This past weekend, a group of us drove up to New Hampshire for the last races of the season: the ECCC championships, hosted by UNH. Once again, we had fantastic host housing (thanks, Mom and Dad!), with a quiet place to hang out and sleep and plenty of great food. Oh, and we rode our bikes a little, too – more on that in a minute. I think we’re all sad to see the season end, but it’s been a lot of fun. Thanks to everyone who helped out – Joe and Alan for keeping things running smoothly in the conference, John Frey at Velocity Results for all of the timing, and the rest of the ECCC for hosting great races and providing solid competition and entertaining antics. And, of course, thanks to Jon Beyer for coaching us, and to everyone else on the team for riding, racing, and just being involved in Princeton Cycling.

Now for the race reports…

Saturday’s road race was in Strafford, NH, and consisted of a 20-mile figure-eight course with rolling hills and two main short but steep climbs. Men’s A raced 4 laps (80 miles), men’s B raced 3 (60 miles), and men’s C raced 2 (40 miles). Sunday’s crit was a 4-corner, 1-kilometer loop on the UNH campus in Durham and featured a small rise after turn 1 and a screaming headwind on the finishing straight.

Charlie made his second appearance of the season with us, racing in the men’s A category. He had a strong performance in the road race on Saturday, attacking in the middle of the race and splitting up the field. He spent some time in a breakaway or two, and while two Brown riders ultimately escaped to take the top two spots, Charlie rolled in with the next group to take 9th place. In Sunday’s crit, he attacked hard midway through the race and bridged to a lone RIT rider off the front, establishing the winning break of four riders that ultimately gained over 30 seconds on the main field. He sprinted in for a great 2nd-place finish.

David and Andrew (me) raced in men’s B. In Saturday’s road race, we both stuck with the pack until the end of the second lap, when a Penn State rider attacked hard up the climb to the finish and shattered the field, dropping David and me in the process. After the feed zone (thanks to Jon for a perfect water bottle handoff), I regrouped with a couple of other riders and managed to chase back to the lead group; David couldn’t quite make it, but he worked with a chase group and ended up finishing a respectable 23rd. In the lead group, we soon caught a UNH rider who had been off the front for the entire race (over 40 miles). Things then eased up for a few minutes. With about 16 miles to go in the race, I was riding near the front, pulled through, and noticed that there was no one on my wheel. I expected the gap to close quickly, but it didn’t; after thinking about my options, I let myself drift slowly off the front without making an obvious attack. When I had a little bit of room, I just put my head down, went into TT mode, and rode as hard as I could for the next 45 minutes. I was sure I’d get caught, but somehow, I managed to hold off the chasers and take my first win ever! Crossing the finish line by myself at Easterns was an awesome feeling. Sunday’s crit was much less eventful; David and I both finished with the pack in one big field sprint, while a Killington Mountain School rider built a 10-second gap on the field to take the win.

Joe and John both raced in men’s C. Joe had a good showing, hanging with the field for as long as he could and ultimately finishing only a couple of minutes behind the winner; he placed 26th in a large combined C1+C2 field of 54 riders. He was actually 12th within the C2 category, which means he grabbed a couple of points – nice! John unfortunately missed the notification about combining C fields and was late to the start line; he managed to chase back on and catch the field, but halfway through the first lap, he crashed going into a sharp left turn. While road rash is never fun, we’re glad he didn’t suffer anything worse, and he was even feeling good enough to race on Sunday. In the crit, John and Joe both found themselves a little out of position at the start, and although they worked hard to move up, they fell victim to the strong wind and were unable to catch the leaders.

Jon came as well to watch and support (and drive). Thanks, Jon!

Dartmouth was a great (and brutal) weekend.  Luckily the rain held off both days just long enough we weren’t riding in the rain, at the very least.  We stayed with a spectacular host family right on campus, ate some delicious food, and survived the long drive.

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Andrew’s Race Report (Men’s B):
Saturday’s ITT went pretty well; they cut off about 1.5 miles from last year’s course – which also cut the climbing in half – and didn’t tell us, but fortunately, Becca went first and got back in time to warn me. The race was less than 6 minutes. I started a little too hard but hung on and still had an ok race, placing 6th (only 12 seconds behind 1st). In the afternoon, I lined up for the crit, which started out at a pretty easy pace. I attacked after the first prime and got a gap with two other riders; we only stayed away for a couple of laps but that move split the field apart. I recovered for a while, took 3rd in a prime without having to work too hard, and then attacked one more time as hard as I could with 3.5 laps to go but couldn’t get anywhere. I then actually managed something resembling a sprint – which is much more than I usually do – for 8th place, although there was a crash behind me in the last turn that held up much of the rest of the field.

Sunday’s road race was one of the hardest races i’ve ever done. The first lap was easy; we started so slowly that we got neutralized for the A/B women to pass us (but that was silly because we passed them back right away). The second lap was brutal. A rider from McGill, who has won a couple of the uphill ITTs this season, just put the hammer down and broke everything up. I was right on his wheel waiting for that to happen and stayed with him and the other leaders, but it really hurt. From there it was just a race of attrition…no attacks, just see who could survive up the climb every lap. I fell off the back a little with a UNH rider after the 4th climb but we chased back on during the descent (at 50+ mph!). I think there were 10 of us left starting the 5th climb. I hung in for a little and thought I might make it, but then I cracked about halfway up and got dropped hard. I rode the rest solo, caught one rider from Killington Mountain School (who had also popped) on the 6th and final climb, and rode with him to the finish, where he outsprinted me for 7th and I took 8th.

This was the first weekend I’ve been top 10 in all three events, so I was pretty happy about that. Next weekend is Easterns at UNH!

