Nationals 2012

One week ago was some of the hardest racing in my life. Even though I did not pull off any results myself I did my best to help the team. I learned a lot and I am very motivated for 2013.

Day One - Monday, June 18th
Left my house at 2:30am and arrived at the team house in Georgia at 9:30pm. TSA took great care of my equipment, forgetting to latch my wheel box shut and figuring out how to scratch my bike up with 3 layers of foam in the bike box.

Day Two - Tuesday, June 19th
The whole team went and rode the road race course. The course had a lot of rollers with a climb to the finish and a hard feedzone hill after the start/finish. My legs felt a little sluggish from the traveling of the day before so I rode as easy as possible while retaining a visible forward trajectory.

The team before the ride Tuesday.

Day Three - Wednesday, June 20th

This was the day of Sean's 13-14 road race. Before Sean's race the team pre rode the TT course. I did a few leg openers and by the end of the ride my legs felt pretty opened. Sean rode a strong race despite going down in a crash and having to chase back to the lead group.

Diego and Dean made dinner. It was pretty good.

Day Four (The 15-16's first race) - Thursday, June 21st

On Thursday we had the time trial. I had a time of 29:03 for the 20k course. After the TT the team went for a swim in the lake and then drove over to awards. Sean had placed 2nd in the 13-14's and Jack took 5th in the 15-16's. 

My right TT bar slipped so I was forced to finish in the dropouts.

Day Five - Friday, June 22nd

Friday was the day of the Criterium. This was not a good day for the team since our sprinter was crashed out with a few laps to go. I was not able to do my full job for the day so Jack and Matt had to make up for it leaving them tired for the finish. 

With around two to go a crash happened in front of me and I had to skid around it. I ran into some debris with my front wheel but stayed upright. I was off the back and finished off the back. After the criterium I was very motivated for the road race and ready to deal some damage for the team.

Day 6 - Saturday, June 23rd

Saturday was the last race of Nationals, the road race. A few minutes into the race Matt and Michael (Garmin) went off the front. Because Matt was off the front I tried to sit in the pack and conserve my energy for when it counted. On the second lap I found Nick and communicated with him letting him know I was moving to the front since attacks were starting to fly. Immediately after I found Nick the pack hit a downhill and an attack went. I moved into the pack to wait until we caught the attack to move up, but then a crash happened in front of me. I braked and tried to maneuver my way around the wreckage when a bike pile drove into me sending me over the first kid that crashed. I put my hands out to catch myself. Thankfully I only sprained my wrist and I did not even get road rash. However, my front 404 was broken and that has definitely left a mark.

Thank you to my Parents for making my racing possible. Thank to the Sponsors and Founders who made our Nationals trip possible. Thank you to Larry for helping the team do the best we can.

Thank you for reading,

Jonathan Christensen

Winning Burlingame Criterium

Hi my name is Oliver.  I want to share with you  my first win in the elite 4's. Last Friday, just two days more before the Burlingame Criterium I was doing my last hard workout on the trainer and I felt a special energy.  The resent changes in my equipment, training, and nutrition had all blended well.  It was getting late so I decided I would take my recovery drink and head to bed.   It wasn't early, but I couldn't really sleep.  In my mind I just kept watching a bunch of top ten races but never a win.  I wanted that "S" on the van.  I woke up the Saturday, ate breakfast and prepared earlier than usual.  I did my stretches and kept eating and hydrating.  I was in the zone, extremely focused, I knew what I wanted, but I knew I couldn't want it extremely bad or I would end up messing up my race.  On Sunday, I woke up at 5 am and hoped on the trainer for about 10 minutes, a nice trick I learned from a green edge video, which is a warm up intended to wake up the body. I got to the race with enough time to preview the coarse. My ex-teammate Thomas, told me it would be nice if I won Burlingame Crit, since it was my first crit as a 4 a year ago. That was one more reason for me to win, I had to do it!

The race started and I was sitting in the pack not very comfortably.  I was losing spaces in the corners as primes approached. A former teammate (Mike Baxter) approached me and like a guardian angel guided me through the race "Oliver you want a result, you better earn one" that really got me going as he said that I heard " five laps to go".  The race was on!  I moved to second wheel because my former teammate was pulling back the break.  I stayed on his wheel until about 2 to go when I locked on Team Webcor's lead out train they took me to about 500 meters to go. I sprinted to stay there and as I placed myself about third wheel coming into the sweeper I knew it was time to make it count. I started sprinting. I unleashed all I had.  I could hear the guy in front of me in pain as I came around.  It was only a matter of seconds and he would blow up and he did 15 meters before the line.  I knew I got him and I yelled "I love you dad" in Spanish and tears came out of my eyes as both hands were up! It was not believable.  It just wasn't possible, but I did it!  I would like to thank so many people and I truly believe they all deserve a piece of this win! To my coach and mentor Larry Nolan, my parents, my doctors, the crew at Eden Bikes for keeping the bike in shape, the team parents, to my junior and master teammates, and the sponsors for making this all possible!!

