My game of "chess" - SoCal #1

Things happen in order, for a certain purpose. This has been true of my racing experience the last few years.

This past weekend was the first race in the SoCal High School League series, Beach to Boulders at Lake Perris. I was a bit anxious for the race, being the first of the season and being expected to win both by myself and others. It was great to be back in the SoCal atmosphere! The venue feels like a big bike party attended by nearly 900 high school and middle school racers, who all want to have fun racing their bikes. Heading into the race I felt ready to go. I had built solid base miles and more good training on top of it. The first race is always the most nerve racking, but this time confidence overtook half of my nerves.

We arrived at the venue Friday night, in time to set up camp. Saturday was a typical "day before the race" day filled with talking with friends in the pit area, sitting and resting the legs as much as possible, drinking lots of water, and watching the middle school races.

Sunday morning arrived and Genevieve and I slipped into our race day schedule. Eating breakfast, stretching, transporting our gear to the pit, cheering on the freshman boys, snacking, setting up warm up trainers, kitting up, and heading to the start line. That's about how short the morning felt. It flew by and before I knew it the call ups were happening. "From Buttermilk Academy, Meade Plum", I had the first Varsity girl call up. I rode up to the start line and chose my starting position.

Tactics and positioning were going to be a big part of the race because of the strong winds that were blowing. The other girls rode up to join me on the line (one of them being Genevieve who had secured herself a front row start because of her awesome racing last year). Brandon (league associate director) gave us the race directions before sending us off to Matt (the league director) for the final count down, done by Larissa Connors and Nikki Peterson (two pro woman mountain bikers).

Five, four, three, two, one... and we were off! Let me explain that better. We were technically racing, but it was one of the absolute slowest starts you will ever see. None of the girls wanted to pull the field through the wind, and they were all looking at me to set the pace, but I wasn't going to pull them all either, so we went cruising up the paved part of the climb. Once on the dirt I knew we had to splinter the group, so I upped the pace and there was soon a small group of five of us racers out front. We climbed steadily up the climb with me and Vieve setting the pace. I led down the only singletrack section to see how well the other girls were descending. At the bottom I had opened up a bit of a gap on Vieve who had opened up the same gap on the rest of the group.

Through the rest of the lap I let the group regroup until we had nearly ten girls with us. We cruised up the paved road again until I put in a little attack to break the group again.

Three of the same girls broke off with me, and I got them to work a bit until we hit the dirt. I started my mental calculations for where I should make my attack, based upon my strengths, and how long I could hold a break in this wind. As we got deeper into the dirt climb I could tell the other two girls with Genevieve and I were hurting. Sitting two back in our "train" I started to see the girl in front of me struggling to hold Genevieve's wheel. With that sign I launched my attack. I wanted Vieve to come with me to secure a second place finish for her and to have help working in the wind, but she didn't have the strength to match my acceleration. I had the top quarter of the climb left when I attacked and knowing I descended faster then the others, I started to grow the gap. The singletrack descent turned into a dirt road trending downhill which then turned onto a rutted beach and then turned into a sand beach, on which we cross three times before the finish line. I knew I was going to have to work hard to stay alone out front in the wind, but I had a gap and I needed to go for it. From there it was a time trial. Get in my rhythm and go... across the beach and through the finish to start my third and final lap.

Up the climb and down the descent I kept picking off all the girls I could see. Onto the beach one last time, through the corners, onto the grass, and sprint across the finish line! I HAD DONE IT!! My first ever SoCal win! It felt so good to know my plan of attack and training paid off and brought me this victory. Genevieve finished first out of her group of three, securing her a second place!

The race weekend could not have gotten any better for me! I used all the racing strategy and knowledge I have gained from the past years to achieve this victory, and hopefully continue with many more victories to come.

As for now, all I can do is more hard training to ensure my future success (especially now that I have a target - Leader jersey - on my back)!

I want to thank my parents for all the support they give me in all aspects of my training and racing. My sister, Genevieve, for the help she is in training (and now in racing!). And my sponsors for their support: Speed Tuned Wheels for setting me up with a killer pair of race wheels, and Ice Sports Wear for the super comfortable kits they supply!