Nationals in Lac Megantic

I decided to race Nationals in Quebec this year which was probably a year or 2 premature based on my fitness level.

Nonetheless me & my buddy Patrick talked about doing it way back in Mauii late in 2011.

The learning experience we could pull away would predictably be very humbling since your racing the best in the country.

The race was 180km including 7 laps of Mt Morne near Lac Megantic. This was about a 2km hill that was very steep. A definite separation point for anyone who had the legs vs the guys who didn't. Being only a week out from Banff i was a bit concerned about fatigue but had confidence I could at least race with the local cat 2 Alberta boys in a stage race.

Sure enough the race didn't disappoint. All the big boys were there except Ryder himself. Meier, Tuft, Britton, Sparling, Hamilton, Routley, Bell, Barry, David V with Europcar, Dominique Rollin with FDJ. Among these riders were other incredibly talented National level riders that definitely made the main peloton feel a bit inadequate for sure.

The race started in downtown Lac Megantic & a "neutral" roll out to the start was the plan. Torrential rain shot down from the sky as soon as the race started. It was difficult to see in front of you & braking was compromised immediately which made things sketchy. Any of the riders that started in the back wanting to get to the front did so by hopping curbs in the neutral area during the rain which made things lol uneasy lets say. Rolling over a few railroad tracks caused a few crashes in the neutral area.

Once the peloton made it to the start area relatively unscathed the neutral car blasted off and the race was on. The speed was holy shit fast on the flats given the reduced visibility from the rain which I expected it to be. What I didn't know was we were going 69.9km/hr on a slight decline by no means an actual downhill. I was in my 53x11 spinning out trying to move up on Rollins wheel to the front 1/3rd of the pack.

When we hit one of the last big ass rollers I went from the front 1/3rd of the pack leading into it all the way to getting spit out the back getting dropped. In absolute shock & frustration with a feeling similar to Pigeon Lake left me with questioning all kinds of things. Why the f$ck am I here, why did I come, Jevon at 170ish pounds your fat compared to these riders, not strong enough blah blah blah. Mind Games.

I trooped it out for 2 laps of the mt morne section on my own trying to catch any riders that were dropped. All of the guys that were dropped ahead of me had already pulled out by the feed station at their team cars which wasn't surprising. I had come so far to try my best to keep going & maybe not get lapped. I inevitably knew I was going to be lapped within the last 5 laps but I wanted to try to get at least 100km in before i was passed by the breakaway group. Passing the feedstation I could sense guys that had already pulled out were wondering wtf I was still in the race. I had obviously no chance of catching the peloton & maybe they thought I was embarrassing myself. I didn't really give a shit because they elected to pull out. I understand a lot of these guys race way more than I do & know when to pull the plug & rest up for the next race. I flew down here & wanted to race vs the best in the country so I was gonna go as far as possible to try & finish whether it be lapped with a DNF or maybe not lapped with an OTL time. At least I could try to get a good workout in. Well that was short lived because my rear went flat before I could start the 3rd lap of Mt morne. Pulled to the side of the road & became a spectator. About 10 minutes went by & I saw the breakaway group blaze past with Britton crushing it. That guy rode so hard & should of won the race. Too bad things didn't play out for him as he raced the best in my eyes. That gave me the sense that I could of got maybe 2-4 more laps in but all is history. Congrats to the winner Ryan Roth with Spidertech & to Michael Barry of team Sky for a second place finish even after his very bad crash at Quatar.

Watching strong local riders from H&R, Trek Red Truck & Garneau get shelled was definitely an eye opening experience. I guess the lesson is there's always a bigger fish. If your the biggest fish it's probably a small pond.

Since getting back home I haven't done anything in a designated regime at all. I have been doing some running & swimming as well as light biking trying to wrap my head around what is required to be with those guys. All in all I was able to win a Cat 3 stage race & get into Cat 1/2 this year & race some big races & gain valuable lessons that I will become stronger from. The bottom line is I need to be stronger & lighter than I am now. I may be back next year depending on where my fitness is at but at least I now have an understanding of what it takes to stick with the main group. I'm gonna finish the season off with racing a fun hill climb in Golden with my teammate Evan Bayer & then perhaps some of the Tour De Bowness stage race.

I want to congratulate my buddy Patrick Paquette on finishing his first debut at Nationals. Patty will be back & more dangerous in the next few years & the fitter he gets the more people need to watch out that's for sure.

A huge congrats goes out to my teammate Evan Bayer again for destroying the cat 3 field at RMCC stage race in Canmore & earning his Cat 2 upgrade in only one season. I don't know many riders who just started road biking that can do that so cudos to him.