Win or Lose~ Defeat is Not an Option

When the game is over I just want to look at myself in the mirror, win or lose, and know I gave it everything I had. ~ Joe Montana

2012 USA Cycling National Championships in Augusta, GA proved to be a challenge this year. I may have come home with 1 medal and 2 top ten finishes, and some people may say that’s great, but I would disagree. You experience defeat when you stop trying and fail to take chances. I took chances at Nationals this year. I picked up the slack and chased too many attacks at the crit and dug myself into a hole for the road race, but I took a chance. I never stopped trying and gave the races, everything I had. To quote NFL running back, Emmit Smith, “I may win and I may lose, but I will never be defeated.”

~Jack Maddux

What I thought about and learned during Elite Nationals Crit

From masters team member Chris Lyman

Guanella Pass Hill Climb

Hi everyone, Dean here.  My nationals overload was pretty intense.  A mountain bike race in New Mexico Saturday, 100 mile ride Sunday (http://app.strava.com/rides/10536014) a full week of hard rides and the Guanella Pass Hill Climb.  It is west of Denver and begins in the town of Georgetown at 8500 feet.  Guanella Pass (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Guanella_Pass).  3200 feet of climbing in 12 miles.  Climb tops out at 11699 feet.  I have been riding really strong going into nationals this next week and this race was a huge confidence booster.  Even though there aren't any mountain passes in Augusta, GA, 5th place in any P12 race is a motivator.  I am ready to bring home the gold at junior nationals this week for Team Specialized!

 

Summit of Guanella Pass (Mt. Bierstadt in the background is 14,000 feet)

Neither Hand Grenades, Nor Horse Shoes

This past weekend I raced the Folsom Cyclebration Omnium to get three hard days of racing in two weeks before Junior National Championships in Augusta, Georgia. The first day was a time trial, which was the first time I ever raced a flat time trial, and my fourth ride and first hard ride on a time trial bike. Surprisingly I managed to get 7th out of about 25 racers. Saturday was the criterium, and I was looking for more omnium points to add to my 15 from the time trial. With about 5 laps left a dangerous looking break went up the road, so I took the effort to bridge the 10 or so second gap to the leaders. When I got to the break it started to blow apart and I made the split with three other riders coming into three laps to go. By the time we came around for two to go it was just a lone rider and me with a 25 second gap to the peleton, as the lead out trains started to form our gap was down to just 10 or 15 seconds with a lap to go. All it would have taken for our breakaway to succeed would have been for the powerful Leadout Racing team's leadout train (team name is a little coincidental right?) to have hesitated for 5 seconds before opening up the throttle. But no such luck as my companion and I were swept up in the last 1/3 of a lap. The last event on Sunday was the circuit race which after the previous days failure I was pessimistic about the chances of a break away, but then I was wrong and 4 people got off the front and stayed away until the finish.
Coming into National Championships this leaves me with the lesson that cycling can be a gamble, and that you have to make your own luck, because if you don't try you can never know.
Thanks for reading,
Jason S

