1989. A 3rds and juniors road race (see my earlier post about this – no 4th cat then, everyone restricted to 52 x 15 gears..) in Dorset. Last lap. Approaching the final two hills…well, more like  lumps really. The zenith of a much younger Blackcat’s cycling career…. A flurry of attacks – Bang, Bang, Bang and three riders are away, one having gone and been caught, a counter-attack by another, then the original rider bridging up with his rival glued to his wheel. And I’m at the front (you should always be near the front…) …and I have no-one with me from my club…and I know I have good legs…..and I’m “mayking the calculaytion” as Sean Kelly  would say ….and wondering “should I try to go with them?”.

GO ON! I hear you cry…in these situations he who hesitates is lost! Some background, though. The three riders in front are all juniors and between them have won pretty much everything in the south during the season. One will go on to become National Junior Road Race Champion. They are all very fast indeed. This weighs on my mind as I wonder whether to keep my powder dry and wait for the sprint….I once actually got a 7th place in a road race that finished on the same hill. Or a similar hill. Anyway, I passed a lot of people.. apart from the 6 in front of me. We slow for a left turn before a small hill and no-one is chasing. Someone will go soon, surely……but no-one does so I slam it in the (ahem) 15 and “hit it flat stick”!

A gap!! I have a gap!! I know this because I keep looking behind me!!! An aside here – never do this in a race. Attack hard, settle into it and then look under your arm/through your legs but don’t ever, ever look over your shoulder. It’s un-aerodynamic, uncool and very unsafe as you will probably veer off into a ditch. I know. I’ve done it. It’s difficult to convince people of your cycle coaching credentials when this happens. You look like a berk.

So – off I go, head down and no-one is chasing me! I’m really shifting and all I can think about is 4th!! I want 4th!! I don’t care about winning, I can’t beat those guys, I just want to beat the bunch!! And I’ll get 2 points!!! Then…I round the corner and see them, not far off. OK – I’m committed, if I catch them I might be able to sit on and still get 4th!! And I’m closing on them!! Yes, closing!! They’re getting closer!! That’s because…..they’re sitting up looking at each other. What are they doing…..? Then I’m on them and the adrenaline goes “psssssst” out of me and I’m gasping for breath, legs burning. They glance at me, mouths closed, no expressions. Then the one who would go on to be National Junior Road Race Champion goes BANG and they are all gone. Me too!   But rather than Bang,  I go “phut”, and backwards,  and the entire bunch passes me as we start the final hill……..all of them. Dead last.

They had  been, for want of a better phrase, just p***ing around with each other. I hadn’t “caught” them. I had just happened to stumble upon them playing cat and mouse. As someone who I respect very much once said – “you made your move, then the real move went”. Since then….I’ve got points, gone up a category (well, back up to 3rd!!) and had some unsuccessful breakaways but that 1989 race was the one where I dared to believe in myself…even if it didn’t quite work out. For that reason (unless I suddenly get a lot fitter) I would classify it as the zenith of my cycling career. And the main reason for the description is that it was so exhilarating! Being very tired but completely wired at the same time, responding to a primal urge to attack, being alone on the road and smelling a (sort of) victory. Every cycling fan  wants to win a road race – and the best way  to do it, the most emphatic way, is on your own. No bunch, no breakaway group, just you. And if you can’t do that? Well, in the company of others who are better than you. If you beat them in the sprint by playing crafty then they have only themselves to blame…..

A long time since my last post and a lot has happened since then….but now the cycling season (we are a broad church – and this encompasses TT’s, sportives, charity rides, mtb events and road racing) is well and truly upon us. So- time to reflect on another race…maybe your first road race of the season? Of your cycling career? Some words of advice then…..

Road racing requires you to hurt yourself. Racing isn’t easy, only when everything comes together beautifully – and even then it isn’t really easy, you still suffer, but smoothly. So, as racing isn’t easy then, of course, neither should training be. If your training is all at 18mph and you do a race where you must do 30mph for short (or long!) bursts then there will be an inevitable disconnect between your ability and the demands being thrust upon you…..and if, at the other end of the scale, you can happily sit in a bunch at 26 mph but can’t break away at 28 then you are going to have to sprint….and it never ceases to surprise me how little time riders spend on this aspect of training, considering that it is the most likely scenario for the finish in the lower category (and therefore the majority of) road races.

