Tour of the Catskills - Stage 2

Through the night I woke up a few times with my knee being sore, so I wasn’t sure how this was going to pan out. I had some spidertech tape with me so I threw it on a little before heading out. Today was the circuit race with a nice 1.5km climb on each of the 3 laps. Race was a little shorter than the tech guide said as I crossed the line with 107km. The scenery again was nothing short of breath taking (assuming you had any during the race to spare).  The start and finish was at Windham Mountain resort so it was a nice little punch to the finish, with a long gradual climb leading up to it.

The race started and the neutral start dropped us off a little before the climb. Pace was high on the first lap with lots of action going on in the front. The group split up a bit on the climb, but came back together on the long and fast descent. After you had enough time to recover from the climb the pace picked up again for the sprint points at roughly halfway through the lap. The roads were fast until we took a right turn back onto highway 23 where it started to go uphill again. The first section of this was the hardest as you sprinted out of the corner to be met with some little hills at a high pace that made the legs burn. For the first lap everything stayed together for the most part despite the attacks.

Heading into the second lap the climb was the same except I saw some people suffering on the climb that I didn’t expect to see. Once we got over the top I was with a small group including Merritt and Bird who paced us back to the group. In this I think I went into too much of an aggressive aero tuck and bent my knee too far (only gets about 90 degrees worth of bend right now on a good day, maybe should see a doctor). After that my knee gradually got worse as the race progressed.

After we caught on I found myself moved right up to the front of the group. I stayed there for a while until a flurry of attacks sent a bunch of riders past me. I struggled a bit as we turned onto 23 but caught back on.  We turned into the third lap and the pace was much more calm this time on the hill. There were a few riders that separated but for the most part the peloton stayed together. I was starting to lose my ability to put pressure on my left leg standing (I thought it was supposed to be healed!). I should have been closer to the front, but I was near the back when we turned onto 23. The pace was high as the group was working to chase down the break. I couldn’t stand to sprint around the corner and lost the group. I tried to chase and catch on but I was no match for the driven peloton.

The next 17km I was plagued with bad thoughts about the stage and the weekend, and whether I should even start on Sunday. As I passed the right turn for the circuit I noticed there was a crash in the group as there was a rider pretty scraped up sitting at the side of the road being taken care of by race vehicles. I rode the rest of the way up to the finish passing one more person on my way. Finished the day losing over 7mins on GC.

Afterwards I congratulated Merritt on his “fourth place” (results say otherwise right now but I believe him). Then Bruce Bird gave me some motivational words and I was feeling better. After doing some easy spinning, icing and some Aleeve, my knee was feeling good again and I am motivated to take the start tomorrow!

Garmin data: HERE
All the result links for this weekend are HERE