2013 Berkeley Bicycle Club Criterium: Fast from the Gun

By Travis Lyons I like this crit. It’s a four-corner course, about 1km in length, with a few spots of bad pavement and a pretty high crown on the road surface, making the majority of the turns off camber. The back straight has a slight hill in it, and the 3rd and finishing straights are downhill with fast turns.

Originally, we had planned on having only three riders in the field- Eric Riggs, Dana Williams, and myself. A couple of our other teammates, Shawn Rosenthal and Roman Kilun, both who live in a close area of the course, rode over to watch the event. Roman decided to race at the last minute- so you’ll have to excuse his “got dressed in the dark” appearance with miss-matched kit.

At the line we had four of the twenty-six starters in the P/1/2 field. On the whistle, Roman put in a little dig to initiate the early breakaway. Another rider followed and Dana was behind him. The three of them got a small gap before turn two as they started up the hill on the back straight. Their advantage didn’t gain them any more than 8 seconds in the first lap. Going into the second lap, the peloton started to bring back their lead on the downhill section and the gap was closed almost completely. On the back straight of the second lap, Riggs counter attacked to pass the group with Roman and Dana. A rider who tried to follow Riggs unclipped at the front of the field, and swerved off to the right of the road, and the field sat up for a second. A Davis rider went to follow Eric with me in tow, as Dana, Roman and the third rider, Rob Scheffler of Fremont Bank, followed. The Davis rider was gone after that, and I have no idea what happened him after he brought me up to my teammates. About a half a lap later, we all looked back to see about a 10 second gap to the field. Roman, Dana, Eric, myself and Rob were in the break… How’d that happen? Fewer than four laps into the race, we had all four of our riders in the five-man break.

The next thirty minutes were pretty boring for me. I sat at the back at the back, pulling through every so often to try to put Rob on the front during the headwind/crosswind sections of the course. Our gap stayed pretty steady around 20~25 seconds to the main field. From what we heard after the race, a few 2- or 3-man attempts to bridge were made without success.

We lapped the field with about ten minutes, or 8 laps to go. Roman and Eric quickly got to- and off the front again. Dana and I were back in the group of lapped riders with Rob racing for 3rd place. Roman and Eric’s group stayed off to the finish, with Roman crossing the line first.

Going into the last lap, Dana was on the front with two riders between him and Rob with me riding behind Rob. A Giga OM-ARO rider attacked going into the last lap with a rider on his wheel, Rob followed them. He attacked on the back straight and hammered into the third corner. I sat on his wheel out of the last corner and started my sprint with less than 200m to the line. I waited too long and ran out of road, so Rob took third by about a half a wheel.

2013 Colavita Grand Prix

By Dana Williams As a team we went into the P12 race with just three riders; myself, Brandon Trafton and Travis Lyons. Our main goal was to try to get Travis the win. He is a Cat 2 rider looking to upgrade to Cat 1. Brandon and I were happy to do what we could to help him collect valuable points. Both Travis and I had won a race on this course in prior years; I believe mine was the Cat 2 race two years ago and Travis in the 2/3 race last year. We talked prior to the race and realized our wins had come in similar fashion. We agreed that Travis stood the best chance of winning by having Brandon and I lead him out to an agreed upon critical point of the course, where he would start his sprint and go for the win.

There was a decent size field of around 40 guys, with one or two Cat 1 ladies jumping in for race experience, at the start. Red Peloton definitely had the biggest numbers with six or seven. From what I recall (results aren't up yet) Squadra and Olympic Club had three or four riders, MarcPro Strava and a number of other teams had two, followed by lots of solo riders. The three of us decided that we would play a more defensive role in the race based on the fact that it was Travis' second race of the day, plus we could rely on Red Peloton and other teams to chase if they weren't represented in the break.

The course isn't very technically; basically a 350 meter front and back straight away with a 100 meters on each end. Turn 1 to 2 is more like an semi circle while turn 3 to 4 has a little convex bend in it. The whole back stretch was a climb of around 2%, except for a little 50 meters 5% kicker at 200 meter. There was also a head wind. Out of turn 4 (start of the start/finish straight away) was a little 5% downhill ramp, where it then flattened out for 75 meters before the start/finish line, and then continued to turn one.

It didn't take long for guys to start attacking. I'm not sure what Red Peloton's plan was but if I was in their advantageous position, consistently throwing guys off the front would seem to be a good move. Brandon and I were doing a solid job of marking dangerous moves. At around 30-35 minutes into the race a break of 10-12 guys formed. Brandon and I were both in it but unfortunately Travis was not. In general the break was working pretty well together, with the occasional attack. Brandon and I wanted Travis to be in it so we decided we would rotate through when our turns came, without accelerating, in hopes that Travis would bridge up.

Travis ended up in a chase with four or five other riders. The gap between us bounced between 20-30 seconds for quite a while. Finally, with around 15 minutes to race, Travis and the others in his break bridged up. We were now 15-20 riders. It was now time to execute our plan. The only hitch is that Travis told me he was feeling some leg cramps and wasn't sure if he could sprint at full strength. I told him to sit in and see how things felt towards the end. On the third las lap, Brandon and I moved to the front. We rotated and set a good tempo. Travis soon found my wheel as we ended the second to last lap. Right around this time, Will Riffelmacher of the Olympic Club shot off the front in a last ditch effort to stay away. We didn't panic, kept the pace going and were able to bring him back on the back stretch.

As we crested the short 5% pitch, Brandon on the front followed by me, I looked behind and realized Travis wasn't there anymore. He would later tell us a hamstring cramp snuck up on him which ceased his effort to stay with us. It wasn't a time where we could sit up and wait as guys were nipping at my back tire like a hungry pack of wolves. It was time for 'Plan B'. Brandon dug a little deeper and got me to turn three. Guys started to swarm me so I couldn't wait any longer. I saw a little gap between two riders, stood up and sprinted. I looked back and had a little gap. I knew I had to give it all to keep away from the 'hungry dogs' chasing me down. I exited turn four in the lead and pushed hard, all the way to the line. Time was on my side and I was able to raise my hands,   in celebration of getting my first win of the year. It was even more special because my wife and two boys were there cheering me on.

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