Tour of the Gila Report, Photos courtesy of Bernie Digman, my dad

Well, I had big plans for writing things up on a daily basis while I was at the Tour of the Gila (TotG). That didn't quite happen, partly simply as I was having good time hanging out and doing the whole race scene, I didn't really want to spend a lot of time on the computer. Given that, apologies for the delay.

Before going too much further, I should note that this report might not be shortest. I will offer a brief summary and then go into more details on the whole weekend.

Summary
I had been thinking about doing the TotG for a long time. I don't remember too much about it from my days as a junior bike racer many years ago in New Mexico but of late, the race has gained a broader appeal and profile due in part to the "Lance effect." With Lance's racing in the past few years, the race has increased in popularity and has solidified what I think was already a great race into a great race more people have heard about. For the past few years, I've been thinking about racing it myself but have never gotten the chance. This year proved to be different and I jumped at the chance.

My race as a Category 4 rider was 4 days straight of racing done as a road race, time trial, criterium, and road race. The last day is a beast, known somewhat affectionately as the Gila Monster stage. I had a great first 3 days and had a rough one on day four. All in all a great trip and I am really thankful for support from my family -- mother, father wife and kids -- and the many friends who sent me emails and positive vibes all weekend. Big thanks to you all!

Onto the details
Stage 1
Inner Loop Road Race (60 some miles, climbs)
This one looked like it could be okay or really hard depending on the mood of the group. I was a bit unsure how I would go at altitude and all, so I lined up mid pack and was figuring I'd just check out the scene a bit as we had about three quarters of a mile neutral while dropping down a really steep hill.

Here I am making last minute preps for the race.

After the descent, the road was quite twisty and narrow. The pace seemed pretty high and about 10 minutes in, I realized that guys were throwing it down at the front already. With the climbing to start about mile 10, it just seemed way to early to do a lot of work. I opted to continue to work but not to go nuts. This approach seemed to work okay as there were a few folks around me and I ended up bundled with a small group of guys as we rolled up the hill. On the drop off this climb, we picked up a few more guys and then groups started to form as we rolled across a valley in the middle part of the race. The group that formed was quite big, circa 20-30 guys, and the fitness and group riding skills in the group were spread a bit too much. Guys were there who were working hard to stay on and there were quite a few who weren't real good with keeping things flowing in any sort of a smooth way. I didn't attack or anything but kept myself near the front and continued to work, almost hoping someone would attack so we could get ride of the guys at the back. Didn't happen but I was fine with the status quo as we rolled towards a long climb with about 15 miles to go. Here I was feeling pretty good and I moved towards the front, not so much to attack or blow the group apart but to put myself near the front so I could do an easy feed. My dad had kindly agreed to work the feed zone for me and I was looking forward to some fresh water. I didn't really pay too much attention to what was happening but settled into a good rhythm and got busy climbing. It felt good and I realized I was breaking the group apart. It was a nice thought, me, from Minnesota weighing a good bit more than some of these dudes, on the front and riding them off the wheel.

Got my water and kept at it. Near the top of the hill, I looked around and saw a small number of guys from the group were not too far back. The wind was picking up, and coming straight at us, so I chilled it a bit and rejoined these guys.

We start taking turns and make good progress over the climb and down. As we go, we pick up more guys and the story of earlier starts to repeat as some were over their head. I follow the same plan, no attacks, just keep riding and enjoy the shelter I can have. With a few miles to go, I realize the number of guys is down again and I am waiting for the attacks to start. I knew we were back from the front of the race but wasn't sure how much. I was confident attacking this group for a small amount of time wasn't going to be that worthwhile so I kept things pretty comfortable. I found myself in the lead with a mile or so to go, still no attacks, so I hold the front and slowly start to ramp things up. With about 500 meters to go, we're moving along pretty hard and no one's jumped yet. At this point, guys jump around me and I speed up a bit but don't go nuts as the need to bury myself for a handful of seconds with 3 hard days to go seems silly. Finish and am really happy with how I've ridden and the quality of the riders around me.

Big ups for day 1.