The same year as my “zenith” race, I watched a road race where three riders from a local club broke away together and won convincingly. Rider 1 was a superb time triallist, rider 2 one of the riders I “caught” in the race described earlier, and rider 3 was a veteran who was very talented but was below his companion’s levels. Rider 3 saw riders 1 and 2 escape: he then turned himself inside out to cross the gap to them, and pretty much continued turning himself inside out just trying to stay with them…he finished 3rd. He was, as I say, very talented and had been a Divisional Road Race Champion as a junior. I congratulated him at the end and asked him how it had all happened. He was visibly exhausted, and the words he told me that day I have repeated to any rider who wants to start racing: “Road racing is basically 2-3 race winning sprints -could be to get over to a break, make a break yourself, or just hang on to the bunch. Whatever the outcome is going to be, unless you are prepared to commit to that level of effort – 100% – during the race, then you will not have the outcome you want.” This, of course, has since been couched in other terms – spending pennies, burning matches – but the advice remains every bit as valid.

Training tips then: road racing is basically a series of max intervals from 4s to 4-6 mins (if you’re really unlucky and have a successful breakaway then longer…Ok I mean lucky, I’m just thinking of the pain and blackness an all out, trying to get away effort entails..) and then a load of very unpleasant around threshold or just above efforts. In short, it isn’t a 2 x 20 FTP session, though this will help you overall.  So your training should include varied sessions where this happens. And specific sessions where you “plug gaps” . An example of this might be a classic pyramid training session where you go from 1-3 minutes with a steadily decreasing rest period – all reps at max. Or a 40/20 session, with long sprints followed by only very short rest periods…but, at the risk of offending other coaches and those who believe all sessions should target a separate energy system, a ride out with 3 or 4 others who are hopefully a bit better at some things (hills/sprints) than you are, and a bit worse at other things (going downhill,/riding in the wind) than you are, over 2-3 hours with some KoM points, some sprints and some putting each other under pressure parts, is a great workout. No mates? They’re all up the road, winning the nationals? Then try a Z3 starter for 20 mins, some 4-8min threshold reps with short rests, back to Z2 15 mins , some more Z3 (Sweetspot now) for 10:00, then put in some 15-40s 90% sprints over varying terrain (like a road race where you’re tired and closing gaps) with short recoveries, ride Z3 for 5 mins again and then empty your tank in Z4/5 and finish with a sprint.  That is, pretty much, the story of the 50K “zenith” road race of my  youth….I hope you get the jump on them.

Speaking of “them” – winner as far as I recall that day was Mark Armstrong from VC St Raphael/Waite Contracts. He used to come over from the Isle of Wight and murder everyone in the junior road races, and it was he who went on to win the National Junior Road Race Championships (Year? May have been 1989, maybe 1990). Very talented and, from what I can remember, a very nice chap. The picture is courtesy of Mick Waite, the man behind VC St Raphael and promoter of the Perf’s Pedal race – a prestigious early season road race who’s past winners is like a who’s who of cycle racing in the UK……and the sponsor of BlackCat rider David Billings (pictured at the top of this post) who is as aggressive a racer as you are likely to meet and who certainly wouldn’t have hung about waiting for the other guys to make a move, were he to have crossed the gap to them all those years ago…in fact, were he to have crossed the gap I would have been on his wheel and saved a load of energy, then I would have jumped, destroying them all on the 15….etc etc etc….

David has had a great winter, moving back up to 2nd cat with a win on the way, had a beginning of season break to get married and go on honeymoon, and is now back in the racing groove and looking for wins. The words below are his account of his last win at Odd Down and, in my opinion, really give an insight into the effort level and mindset needed to win a race. The win came on the second day of a weekend of winter racing, the purpose of which was to amass enough points to make it back to 2nd cat after mid-season illness:

“Saturday 28th Dec

Preston Park track – 3rds race

I started the long drive to Brighton, my target today was the 3rd Cat race followed by an E/1/2/3. I had planned to win the 3rd cat race and just use the E/1/2/3 for training as the turnout this time of year is low so I could at least guarantee some points from the second race. I’ve been working with Tim to focus on my top end early this year so I could regain my 2nd category licence before the season starts proper so I was feeling in good shape although a hilly 85 mile ride 2 days before meant my legs felt a little heavy.

I decided to forego my usual warm up and just go 5-10 minutes around the circuit to get the legs spinning safe in the knowledge that I could get another 5-10 minutes in the bunch before I started to race proper.

There was another racer who’d been in the break 2 weeks before with me and he asked me if I wanted to try something so I already had a breakaway partner before things kicked off. The race started quite slowly. I put in a little dig after a few minutes to see what the bench were feeling like and to finish off my warm up. The bunch closed me down after 20-30 seconds as expected.

