Today I raced the Fremont Peak Hill Climb in San Juan Baptista. It was a 10 mile climb. The first four miles were uphill with some rolling terrain. The last six miles had grades averaging from 6-8%. The second to last mile was the hardest. In the last mile there was a slight downhill and with a slight uphill in the finishing straight.
I got to the race two hours in advance mainly to preview the course to see what was in store for me today. Towards the top of the climb some of the views were incredible. It was exposed so you could see the green valleys down below.
At the start line there were a few names there in my category that I recognized. But my main concern was Nate English from Yahoo! who brought a teammate with him today. It was no secret that he was the strongest rider there. The race started with Nate's teammate setting a moderate tempo on the flat section right before the climb. He carried it through the first section of climb. There were a few minor attacks at this point, but nothing serious. With ten kilometers to go it started to get serious. Nate set a hard tempo on a steeper part of the course which began to show who came here for the win. I looked back and we were already down to three. With 5k to go it started to get really steep. I was only able to put in a little bit of tempo without cracking. If I had cracked with Nate English on my wheel, it would have been all over. So I was being really smart about my output. He was not too happy with my tactics so he decided to basically come to a complete stop to let me pull through. I did, but didn't put in my full effort. I pealed off and he immediately attacked which was the first of many. For the last kilometer it was simply a game of tactics. The last rider we dropped caught us and went straight on by to solo in. I jumped straight on his wheel and Nate jumped on mine. Because we were on a slight downhill we were hitting speeds over 40mph. It was a fast finish. With 100 meters to go Nate jumped around me going for the win but went a little to early. With 20 meters to go I was able to come around him for the win. It was such a good feeling. I really wanted to get a win before the season ended and I did. To add to the excitement when I got back to the bottom I found out that I had broke the course record set by Jesse Moore of Cal Giant/ Specialized by 13 seconds. It was a good experience and a good end of the year result. Thanks for reading.
