 2002 and winning seventy bucks and a watch, congratulated my teammates, then headed back to the car for some warm, dry clothes.

My dad suggested he buy me breakfast at Denny's and although I'd eaten already, I agreed to join him at least for a cup of coffee. As I arrived in the Denny's parking lot, my dad was still in his car and drove up alongside.

"You can't even get in the door!" he said, shaking his head. My dad's not the kind to sit and wait for a table for more than ten minutes, so he wanted to try the Ponderosa down the street for breakfast. I followed.

There was absolutely no line at Ponderosa, so we entered. The only breakfast item though was the "breakfast buffet" which cost seven bucks. With coffee, the total was around $18. I felt guilty at this point and decided to try to make a good show of eating some food even though I wasn't hungry.

We filled our plates, more or less, and the waitress filled our coffee cups with a mysterious just-off-clear liquid. It smelled and tasted vaguely like coffee, but looked like maybe they'd made this batch from the fourth run through a single batch of grounds. The food was nasty, and I picked at it and kept my opinions about it to myself.

Just a few bites into the meal, my dad said, "These pancakes are terrible. And look at this sausage!"

So we had a little lesson about what the length of wait to get into a restaurant might indicate about the food. Otherwise, it was fun talking about guy stuff like him patching up the old house with new shingles and me trying to get rid of a bee infestation. We topped it off with a quick stop at Lowes (for some more shingles) and then I headed to my mom's place for a visit, glad to be inside in the now pouring rain while the runners ran and the pros rode back at the Chris Thater course. It was very nice to be done racing by 8:45 in the morning with a full day of doing something else ahead of me.

With my mind shifted away from road racing, I'll be hitting the singletrack more now, and turning my attention to more home projects and maintenance fitness. I have to replace some windows, seal and re-caulk a shower, weed and prepare the garden for fall and winter, and paint a couple rooms. We're also looking to buy a used, beater pick-up truck - something we can haul big stuff in and something I can drive in the winter so the Audi can stay nice and snug and rust-free inside the barn during the cold, salty, winter months. With her quattro footing, she loves to go out and play in fresh powder, but daily driving on salty, slushy roads makes her feel itchy all over.

By the way, the very cool poster in the above picture is straight from France. My brother-in-law, Mark, was in France during the time of the 2005 Tour and passed through a town a little while after the Tour had gone through. Some street workers (not to be confused with "street workers") were ripping down the promotional posters and he asked for it, folded it into his backpack, brought it home and gave it to us. We had it mounted (they did a great job - the creases and staple marks are only slightly visible) and the colors go perfectly in our dining room.

See you on the trail!