Bahati, Captain Kirk, and a Threepeat…

The LA Circuit Race holds a special place for me as it takes place in my “backyard”, and I’ve won it two years in a row. Sponsored by Bahati Foundation, the LA Circuit Race is a designated LAJRS race and was paying out over $2,000 in cash prizes for juniors, along with a custom made jersey for the winners! Rahsaan Bahati, a pro cyclist and founder of Bahati Foundation, travels the country to speak to inner city youth in underserved communities. The Foundation’s mission is to motivate and empower kids toward higher achievement in education, music and cycling. He also offers cycling skills clinics for inspiring bike racers. Bahati is a great mentor and is giving back to the cycling community.

Back to the race...as soon as I jumped on my bike that morning, I noticed my legs were flat. Two days of hard racing at Sea Otter had worked my legs. Without any teammates in this race, I knew I would have to ride conservatively and smart. No heroic attacks today! My plan was to ride in the front quarter of the field and be ready to follow any threatening attacks. Otherwise, I would hide in the pack and sprint for the finish.

LA Circuit consists of four laps of a 4 mile, two turn paperclip-shaped circuit. There is a small rise and headwind in your face going out. Coming back it’s a tailwind with a slight uphill finish.

I'm hiding in the pack.  Can you spot me??

I hid in the pack so well that my mom later said that she had been trying to take pictures of me but couldn't find me. So this is what would happen, every lap we would go really fast with the tailwind then slow down to a crawl into the U-turn then full throttle into the wind then crawl into the other U-Turn then full throttle as we came out of the turn with the tailwind. Repeat this for four laps. Ouch! My legs were worked and it became very apparent that sitting in was more important than trying to be a hero today. So I sat in until the last turn. With about a mile to go the pace really picked up. SC Velo had a train going and I jumped on the back of it. With 250 meters to go they were going full for their sprinter. At that point, as Captain Kirk would say, “Scotty, give it all you’ve got!” I started my sprint, put my head into the wind and put at least three bike lengths on the field for my third consecutive win of the LA Circuit race.

I won $80, a Bahati winner’s jersey, and got to chill the rest of the day after three straight days of racing.

Next stop, Devil’s Punch Bowl. Thanks for reading, Diego Binatena