The Cascadilla Hill Climb is a regular Ithaca event that brought in about 50 riders this year. As a solid B racer from the Tuesday Night Races earlier in the season, I registered for this group today. This race has matches with 2 (or sometimes 3) racers at a time. The winner moves on, the loser gets a second chance, until all but one rider has lost twice. I showed up just a minute late, but was able to sneak onto the list in time.

The first match was with Max Kraft and one other rider I hadn’t met before. I was worried with this as the first race, because Max had recently beat me on the Brown Birk race (the last TNR of the season) with a good lead up a climb. Even though I had some tactical ideas in mind, I blasted off the front immediately to get a big gap. This used far too much energy, so I soft pedaled once I was out of sight until they caught up a bit. I kept looking back anticipating that they would catch up and pass me, but there was still a good gap to Max and a bigger one to the other rider. The final stretch came and I pushed one last bit to ensure the gap would stay and won the match. My goal to not waste all my energy on the first ride didn’t work unfortunately!

The second match was with Juan Salazar. We’ve been on many rides together and I knew he had far more miles and experience on hills than I did. Juan is always looking to add more climbing to his long weekend rides. I started slow, hoping to cruise along until the final stretch to pull out a sprint. We rode next to each other most of the way, when I realized my chance. He was shifting occasionally, since the incline does change several times, and I decided that the next shift I hear I’m going to sprint, hoping to get away when he would have a harder chance to latch on. Whether or not this plan was the kicker, I sprinted fast and looked back to see a big enough gap to ensure victory.

My third match was with Sam Kolins, another solid B racer who probably matches my miles this year but has more experience (I’m pretty sure). This race was similar to the last; I tried to match him the whole way until the final stretch. The main difference was that Sam kept pushing the pace. I think he was hoping to tire me out with this pace, in hopes that I would slow, but I was ready for this one. He lead most of the ride with me closely behind getting ready to jump if he sprinted. The last stretch came and off I went to pass him and secure another win and a spot in the top 2!

Finally I got to rest while Sam, Max, and Juan raced together to see who would race me on the final bracket. They are each great racers, so I was eager to see how this one would fare. They looked very close coming across the last bend. Sam had a slight lead over Max, and Juan was close behind. Now I knew my final match would be me and Sam for the second time. We realized that in order for Sam to win, he would have to beat me twice now, since I had yet to lose a match so far. This was reassuring, and I decided to aim for a slight lead (if possible) instead of going all out, hoping that I could either win the next one or tire Sam out enough to win the final match.

After waiting for traffic to pass, Sam and I approached our (possibly) final climb. This was similar to our last race, with Sam pushing the pace early. The difference was that this time about halfway up I decided to push it harder, and had the slightest lead. Once in the cemetery, we realized we started too soon because there was still a family race (parents with kids in tow), and a car in front of them. I passed the traffic, trying to leave as much room as possible for Sam to get by if he was going to pass me also. I rocketed off the front one last time and Sam could not catch me. I had won the B’s! I was thrilled because after the final TNR coming in 2nd and feeling ready for more, I was able to use that energy on this race. I was concerned that it may not have been a fair match with the traffic interfering (I hadn’t looked back at this point), but Sam said that it was indeed a fair win.

This was an amazingly fun race, even though it was extremely taxing to do hill repeats at that kind of speed against very strong competitors! I’d say this concludes the 2009 racing for me, but with cyclocross just starting up, I may have a new style of racing to enjoy during the fall.

Things to remember for next time: I was in the lowest gear the entire time (40×23). At this gear I was able to spin fast enough to not need to stand up at any point. On the flatter sections I considered shifting one over, but decided the extra 2 shifts was not worth the risk, especially with my currently sticky rear shifter.

A small group of 5 left EHP after waiting for any stragglers, route undetermined. We rolled up Ellis Hollow and Eileen made a few decisions and we were set for White Church / Coddington. White Church was recently repaved, but now it’s covered with chipseal. The pace seemed high (maybe I’m just tired from racing yesterday). We stopped at the point to turn on lights and made a smooth ride up Coddington. We turned on Banks and headed back via Rt 79 in a line.

The last Tuesday Night Race of the year ends with the triumphant prize of signing your name on either a Pink Slipper (A’s), Brown Birk (B’s), or the Silver Slipper (C’s). These are all shoes found on the side of the road, a few decades ago, that are now part of Ithaca tradition. I had been racing with the B’s ever since my first race where I easily won with the C’s and realized that I wasn’t nearly as bad as I expected considering this was all new to me.

The race started from the Ellis Hollow Nature Preserve. The route was declared, the A’s rolled out, and it was time for me to ride. The pace wasn’t anything special here, until we turned onto Ringwood where I tried to tempo myself for a steady climb. This is typically a road we slowly ride up before starting the hilly route races, so riding it 5mph faster was a new experience. We then turned onto Midline, where I expected the pace to jump since it’s relatively flat. But nothing happened. A paceline formed, and I swung through a few times only to soft pedal through the left lane and parts of the right. After the recent incidents caused by this group not making aggressive moves, I knew it was time to try something. I’m scared of breaking away because I still don’t know exactly where each turn is.

