Awwww yea!

I've talked about it...repeatedly...but I have a drafting problem when i ride the velodrome, and i'm sure in general. And by problem, i mean I don't draft well. So...one of the guys in charge of my class offered to meet up with me before class and practice 'bike wrestling'...as I like to call it. Bumping side to side, and then try to get me to bump his rear tire. This is best practiced on grass with tennis shoes on. Stick your arms out and occasionally your knees if someone gets too close and push into them with your arms. Go on...you won't push them over as long as you both have some speed in the forward direction. He even said cyclists have been known to even head butt during races.Check this out at about 18 seconds into the video and also around 30seconds. He was apparently DQ'd because of this.

awww...how ya doing Stuey???

I found the whole 'pushing' thing to be hilarious...as i do with just about everything. Granted I was told that if I fell over because I was laughing too hard that would not be cool. Spoil Sport. The rear bumping of my instructor's rear tire was the trickiest for me. I'd get really close and then chicken out...i did hit his tire a few times but he'd just ride around in front of me saying: I don't feel you bumping into my tire. The reality...you can hit tires and not fall over.

I'm not sure if the practice helped my confidence level or what...but i HELD to people's tires SO WELL last night. Didn't get yelled at once to draft closer. We did have a guy who was joining in on the class for fun who was quite an experienced racer. He road around with my group all evening and gave out pointers.

After awhile he seemed to pick on me a lot over the evening as he'd sit on my wheel and tell me what to do a lot and point out where I was working too hard or riding too high or whatever. It was helpful. And on many races where he was riding my tail...he'd totally push me to out sprint whomever was next to me...even if we were deep into the field and not about to come close to winning anything. It was good practice.

But the best part of the night was we had a set of sprint races. We were told we would have 3 sets of 4 lap sprints. I can't remember if we were racing for points or not, but the first two sprint sets were pretty hard. After each set we would have to regroup and then they would send us off again. So the third (and what we all thought) was the last set...we made it through the first lap and I just got possessed to see if I could take it...I have no idea why I just WENT..i knew it was chancy since i had THREE laps to go..but I knew everyone was pretty tired too...so I decided 'why not'? I didn't know how good the endurance of the fast guys in my group were(keep in mind this is not the super fast group...but still)...so I put the hammer down and went for it.

I did manage to hold them off for the next 2.5 laps and it was only with half a lap to go that three guys had to work together to chase me down. One of the guys on the sidelines told me after wards that I had a quarter lap gain on the rest of the field and those 3 guys that did reel me in had to work pretty hard together to pull me in. Totally satisfying.

It didn't 'work'...but man it was FUN. :-)

I learned a bunch of things:
1)Three laps is WAAAAAAAAAY too long to go all out on...2-2.25 is about all I can probably manage.
2)If you time it well you can take people by surprise.
3) Don't suddenly think that, that guy over there is suddenly going to be really fast if he hasn't been all evening in any sprint. Same for yourself.
4)It's not all about speed...learning more tactics can help the game.
5)Making people work hard to chase you down...even if it doesn't work is totally satisfying.

You would have thought I actually WON the race yesterday because of how giddy I was. I didn't even place well...but it was just awesome that I didn't hesitate and just left it all out there. I learned a lot by mucking it up.

One guy afterward complimented me on pulling away from everyone...even if i didn't win...it still was fun.