Posted by Dan on 11. July 2011 21:27
After a year off for good behavior, the Tour de Toona came back for 2011. I've driven through Altoona, PA a billion times en route to the family farm in Emlenton and each time wished I could ride in the Tour de 'Toona. This year I got my chance. At the suggestion of Team Traveller, Frank and I set out for was now a two-event points race after losing the Friday event due to uncooperative communities in the surrounding area. We'd be doing a 70 mile road race on Saturday followed by a downtown crit on Sunday.
Saturday morning, we made our way to registration and met up with Paul Ward (Kelly Benefit Strategies/LVS). He was doing the PRO/1 race and was departing early. The PRO/1/2 women took off soon after them. Paul had ridden the course with his team the day before and gave us a quick briefing on what to expect. The first 20 miles of the course were nice, harmless rollers. Soon after that, they began picking up intensity. At 25 miles, we were on our first proper climb which lasted until the 30 mile mark. This first climb up Blue Knob contained several 15% spots and more than a little gravel. After that was a smaller climb followed by a third climb, just a little smaller than the first one and not as severe. After that, it was a 10 mile downhill run to the finish line.
The Cat 2 group went off at 9:40 and we took to the street to line up. I was fortunate enough to get on the line while Frank was in the second row on the far right side of the road. We listened to the official's go on with his rules and announcements while the other 52 riders, including Paul Low of Team Traveller, massed up. We'd just been told we had less than one minute to go when Frank says, "Dan?" I responded: "Yeah?" "No balls you to go from the gun."
For those of you not familiar with the phrase "no balls", I provide you with a definition ripped straight from urbandictionary.com:
"The ultimate dare from which a man cannot back down without incurring more loss of dignity than following through with the actual stupidity of doing the dare and suffering its consequences."
Frank was daring me to attack the field by sprinting away from them as soon as the whistle blew. The field would either respond by chasing me or, worse, let me go, in which case I'd be alone with no one to work with while they all sat behind one another conserving their precious energy. I could not decline his dare lest my manhood be called into question. I dropped my head and slumped my shoulders. In a defeated tone, I asked, "Really?" Frank nodded enthusiastically while laughing. I didn't have much time to think about how I could accept the dare without actually killing myself.
When the whistle blew, I attacked. So did the kid sitting immediately in front of Frank. Hard. He was like a bullet. So I swerved right and got behind him, albeit about 50 feet back. We both kept the gas on and charged away from the field. Frank yelled something like, "NO! What are you doing?!" but it was too late. I was in attack mode. a mile into our break effort, Andrew Clerico (CRCA/BH Garneau) rolled up behind me and started to organize the effort. I still had not latched on to the first guy, thinking he was either going to let up and come back to me or he'd die out there alone. Andrew and I began working and caught him, but he wouldn't last long. He got shelled and found his way back to the field. We kept going, getting into a very smooth, effective rotation.
A little over 10 miles into our race, we came to a "T" intersection with about five people standing in it. One wore a bright yellow shirt identifying her as a race volunteer. The other wore a snazzy brown number with a shiny gold badge on the pocket, identifying him as a state trooper. The woman was pointing with both arms to our left, while the officer was pointing with both arms to the right. What to do? As the woman had a googly eye and unkempt hair, I opted to go with the badge and went right. Turns out that was the correct choice. After about 3 miles and just minutes away from the first feed zone, the race official pulled up next to us and told us to "neutralize". We weren't sure what he was talking about so we kept going but maybe a little slower. He eventually told us some Cat 2s had gone off course. They were going to mass all the Cat 2s and Cat 3s up at the feed zone and restart them. That's fine if you're in the field, but what about the guys in the break? They calculated our lead and were going to give us a head start equal to our current gap, which was reported to be 1:10. We figured it was 3:00, the field thought it was 5:00 and people in the feed zone said it was 4:00, but whatever. When we stopped, another official asked if we were 2s. No, we're 3s. She said, "Oh, you keep going. Go on." So we went. We were stopped at the next corner and made to sit tight until they finally ordered us back to the feed zone where we found the Cat 2 break of 5 getting ready to take off, the rest of the entire Cat 2 field and then the rest of our Cat 3 field, all massed up on the road looking confused. Our group was pretty surprised to see us, thinking we were still going on up the road. The Cat 2 leaders left and when they'd been given the appropriate head start, the rest of the 2s took off. Andrew and I had to wait 5 minutes before we could go and the rest would go 1:10 later. On their signal, we lit out of the feed zone and worked as best we could. A motoref soon reported the time back to the field was 1:25. We were opening the gap.
