TSV Race Report-Philly Phlyer

Daily Miles: About 40
Avg. Speed: About 25 mph
March Total: 312.34
2008 Total: 2856.61

Race Report from the Philly Phlyer 3/4 Race on March 9th:

After some difficulty in navigating the traffic in Philly, Taylor and I made it to the race with about 30 minutes until departure. A quick warmup, and it was time to go.

Our race tactics were simple, attack and block, attack and block. The race started off at a pretty good pace, then quickly died as soon as we hit the vicious headwinds on West River Drive. Taylor put on a good move and attacked hard, bringing 5 or 6 with him and increasing the packs tempo significantly. I blocked a bit, and he was able to open up about 30 seconds. However, the group he was with didn't want to work, so he was brought back in on the climb to Strawberry Mansion. A group attacked up the hill, with 4 riders from 4 different teams. I attacked to cover it, knowing that if it stayed out, we wouldn't catch it. No one followed and I bridged up by the time we started the decent back to the drives.

Back on the drives, and in the headwind again, the now group of 5 quickly started to fall apart. By the time we turned up the hill on Black Rd, there was just we and Adam, a rider from Baltimore riding for T2. We talked back and forth for a bit, with a gap of about 1:30, decided we both felt pretty strong, and decided to have a go. And go we did. I pulled into the headwinds on the flats, and he hammered up the hills, pulling my fat ass with him.

We managed to stay out for 3 full laps, and I managed to win the meaningless sprint to the finish to take the race.

Taylor made it all possible, working with 2 of the T2 riders to control the pace of the group and really disrupt things. Another rider noted after the race that pace seemed to yo-yo a lot, and never seemed to get over 22 mph. If you also noticed this, it was Taylor's fault. Excellent team effort, and a great win in the first race of the season for TSV. Much beer was consumed in celebration. Strasburg is next...