Coming up the right lane, I went faster to jump off the front. I was cautious not to start a solo sprint. I was looking for a few others to join me so that we could leave the passive racers behind and work together in a smaller line. Especially with some iffy turns where there’s traffic, it’s much faster if you aren’t stuck in a long line. Unfortunately only one other tried to join me on the breakaway. I wasn’t willing to keep pushing it, so I moved off and rolled back into the pack. A few rotations more and still no moves.

Approaching Rt 79, every tends to slow down if there’s no chase, because of the right angle turn onto a major road. This was my chance to make a move. I was near the front and started going faster when Juan came up and said “Let’s Go!” There we were, on the smooth newly-paved Rt 79 with a good gap behind us. I was worried that with only two we had little chance, but I had to take the opportunity. We rotated a few times, and eventually one other joined us. This is good because we had more people to share the work, yet bad because it meant we weren’t too far ahead. The pace was beyond my ability though, and without being able to pull enough we got reeled in by the pack we tried so hard to leave.

I was passed by most of the group, trying to figure out if I was spent or still capable of more. Juan says to me, “I just committed suicide” since we had both used a lot of energy only to end up in the same place as the group. I shouldn’t have let so many pass me here and just held on as best I could. The pace of the group was reasonable, and I held on during the incline well. I realized that somehow my legs were still inspired, so I started to pass several riders at my ideal tempo for this type of hill. We yo-yo’d a bit and finally I made a big effort to get ahead of them to discourage them from catching up. It’s rough when you get passed on a hill by someone that makes it look easy, so I tried my best to be that person this time, since I was so often in the other position. It worked perfectly.

Now I could only see a few other riders ahead of me, although quite far ahead. I tried to keep my pace slightly higher than ever, and was catching up slowly. I knew there were a few hills left, so I tried to find the right pace to catch up without getting to them too soon either. I paused for a few strokes and prepared for one final push to get to the front. I passed these two riders at a considerable speed and didn’t look back. Either they are sprinting to keep on my wheel, or letting me go. Nearing the top of a roller I looked back to see they weren’t right behind me. Could I really be in front?!

There was now only one rider in front of me, although quite a ways up. I wasn’t sure if he was an A or a B rider though. By this point I was fairly spent and conceded that catching Max would be impossible given the remaining distance. My focus here was to keep enough of a gap in front of those other two behind me. I looked back a few times and all was good. I even upped the pace a few times knowing that they were likely trying to catch me now that I wasn’t increasing the gap. On the final hill, I stopped looking back and just pedaled waiting to see the A’s at the top. I was the second B rider on top of the hill when an oncoming car came up, slightly out of their lane because they moved away from the A’s on the side of the road. At this point I was done racing and just rolled along when the two other riders tried to sprint past to catch me before the sign. So I may have finished somewhere in 2nd-4th because I wasn’t going to push it with a car right there. I’m calling it 2nd though.

This was by far my best performance in a TNR. It’s hard to believe that I not only tried to make breaks for the first time, but had a moderately successful one for a few miles AND was able to still keep up on the next hill and still manage to get ahead of most everyone. I think next year with a little more confidence of the routes and early-year miles again, I should be able to place more, and possibly will try to hang with the A’s… possibly.

With earlier rain, it was only Sam Kollins, John Dennis, and I ready for the 5:30pm start. We looked up, noted the direction of the clouds, and headed away from the storm that had passed which went through the northwest corner. I love the northwest corner… maybe because so many rides go southwest, maybe because it’s just rolling hills forever, or maybe because there is almost no traffic.

We kept up a moderate pace, with no huffing and puffing which was great after the racing yesterday. We made route decisions on the fly, and I got to ride on many roads new to me. I’m always up for riding on new roads instead of the same old roads. We made it back to EHP before sundown, but after stopping at the office I turned on the lights and rode home swiftly.

24 miles from EHP and back.

We started up Ringwood, and the A’s decided to hit some major hills and ending on Mount Pleasant. Thankfully the B’s chose a different route this time going on Hurd and then Snyder Hill. Right from the beginning a break gained some ground while the group was still adjusting after the initial stop sign. I was near the front and flew off to catch up, although no one else came with me. The pace was above 30mph for a minute while the break tried to gain more ground, but they eventually slowed just a bit and the others caught up.

The turn for Hurd is very sharp, and after getting back on track, the hill starts in just a few hundred feet.  It’s certainly difficult to start a hill climb without much initial momentum! After about 10 seconds of pacing myself but still climbing hard, my right side was cramping more than ever. I tried to ride through the pain but I was already falling back and not feeling better. I kept riding hoping that I could eventually catch up, but by the time I felt like I could get going fast again, I could only see two other riders and they were far ahead and trying to speed up as well. I never did catch them.

At this point I knew the lead group was well ahead with no chance of me being able to gain a few minutes to catch them so I rode a bit easy until the cramps ended. At that point I went into TT mode and was riding 30+mph on the drops but still didn’t reach anyone. Once I couldn’t see anyone else ahead of me, I decided to just stay on Rt 79 to get home before sunset instead of riding up the next hill. I was pedaling slowly and then 4 other B riders caught me. I didn’t think there was anyone behind me! I rode with them for a bit until they turned of 79, and I continued towards EHP with Jed.

32 miles this evening, plus the commute home