After 10 or so minutes and a few digs by various people Johnny (the previous weeks breakaway partner) put in a dig and I went with him, we had a 3rd rider come with us also. I quickly got things organised and we started to take 1/2 lap turns on the front. We were working well and I was feeling strong, having blown the cobwebs off from the long ride a few days before. It took us about 15 or so minutes to almost lap the bunch, the other two were fading but I still had legs so I put in a big effort for a lap and closed the rest of the gap as the bunch had given up. I knew Johnny was a better sprinter than me so I tried to attack off the front again 4-5 times but Johnny stuck to my wheel like glue. I wasn’t going anywhere!

We got to the last few laps and Johnny was still on my wheel. I knew he would go soon and he’s a good racer even though it’s only his first season. I watched him start to go and got on his wheel…in the last corner he had opened up a little gap and in the home straight I started to close him down but run out of tarmac and he beat me by a bike length. A disappointing 2nd place as I had done a lot of the work bringing the other 2 round in the break but well done to Johnny he is a good racer and he played well.

Sunday 29th Dec*

*2/3 – Odd Down – Bath CC Crit*

I drove to Bath and to be honest I was stick of travelling at this point. My legs felt OK in the car with my usual “push the quads to see how much they hurt” method so I felt positive. However, when I got to Bath and started to warm up on the turbo everything felt like an effort! I did some high cadence spinning to try to work out the day before with a couple of 10 second 9/10 efforts to wake up the fast twitch. There was a good-sized turnout so I was thinking this might not be my day. My breakaway head is firmly attached at the moment and I knew if I sat in the bunch I’d just sit there feeling tired and sorry for myself so the plan was an ‘all or nothing’ breakaway attempt.

It didn’t take long for some attacks to start and I got in a break of 5 riders after 5 or so minutes, but that was caught by the bunch. I saw a Bath CC rider still powering on as the bunch slowed after catching the break (a great time to attack again!) I got on his wheel and quickly came past him in attack mode to show my intentions. We gained a 3rd rider and had a gap while the bunch sorted out who was going to do any work. The Bath rider and I quickly became frustrated with the 3rd rider as he was clearly not committed and glass pedalling. This is a huge frustration of mine in lower cat races – people who try to breakaway but then realise it hurts and are lazy and don’t want to do any work thinking that somehow they will magically stay away from the bunch! Nothing good is easy and that same principle applies to breakaways in bike races…it hurts…a lot…the sooner you accept it the sooner you can get on with your business of trying to stay away! The Bath CC rider signalled me to attack the 3rd rider out of the corner, we got into the corner and the BCC rider attacked hard with me on his wheel and we quickly dropped the free loader.

 (A note from the coach here – There are different techniques for getting rid of people who won’t contribute to the workload in a break…it is often referred to as taking someone off the back when, in a paceline, you let a gap develop with the non-worker on your wheel, then sprint quickly to close it up to the line again. If everyone in the line does this as they come through then the freeloader runs out of steam…unless he is playing the game too and still has the strength to outsprint everyone at the end…)

I looked down at my Garmin and we had only been racing for about 15 minutes and had been away for 5, so we had to stay away for a total of 55 minute (race was 1 hour + 3 laps) – a big ask…The BCC rider and I worked well together and somehow we were still away with 5 to go. The breakaway was the usual business of screaming pain on the front and sweet recovery when the other rider(s) take over: Tim’s training really helps with this sort of hard effort, recovery cycle (David is being generous here. I once met one of my riders doing a long interval session I had programmed for him at our local road racing track, Fowlmead Country Park. As he passed me, his face a mask of pain, he had the strength to force out the words “I hate you”).

With the last few laps in sight we pedalled hard and I nailed it at 100% effort down the back straight and round the corner into the wind to get as much distance as possible between us and the bunch. We were still away with a big gap – 15-20 seconds with one lap to go. The BCC rider was a big lad so I knew he had a sprint… just before the final corner, when he moved to let me go through, I attacked him hard as I didn’t think I’d win a straight drag race. He got on my wheel but I just had to keep going at 100% – Odd down has a long run to the finish and is slightly up hill so you don’t want to go too early. I was at 110%, my legs were screaming but I wasn’t going to let this go. The BCC rider started to come around and I got out of the saddle and stomped on the pedals for everything I was worth. He came round and we were neck and neck for the last 100m, but he faded in the last 20 m and I managed to pip him by 1/4 of a wheel. I let out an overzealous roar like I’d won the world champs! Yes, this was only a 2/3 winter race but after my terrible season last year a whole year of frustration and disappointment was let go at once my first win in 2 years!

All in all a good weekend picking up 21 BC points and almost regaining my 2nd cat in under a month.”

And there you have it. You need fitness, skill and a strong will………and specific training (or, non-specific!). And don’t let anyone tell you winter races are easy. they may have been easier 5 years ago when there weren’t may of them but now you need to be at the top of your game to get points in them.

Right, time to get the bike out and go training – this time I’m attacking and riding straight past that “soft” break………