Mt. Hamilton Road Race - 35+

I love this race, but hate the descent. Somewhere in the process of getting old I have become a chicken...
Anyway, as soon as the climb started Chris Phipps attacked. It looked like a case of stravacide (Stravacide [strah-vay-sahyd] verb. The action of ruining a training ride in the pursuit of pointless Strava Leaderboard advancement. Definition courtesy of @MTFU_Training) Josh Dapice went with Chris and Dan Martin bridged up a little later. Behind we rode a hard tempo. We rode the first section of the climb at threshold and the second section at just a bit under. All the while the guys up front were slowly riding away from us. I tried to ride a hard tempo on the third climb to keep the gap from getting too big and to try and whittle the group down. I got some help from Harlan Chapman, Andres Gil and Matt Carino. Matt's pulls towards the top were particularly painful.
Towards the top we saw Dan Martin up ahead coming back to our group. At about the same time Ken Gallardo attacked our group. It didn't seem like much of a threat at the time, but he railed the descent to close a 1:50 gap to the leaders. I on the other hand rode my usual abysmal descent and ended up in the second half of our group when we got to Isabel Creek. On the plus side I didn't crash this year! Chris Lyman though rode an excellent descent to make the front group. After a relatively short chase our group came back together and we started cooperating to chase the three leaders.
We ended up with a group of about 12 and though not everybody worked, the guys who were inclined to work were smart enough to know that the non-workers probably couldn't work as opposed to wouldn't work. For the most part our group worked well together without too much of the starting and stopping that can kill a chase and let the gap balloon. Dan Martin in particular was tireless in the chase. I also worked a lot hoping to set Chris up for the finish. My legs were tired from the climb and chasing and I thought Chris would be fresher at the end.
Somewhere around 10 miles to go I was able to look ahead and see the leaders. I make a time check that had them about 1 minute ahead. We were getting there, but still had some work to do.
That last 10 miles was really fun. The road twists and turns and we were pushing the whole time. On the last descent into the short, flat valley before the finish, Dan Martin really pushed it with me on his wheel. As we got to the flat valley I could see the leaders just ahead. It was going to be close, but I thought we could get them so I buried myself pulling across the valley. We caught Chris and Josh at 200m to go. Ken was just ahead. I took one more hard pull to set up the sprint and Dan Martin came by just as the road started uphill with Dan Bryant and Nathan Parks behind. I had done my job and was blown so I started to sit up and then look behind, but there was only one person there so I gave what little I had left and barely held off what turned out to be Chris Phipps for 5th.
As it turns out, our group split on that last descent and Chris Lyman got caught in the second half of the group.
After milling about for close to an hour and collecting prizes we started our ride back to the start in San Jose. I had to chase for about a quarter mile to catch the group and I swear that was the hardest part of my day! My legs were NOT happy with me.
We had a huge group and for once we rode more or less sensibly back to San Jose. Usually there is at least one person that obviously didn't go hard enough in the race that can make things uncomfortable, but this time it wasn't so bad.
Now here is the interesting part. Using Strava.com and Paul Mach's new site raceshape.com you can see how the race develops. Follow the link below to see the data. As you use the mouse to move along the course you can see Chris and Josh ride away from the group (represented by me, Chris Lyman and Ken). Then Chris drops Josh towards the top and you can also see Ken attack our group and watch Chris, Ken and Josh come together at Isabel Creek. Meanwhile behind watch Chris Lyman drop me on the descent, then we come together and sloooowwwwlllly bring the leaders back. If you add in somebody from the pro race, say Chris Stasny you can see how they rode a much more tactical climb, but rode the rest of the course much faster to virtually catch and pass our group towards the end.
Race Shape data

Team Camp

This past weekend our team gathered for our pre nationals heat camp. Saturday was the first day and teammates made their way to Jack's house in Fresno for a fun three hour ride that included practicing our bmx skills on a cool track.
After lunch and a swim at Jack's house, we made the drive to Shaver lake and did yard work around the cabin. Any leaf, dead piece of wood, or other item that threatened a fire hazard to the cabin we moved into a big bonfire. The bonfire was really big by the end of Sunday!

The bonfire.

For dinner we had the best elk meat tacos ever made. With 14 of us eating and each of us having between 4-5 tacos we probably ate a whole elk. 

On Sunday the team did a three and a half hour ride, ending it with a climb up Toll House to Shaver Lake. That is a 14 mile climb! While most of the teammates stopped to wait for Marcus to fix his rear derailleur Larry, Oliver, and I kept riding. My goal was to make it to the top first so I could get to the shower before everybody else. Jason and I made it to the top together so I completed my goal.

Before the ride Monday

On Monday we had what would probably be the hardest challenge yet: a four mile climb that averaged 10%. 

The climb. Can you find the two Specialized riders?

I went as hard as I could to the top knowing that if I slowed down I would probably start wobbling and fall over the edge of the mountain. I did not trust my handling skills enough to ride down the side of the mountain so I went as hard as possible and when I puked near the top I knew I had probably pushed myself a little too far since we still had another hour and forty five minutes of riding. That was okay though because I had my Clifbar product to snack on and I was able to ride back to the cabin.

Near the end of our ride Monday

Thank you to everybody who made this camp possible and successful. Thank you to my teammates who made it fun, Larry and Mr. Maddux for organizing it, and our sponsors who make it possible for us to make these great memories.

-Jonathan Christensen