Just one of those weekends...

Here I'm radioing to the laws of physics: "Please make this pain stop!"

 

Six days after my first ascent up Mount Washington on a bicycle, which resulted in a second place finish, I took the biggest beating of my hill climbing career on Mount Ascutney.  Being the BUMPS point series overall leader, I received a super neat polka-dot jersey before the race start.  Much to my chagrin, I did not do my new tunic victorious justice.  In cycling, there's a myth of the curse of the World Champion.  The person who wins the World Championships, either in the road race or time trial disciplines, has a horrendous season the following year.  Perhaps there is a curse of the BUMPS polka-dot jersey?  I doubt it.  Besides, I think the jersey's pretty cool and would be really disappointed if I was defrocked of my lordship of the hill climbs.


I climbed Ascutney at speeds slower than those of the Trojan Horse as it was pushed by the Greeks into the city of Troy.  As seen from the expression on my face in the photo, I am most definitely not enjoying myself.  I'm not sure what happened.  I got a great night's sleep in my own bed, I had the car packed up and ready to go the night before, I had my favorite summertime dinner, and I was all jazzed up on the triple espresso that is the Tour de France.  Game on. 

But as soon as Phil Wong, coming straight out of retirement, shot off the start line like it was cyclocross race, I knew I was going to have to race harder than I have this year.  To make matters tougher, Mr. Jake Hollenbach made a locals' race appearance, as did good friend David Glick.  Add to those guys Brent Mellen who beat my record by :16 seconds at Burke, and the usual suspects Paul Runyon, Ian Gordon, and Gerry Clapper.  Ascutney was as stacked as a game of Jenga.  Phil's weightless ascent up the first kilometer of the mountain coaxed Jake and David with him, and soon Brent was passing me, too.  Considering my overall score in the points series, I was somewhat content just to try and beat Paul and Ian.  Not quite.  Although Paul faded early, Ian dieseled forward and soon had a sizable gap.  All I could do was to try to limit my losses and make sure I stayed ahead of Paul.  By the end of the race, I was more than three minutes behind Jake's winning time of 25:25, just :35 seconds shy of the record.  Now, Jake's an amazing rider, but statistically we're pretty evenly matched when it comes to climbing.  This day, however, he was clearly on form.  Congrats.  When the points were calculated the next day, I remained in the lead but second place now went to Ian Gordon while Paul bumped down to third.

Former teammate Tim Mitchell leads me around the bottom corner

Blast off up the hill

After Ascutney, I put my sorrows in a sack and drove the back way, the waaay back way into Maine to spend the night there to do the Yarmouth Clam Festival race the next morning.  This race is almost always hot and sunny and the crowds, the atmosphere, and the fact that the course passes my high school each lap make this a must-do-even-if-I'm-retired race each summer.  What was great for me this year was that I wasn't on a team and could wear any clothing I wanted to, literally.  Another former teammate of mine, Alain Ferry, wore a baggy cotton t-shirt and day-glo orange board shorts.  I donned the Bike Center's Middlebury kit.  It's a little ambiguous: Some people think it's the Middlebury College cycling clothing, others recognize that it's the town of Middlebury's cycling clothing.  Both are right.  Not surprisingly, I heard a few "Go Midd!" cheers from the crowd.  I did not go to Middlebury College.  Snake from The Simpsons presumably did, but not me.  

I'm really paying more attention to the concession stands to my left

Anyway, I was mysterious and unrecognizable, and I was riding very well, if I do say so myself.  About three laps in, Tim Mitchell dove through the course's second corner and I followed, bringing with us two other breakaway companions-to-be.  The four of us kept a healthy pace going for a lap, but poor cooperation and pacelining slowed us during our second lap and suddenly Jonathan Page was breathing down our necks.  I took a rest the next two laps but never hitched a ride near the back.  When another CCB rider took off solo, I moved to the front to drive the pace and soon found myself in another breakaway, this time bigger and more threatening.  This was it!  I could feel it.  This would be the year I was going to get a decent result at the Clam Fest, perhaps even a top-3, perhaps even a win!  However (and you could just tell this wasn't going to end well, right?), with two laps to go, there was a little "Argy-Bargy" as famous cycling commentator Paul Sherwin likes to say.  After some physical altercations between two riders in the breakaway, I thought for sure the pack would catch us.  As I moved back off of my rotation in line, I bumped a rider and then hit a crack in the road, which caused my computer sensor to dive right into my spokes.  Nothing was broken, or so I thought, but it became quickly obvious that I would have to pull over to take the thing off.  Unfortunately, I had to take my wheel off as the sensor was hanging off of the outside of the hub, and by the time I got that sorted out, the pack was upon me.  As I sprinted to catch the tail end of it, I felt tremendous hesitation in my front wheel and saw that my front left brake pad had come loose during the incident and was pushing hard against the rim.  For the next mile, I rode one-handed, attempting to move and tighten the pad down while chasing the slowly fading-in-the-distance peloton.  And that was it.  I fell prey to the wheel goblin that was my computer sensor.  A 10 gram piece of plastic and electronics took me out.  I will do that race again though, even if I have to count the seconds between telephone poles to gauge my speed.  Long live the Yarmouth Clam Festival Race and happy 30th anniversary!

Next up: Equinox on August 7th.