25 miles into the race, we made a left and started our way up to Blue Knob. Andrew and I paced each other up the climb, staying close in hopes we'd reach the summit at the same time and be able to continue our effective break. With maybe 3k to go, the road surface went from paved and nice to gravel and spiteful. I was so focused on keeping my power up while not crashing that I didn't notice Andrew had been dropped. I reached the King of the Mountain point alone. Looking around, he was nowhere to be seen so I continued on solo, starting the fast descent while shoving a Honey Stinger waffle in my face.
It wasn't long before I caught the tail end of the Cat 2 race. I started picking up riders, who were told in no uncertain terms that they could not work for me. Being alone off the front had a surreal VIP feel to it. I had a state trooper out front with his lights on leading the way, followed by a motorcycle. Behind him was the official's car, always just in front of me. A motoref was usually to my left and the support car was always immediately behind me. They'd swerve to allow dropped Cat 2s into the envelope and then swerve to let them out. I motored on, up and over the next climb, all tucked soundly in the confines of the protective enclosure. The only thing missing was a helicopter, and while one did pass overhead, it was surely en route to the find the Women's PRO/1/2 race, which had been stopped earlier when they all took wrong turns and had to be regrouped and restarted.
The last gap time I remember getting sounded something like, "5 minutes to the field, 30 seconds to chasing riders." I asked if they were in my race to which he responded, "Yes, you can work with them." I passed a sign saying 5 KM to KOM. Seconds later, I was caught by Jim Johnson (ABRT). He said he had a teammate a few hundred yards back, but I never saw him. A minute or two later and we passed the 20km to Finish sign. The road turned up and Jim dropped me. I desperately tried to keep him in striking distance, but it wasn't to be. I was exhausted. Sometime later, I was caught again by Jonathan D'Alba (Schuylkill Navy Racing). He looked to be in the same shape I was. We worked together for a little while. When the 5 km sign came up, it was time to go. I attacked going into a left-hand turn leading into a short but steep hill. I gapped him, but he caught me and opened his own 30 second gap as retribution. The finish line was now about 1km away. I dug deep and desperately tried closing the gap, but only got it down to 9 seconds. I finished 3rd and got the KOM jersey. Frank would cross the line 10 minutes later in 24th place.
Back to the hotel for a shower, food and Tour de France prime time show to recover for Sunday's crit.
Sunday, we headed back downtown to the business district for a 20 mile criterium. Same cast of characters, but this time we'd be doing 20 laps of a 1 mile loop with a bit of a hill and corresponding downhill and 8-corners for our bike handling pleasure. The group was not in the mood to allow breakaways to form despite my best efforts. With 8 laps to go, five of us formed a pretty promising break. It took the field two whole laps to shut it down. With three to go, the sketchiness reached critical levels. Everyone wanted a position on the front but no one would do work when they go there, so we'd constantly go from strung out to bulging. People were picking the strangest lines through corners, usually intersecting with my own line. At the start of the bell lap, I told Frank I was out and drifted to the back. He opted to move to the front, another viable option for safety's sake, but not one available to me as I was getting tired. Going into the very last corner, the crash started mid-pack, taking out Jim Johnson in the yellow jersey and Jonathan D'Alba and a few others. I rode by to secure 20th. Frank got 11th and that's all that matters as they were paying out 12 deep. Overall, I finished 6th in the GC and Frank took 18th, also good as they were paying 20 deep.
We raced back to the hotel for a quick shower and Tour de France coverage before loading the car and going back to watch Paul in the super-fast PRO/1 race, where the Pure Black team drilled it for 29 of 30 laps, finally giving way to a bunch sprint. Exciting stuff.
With that, our Tour de 'Toona drew to a close. Lots of valuable lessons learned I hope to bring into our own race, the Franklin Omnium. Thanks to the promoters, volunteers, sponsors and city of Altoona for putting up with us for the weekend. Huge thanks to Mike Hosang (TriPower) for handing up water in the feed zones. He was a lifesaver.