Day 2 Time Trial (16 or so miles)
This was a day defined by crazy winds. I've raced on some windy days before, but this was likely the windiest day I've ever raced, maybe even ridden. We're talking severe wind advisory, steadily blowing at 25-30 mph with gusts in excess of 40. With that in mind, i was glad I hadn't planned to ride a TT bike with deep wheels as that was not a good choice on the day. Some guys did it, but the ones who used disks in the rear didn't use a deep front. I was on a set of 404s and that was plenty deep up front, a 303 would have been better but that was the wheels I brought so there wasn't a whole lot of thinking to do about it. Road bike with 404s was the equipment on the day, no shortie aero bars, just me a road bike and 16.5 miles of TTing fun.

I rode up to the start location, which was about 6 miles out of town. The legs felt pretty good on the way up and I was thinking that it was looking to be a good day as far as how the legs were responding. I lined hung around awhile, got in a few more minutes of riding to prep for the race and then rolled over to the start line. It was fun hanging around with the guys I'd ridden with the day before. Since the TT start times were in reverse finish order, all my riding buddies were starting right around me. I was the 2nd of our group to go and I had it in my mind that I was going to make sure that none of them came around me. Immediately out of the gate, I felt pretty good. I was working pretty hard but made sure I didn't do the classic move in the first TT of the year, i.e. the first 5 minutes feel pretty decent and you go way too hard.

Immediately out of the start, the course started going up. I'd looked at the profile and it looked to be flat for 1 mile before starting to climb but this was most certainly not flat. Couple that with the fact that the wind seemed to be coming straight at me and it was a SLOW start. I went a few minutes in a stupid gear combo as I was not liking the idea of coming out of the big ring up front but soon enough it was clear that I really needed to do that to get my cadence up a bit higher. So, with a bit of an ego check, I downshifted. Immediately I did notice that my power went up and the effort felt better. As I was rolling up, I faced an interesting situation. I felt like I was pacing myself appropriately, working hard but not too hard. I was looking at my power meter and the numbers were low, like more 20 watts too low. I had done a calibration right before starting and the value from the calibration seemed a bit off, not terribly off, but a bit off. I didn't try again at the time as I needed to get ready to start. Normally you'd just do a quick calibration check and move on. To do that when using a Quarq, you'd either completely stop for a hard calibration or pedal backwards 4 times while coasting. Only thing was I was in a race so option 1 is out. And to pedal backwards for that long on this uphill stretch of road going into a 20+ mph wind meant I'd likely slow to a stop as well. So, I opted to trust myself sense of perceived exertion with the idea that I'd do the soft calibration once I started going downhill.

So I trusted my effort and hoped that my watts were not as bad as I kept seeing on the computer for what seemed like a really long time as the uphill just kept going. Finally I got to the top and prepared for the descent. A quick soft calibration and away I went down. I was blasting along, feeling pretty good when I came to a point where there was a canyon that would have crossed the road. The wind was screaming through the canyon and I was blown hard to the left and I was not a happy camper as I felt like I barely had control of the bike, if the balance wasn't in the wind's favor. I kept it together and after an all too short downhill, the course started going up again. Much like earlier, the profile had suggested that the course was flat, uphill, downhill and then flat to turn around. It was more like uphill, downhill, uphill, downhill, uphill turn around and do the previous route in the other order.

Near the half way point I could tell I'd been marshaling my efforts pretty well as I was fairly tired. I had made progress on the guy who started 30 seconds in front of me and was hoping to get him soon. As we climbed away from the turn around, he started to stand a lot more and try to keep up the momentum. I was pleased to catch him soon thereafter. As I rolled up, I could see it increased his determination as he didn't let me pass and picked it up. After about a minute of being nearly even, I started to pull away while keeping the same effort. Soon, I'd gapped him pretty well.

Throughout the TT, I kept telling myself that it wasn't really a 16 mile TT but a 13 mile TT as the last 3 miles were pretty much downhill. I was really dreading the mile from 12 to 13 as it was the steepest uphill on the course and I was getting increasingly tired. But luck was on my side for a bit as this section had a strong tailwind so I was partly blown up the top half of the climb. I also just sucked it up and got myself up it pretty strong and ready to start the plunge back to the finish.

