Two Wrongs Don’t Make a Right and The Eight Turn Circle

I ride criterium races like I ride mountain bikes. Not very well.

Its not that crits scare me a whole lot - I think that my lack of aggressiveness and my ‘whatever’ attitude are incompatible with the criterium race format. I’m not into fighting with guys for position, I’m not into going around corners really fast, and when I ride my bike I usually prefer to turn both left AND right.

So given that, I don’t know why I thought it would be a good idea to race both the Masters B crit and the Cat 3 crit one right after the other at the state championships on Sunday. It was either commitment or stupidity – or a stupid commitment – or a commitment to stupidity.

You get the idea. Here’s the race recap…

Masters B. Riding along, ho hum, turning left, riding some more, turning left again, was that a right turn? – no just kind of a right veer, that guy wants in front of me – ok. Turning left, ride a little bit, turn left again (was that a brick crosswalk – not good), whoa what is that up there – a chicane? Yup, I think they call that a chicane – I think I call it a cluster fuck and a bad idea, ride straight some more, turn left (whoops, drug a pedal – whatever). Repeat for 45 minutes. Is this the last lap – good. These guys are nuts, they can have their medal – I will buy my own.

Cat 3. That last race was harder than I thought. Turn left, ride a little bit, turn left, veer right. These guys are faster than the other ones. Turn left, turn left, chicane go strait, left, left veer right, straight, left, left, chicane, who’s bike is making that sound, left, left, veer right,left,left,chicane,left.left – repeat for about 20 minutes until – well this sucks I am getting pulled – thank God.

All in all not a bad day of crit-ing. Didn’t fall off, that’s always good. They said the course had eight turns, but it was essentially a circle – I don’t know how that works. Maybe that is why I am lousy at crits. Whatever…