Banff Bike Fest 2012

Banff Bike Fest was a great learning experience consisting of 5 stages being a Prologue, 90km road race, 21km Time Trial, 50 lap criterium & 144km road race to finish it off.

The goal was to finish the stage race with an overall placing.

The prologue I once again failed to get an adequate warm up & hit the beginning stretch way too hard. Ended up with lactic acid overload before the hill even began. Definitely will plan accordingly next year.

The 90km 1a sprint the next day was pretty standard. Not having raced this before I thought there may be a chance for separation on the only "somewhat significant" hill before the turn around. Nick J with pedalhead was already up the road solo & I decided to get to the front to see who may attack. Warren M & Josh K were near the front looking frisky so I thought they wanted to jam & I went. I bridge to Nick J before the end of the hill & beginning the descent. We hit the turn around & had a climb immediately afterwards. I wasn't able to recover quickly enough to keep the pace with Nick & looked behind to see the peloton not having any of it. We re integrated but I still wanted to give it a go some more. I went with a few riders here and there whom I thought collectively we could have a shot at staying away. Everything got reeled in & RMCC did a perfect lead out for there man to take the win. After all the attacks I was happy with my mid/back pack placing.

The time trial was the next day & my legs paid for the attacks the previous day. Could never get on top of the pedals and feel in charge of the bike therefore struggled the entire duration of the TT.

The criterium was later in the evening & I really wanted to survive this. My weaknesses in the crits are definitely taking the corners without grabbing any brakes. Watching these guys elbow eachother for positioning leading into the corners and taking the corner almost at cruising flat speed without grabbing brakes was very impressive and intimidating at the same time. I was trying to hang on through the first half & started to feel good with about 15 to go. For a very small period of time I thought I actually had a shot at doing something so I moved up. At one point I moved up to 5th place behind 3 garneau evolution riders and Nick J with pedalhead.

I figured I had to stay here in order to have a shot at any sprint contest but did not have the cornering skills. I braked less and less each turn but still inevitably had to brake to save my ass from crashing through the barriers. Touching the brakes in the corners moved me from 5th to 30th in 2 turns which was frustrating. I definitely have to work on this as I race with the stronger more technically skilled riders that brake very little therefore conserving energy & minimizing the acceleration requirements each turn. I was able to finish mid pack & was happy to have a reasonable gc placing so far.

The road race I figured things would get absolutely shredded. 11 laps around tunnel mountain would tax all the riders legs for sure. Kris Dahl had GC lead going into the final road race as he crushed the prologue & TT. H & R were looking after things reasonably well minimizing threats up the road until Craig jones started to fatigue from the domestique work. I tried jumping on the back of attacking trains about 3-5 times during the race thinking I had a shot at staying away. One of the attacks that was the most dangerous was when we had about 6 riders at the bottom of the descent including Kris Dahl with a 5-10 sec gap ahead of the peloton. Unfortunately it was too early & maybe not the right team mix to get away. Later in the race a good mix of RMCC/ERTC/ROAD/H&R/Independent approx 6 riders got away & put time into us. The peloton obviously didn't chase smart but instead there were constant surges & lulls which only caused the gap to the chase group to go up. I ended up finishing on the tail end of the main peloton after not having enough jam to get over the punchy roller before the descent to the finish. Definitely need to work on my 3-5 minute power as that punchy roller proved the most difficult to get over each of the 11 laps.

With the break staying away the GC shuffled and Aaron Schooler with H&R won the overall. Congrats to him & his team for taking the win.

My teammate Evan Bayer was busy kicking ass like he has all year. He won his first cat 5 race in Velocity & won in Pigeon Lake in cat 4. He then kicked ass at Banff Bike Fest winning overall in GC for cat 4. Pretty stoked to have a strong teammate moving up very fast.

Pigeon Lake Provincials 2012

It's been a long time since I posted on the blog so it's time for a few updates.

I raced Pigeon lake in Cat 1/2 after getting the upgrade from Bikes on Broadway the weekend before.

Long story short I just didn't have jam in the legs for much. Every time I put in an effort at a certain wattage it felt way more unsustainable than what I was used to.

I think there were some nerves & anxiousness with racing my first 1/2 race that played it's tole as well.

Overall a lack of experience & perhaps cumulative fatigue caused me to get dropped early in the race when things were guttered in the wind.

Congrats to Kris Dahl who is on a tear this year for winning Alberta Road Provincials.