While tired, I was really looking forward to the downhill. I've read about it and everyone always talks about how fast it is. The speed seemed exciting, though for the first 1 mile or so of the downhill, the side winds were really strong. It was steep enough I was about to go into a full downhill tuck whereby you take your butt off the seat, stick your head near your handlebars with your legs hugging the top tube. I got my butt up for about half a second and realized I didn't want to do that again, I needed the weight on the bike to hold it on the road. So, in lieu of my tuck, I pedaled and boy did I pedal, really fast! I was moving along and having fun. Passed another guy. Looking down at my garmin, which had converted itself to metric units for the 2nd day in a row, much to my annoyance, I saw numbers that were high, like 72 or 73. I wasn't doing too good of a job of converting that to miles per hour but I knew it was fast. Down I went and for all the talk of taking it pretty easy during the TT, that was not what I did. As I pushed for the line, I'd really given it everything I had on the day.

I finished and was tired, windblown and happy. Another race, another well done effort.

Looking at the power file later, I'm pretty sure I was correct in the calibration being off at the start. The watts for the first 15 minutes of the ride were the lowest of the race, despite being uphill into a head wind and at the start. That's highly unlikely. Given the watts I put up over the 2nd half of the course and the way the effort went, it was a well done TT. Nice job athlete Jason, Coach Jason is proud of your execution:)

Day 3 Silver City Downtown Criterium (15 laps, about 16 miles)
This was the day I had been dreading as I prepared for the TotG. I am not that great of a crit rider in the first place. Also, from a physiological point of view, the fitness to do short hard efforts that are repeated many times over are just what you lose the ability to do well when going up in elevation. Prior to the race, this day looked like it could be a bad one. As I warmed up, I had a great frame of mind. I was happy, relaxed and determined to have fun. If I got dropped, I'd work hard and do what I could. If not, all the better.

As a sign of my good attitude, pic above.

My dad was up in Silver City with me and he signed his coffee business up to be a part of the expo. It was fun to see the Milagro Coffee van and him around at the start. I hung with him a bit and then lined up and was ready to go.

I am really happy that I kept my attitude in a good place, particularly as I missed my pedal at the crit start and was immediately in the back 3rd of the field. I dealt with it and moved back up. Given the course, which includes a hill, 2 steep downhills and a long homestretch, I wanted to spend the first few laps figuring out how the course was riding. I'd ridden it ahead of time but no matter how well you know a course in practice, it's always a bit different with 75 of your closest friends riding around it with you.

First few laps went fine, not too hard but not real easy either. I was still in the back third of the field but the yo-yo effect wasn't too bad so I stayed there as it seemed the safest place to be.

As the race wore on, I kept doing what I needed to do. There were a few attacks but nothing too terrible and the course was really holding things together. The downhills really neutralized the ability of anyone to get a decent gap and hold it. The little climber type guys could get a gap on the up but me and the rest of the pack didn't have to work real hard to close it as we bombed the downs. I'd been doing a mental countdown on the laps and when we got to 5 to go, I was still doing what I'd been doing and was starting to feel pretty good. There was no way I was getting dropped now.

Rolling into 3 laps to go and I was actually thinking about my placing, it was fun. We picked it up a bit for the 2nd to last lap and I was still pretty comfortable, well I should say comfortable in the sense of being about 5 minutes from done while doing a 45 minute criterium comfortable, i.e. it hurt but I wasn't totally shelled. Into the last lap and I was confident I'd finish on the same time with the leaders which was really encouraging. Up the hill and I found myself feeling quite good. With a crash on my left, the field started to break up and I was on the tail end of the lead group. I let a slight gap go into the big turns but as I hit the homestretch, I felt great and could see guys ahead of me. Logic says I should have basically sat up and rolled it across the line for a safe and relaxed finish. Well, logic wasn't ruling the day. I gunned it and sprinted it out, passing a couple of guys down the home stretch. It was a blast and while I was not that close to the front, i.e. my sprint was pretty much pointless, it felt great and I was thrilled with the day. I think I even sat up across the line, both hands off the bars, yea haw!

