Hi everyone,
I'm very happy to report that the Bridge Team scored a bronze in the team pursuit at the Elite Track Nationals last week. Here is the podium photo:
http://www.cyclingnews.com/races/usa-cycling-elite-track-championships-cn-1/day-2/photos/143736
Kudos to Haley and Jane (and Dan) for all the hard work they put in training and practicing! Thanks to Dan for driving all our bikes and equipment down to Carson and being director sportif, coach, mechanic, timer, and photographer for the week! Thanks also to Rich and Mary Ellen Allen, Leo, Jim Turner, and Eliot (did I miss any other AVers?) for supporting us in Carson! It was great to have a cheering section.
Here's Jane's report:
Elite Track National Championships
Team Pursuit 9/30/2010, teammates: Haley and Andi
Our first race was the team pursuit on Thursday: our team was Andi, me, and Haley. We had our order set, our strategy ready, and our communications agreed on. Unfortunately, it didn't go as smoothly as we'd hoped. The plan was for Andi to start and take one-lap pulls, followed by me taking two-lap pulls, then Haley taking one-lap pulls. Our start was okay, and I floated the second lap at 19.0 seconds, then apparently Haley and I were both feeling really good, because we went much faster than we'd planned, with me doing my second lap at 18.1 and Haley holding that pace exactly. Andi was feeling the pace a little, but she did her lap well and then I was on the front again. I'm not entirely sure how it happened after that, but sometime during my two-lap pull Haley and I gapped Andi, and I heard her say "down down down" as we'd agreed. Unfortunately, shortly after I first heard it I heard something else (it may have even been a spectator saying something), and thought that she was back on, so I kept going after a brief slowdown. Unfortunately, I was wrong, and when I pulled off for my exchange I saw Andi a little ways behind and realized my mistake. I wasn't thinking clearly though, and assumed that Haley knew that she was still off, so it took us another lap and a half for us to all come together again. I stayed on front for 3 laps to spare Andi (since she'd been in the wind going full speed for 3 laps) and Haley led us through the final lap. Despite falling apart for a few laps, we still managed to clock a 4:00, which I think is still pretty good.
There were only four teams registered, which meant that all four teams got to ride again for the finals - 1 vs 2 and 3 vs 4. We ranked 3rd. Since there weren't any other events going on that afternoon besides the Men's Team Pursuit, we only got about 30-40 minutes before we had to race again, but even though we were tired, we were glad to get a second chance. We got off to a bit of a slow start, and we were definitely tired, but we knew the other team was tired too. Coach Dan decided that since Andi had been forced to chase us for a couple of laps, she should take half-lap pulls. For the first few laps we were actually a quarter lap behind the other team, but we held it together and picked up the pace a bit, while the other team got tired and fell apart. By the end we were more than a quarter lap up on them, not far from catching them. Our time was 3:58.742, and we beat the 4th place team by nearly 8 seconds. We were all pretty thrilled to have won a bronze medal at Elite Nationals! I was lucky to have Haley and Andi on my team, they were fantastic.
--Jane
Follow the Webcor/Alto Velo Bridge Team:
– http://facebook.com/avbridge
– http://avbridge.blogspot.com/
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