As we rolled a low key lap, a bunch of guys around me were commenting on how fun that race had been and I totally agreed. If only crits could be more like this one, I'd have to give them a few more chances.

I spent the rest of the day watching some great racing, often from the side of my dad's coffee van. It was a ton of fun! Most impressive of all the racing action I think was the cat 2 race where 3 guys broke away early and build up a huge lead, like over half a lap huge. They worked their tails off for at least 45 minutes and it was awesome to watch. One of the 3 jumped with 2 laps to go and held off the other two guys for the last 2 laps by himself for a solo win about 5 seconds ahead.

Closed off the day with a great dinner and a headed to bed happy and content. No matter what happened the next day, it had been a great race.

Day 4 Gila Monster Road Race, 72 miles or so

As I woke up Sunday, I could tell I'd lost a bit of the mental drive I'd had the last 3 days. I don't know if it was a bit of mental fatigue or if my mind knew things about the status of my body but that's the way it was. I took care of all needed business, checked out of the hotel and all that kind of thing and headed to the start. It was a cold morning, at least for New Mexico in May, and I was not exactly sure what to wear.

I lined up and was feeling pretty ready for what was to come.

What was to come was 70+ miles of hard road racing with several hard and long climbs. At least we had a few miles of neutral to roll out of town. I just kept hoping people didn't throw it down right out of the neutral zone as I was not quite sure what I had. Things kept calm for the first part of the race after the neutral and I was glad for it.

Rolling along in the field felt okay. We took a big turn after about 5 miles and the start of the hills brought out action. Almost immediately I was struggling with the high effort. It felt like I just didn't have a lot of game today. I did what I could but basically had to let the group go pretty early into the race as the pace was just hotter than I could muster.

I was near a guy I'd ridden with on the first day and we agreed to work together to do what we could. He was a TT type guy like myself and I was sure we could get ourselves through it if we didn't hit the uphills super hard. We stayed together, taking turns working through the next 10 miles or so. We saw the field on a few occasions but always nearly catching back right before climbs when they'd jump again and the gap would grow.

We were moving along and then we hit a section and we were both really surprised to see the field right in front of us. I yelled at the dude to hold my wheel and put in a major effort. I closed the last 150 yards and we were happy to rejoin the pack. The pace at this point was pretty easy, in fact, the group even stopped for a "nature break" just like you'd see in the pro tour. Even after the unofficial rest stop, the pace wasn't too bad and I kept myself tucked in with the group for the upcoming miles feeling okay but not great.

The proceeding pattern occurred again, Jason in field, action heats up on uphill, Jason gets dropped only to claw back into the field again. I was happy to be in the field as we rolled along about 50 miles into the race. This was where the real fun was about to start. Just after the 50 mile point, we made a big turn and the hardest climb of the race started. It was steep, and while not crazy long, it was long enough to hurt for quite awhile.

Once upon the climb, the action started at the front and I excused myself from it, opting to climb at my own effort level. Almost immediately after the climb started, I could tell my body was not in a good place. My stomach was off, too full with fluid but as I looked at my bottles, I could tell I hadn't drank that much, likely far too little given how long we'd been riding and what was to come. Damn!

The last 20 miles were ones to forget and I am going to start the process right now. I got it done, albeit slowly. I can say the course was gorgeous and if I'd been feeling like myself I would have enjoyed the views, or the racing, a lot more. Oh well.

I was proud of the fact that while I was snailing up the last mile to the finish, a guy came up on me with about 300 yards to go and I held him off in the epic crawl for whatever huge number was about to be our place. At least it wasn't huge +1.

Upon finishing, a lady comes over and suggests I head to medical, that's how good I looked:) I held off but realized I was not in a great place as I was about to start shaking so took off the race kit and borrowed a jacket. After some time, I came around but the full extent of my dehydration became a lot more clear.

While my last few hours at the Tour of the Gila were not great, the same can't be said for the weekend as a whole. It was a great event and I am still excited about it as I write this 4 days later. I haven't committed to going in in 2012 quite yet but the 5 day, 40 plus race is tempting me.

Thanks for reading and see you at the races!