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Becca’s Race Report (Women’s C):
Saturday was a good day for me.  The time trial was about half as long as I expected (in my defense, the copy of the race flier I had printed out wasn’t the updated version – that’s what I get preparing ahead of time!) (Andrew’s note: the current flier still has the full-length ITT. Not your fault, Becca!) but it was a pleasant surprise to not have to do the second climb.  The frat row crit was good, I managed to grab a prime early in the race and just barely hung on to the field to roll in at the end and nab some points.   Sunday was rough, the climb was more than I wanted to do 3 times so I (along with a few other sane souls) dropped out to save ourselves for the taxing drive home in the rain.  I did get to practice my bottle hand-off skills – botched the first one but got Andrew a new bottle on the second go around.  Of course I didn’t bring my camera, anticipating the rain, but hopefully we’ll get some pictures at Easterns next weekend!

Pictures from many of the race weekends this season are finally online.  Albums can be viewed here: http://s1167.photobucket.com/albums/q634/rthorsness/

Enjoy!

The team just got back from a great weekend at Army.  A better race report is still to come, but I just wanted to highlight some awesome results from the weekend.  Princeton was 14th of 32 teams who scored points (and a good number didn’t score any points) this weekend, a great result for us!  Notable results include:

Charlie Avis was 3rd in the men’s A hill climb ITT with 2 full water bottles and won the open ITT, though they refused to pay the cash prize because there weren’t enough entrants.  He finished 5th in the crit.  And this was the day after racing Battenkill!

Andrew Weinstein was 2nd in the men’s B road race, he easily won the sprint in his break group of 3 (the lone winner was 40 second ahead of the chase group).  He was 6th in the ITT and 13th in the crit.

David Hocker was 20th in the men’s B road race, rolling in with the field in a race that saw over a quarter of the field drop.  In the ITT he finished a strong 21st.

Alex Creely finished 12th in the men’s C2 road race (although all 80+ C’s raced together, he was in the low 30s in the combined field).  He turned in a strong 5th place finish in the ITT and was 16th in the crit.

Tanner DeVoe rode close to Alex in the C2 road race, finishing 11th.  In the ITT he was 9th.  He crashed hard in the crit but seemed enthusiastic despite his road rash, hopefully he’ll be back with a vengeance!

John McSpedon rode a strong road race, but really turned it up on Sunday for the ITT and crit.  He finished 14th in the C2 ITT field, and was 13th in the crit, despite crashing hard during the race and jumping back into the field after taking his free lap.

Joe Turner ran into some issues with his number pinning skills on Saturday, as the camera didn’t recognize him in the road race, but he made up for it on Sunday.  He was 12th in the C2 ITT and 22nd in the crit and managed to stay upright when many others didn’t.

Lawrence Diao turned in an excellent 6th place finish in the D2 road race, and was 15th in the ITT.  He crashed in the crit but took his free lap and jumped back in, pulling a chase pack for half the race even with his back brake rubbing the entire time, to finish 20th.

Josh Chen was 24th in the D2 road race, and climbed to a strong 17th in the hill climb ITT.  He avoided crashes in the crit to finish safely with the chase group in 22nd.  This was is first weekend with clipless pedals, and he handled them like a pro, even when his chain fell off in the road race and he had to stop and unclip to fix it!

Hopefully we’ll get race reports and pictures up soon, but wanted to make sure we got results up fast.  We have a small contingent headed to Dartmouth next weekend, but plan to pack up the vans for Easterns at UNH the weekend after that.  Here’s hoping our great results continue!

Harvard’s bike trailer was broken into at the Yale race this weekend and 11 of their bikes were stolen.  For those who frequently look at Craigslist and the like (especially on the East Coast), please keep an eye out for these bikes in case the thieves try to sell.  Yeah, we know it’s Harvard, but I have no doubt they’d do the same for us, and collegiate cycling really is a community.

this past friday, six of us loaded a couple of vans and headed out to happy valley for the nittany cycling classic hosted by penn state. conditions were oddly similar to last year’s easterns race at the same venue, with cool temperatures and some heavy fog for saturday’s races, but the rain mostly held off and the sun actually came out on sunday to warm us up at the end of a hard weekend of racing. thanks to penn state for hosting and for bringing the ECCC back to suffer once again on the slopes of black moshannon.

saturday started off with the team time trials. we had two racers each in B, C, and D, but we opted to combine and create two teams of three. kraus and adam raced up with joe in the Cs and tanner raced with david and me in the Bs. the C guys put in a solid effort, and while they came up against some stiff competition, their time would have put them right in the middle of the D field, which isn’t bad considering that two of the three of them usually race in that category. david, tanner, and i went at a hard but manageable pace, and while we placed near the back of the B field, we think we saved a little extra energy for the road race later in the day. we worked well together and tanner got some great experience in his first event of the season.

within only an hour or two, it was time for joe, tanner, kraus, and adam to head off for the C and D road races. both categories raced one 21.5-mile lap around the infamous black moshannon course, which features a monster of a climb that gains approximately 1500 feet of elevation in 6 miles. in the Cs, tanner put in a very strong showing in his first mass start race, placing 16th in a combined C1+C2 field of 69 riders. joe fought hard and came in only a few minutes back, placing right in the middle of the field. kraus and adam both put out solid efforts in the D field; simply surviving black mo’ is an accomplishment in and of itself.

david and i raced in the Bs soon after the other guys finished. the first few miles were pretty uneventful, but as soon as we reached the first of two small climbs after the big opening descent, a few strong riders went to the front and pushed the pace, splintering the field. i hung on through the rollers – with david close behind – to the base of the main climb, at which point four or five riders rode off the front and the rest of us were left to suffer in their wake. i regrouped with two riders at the top of the climb and we managed to chase back to the leaders early in the second lap. a couple of others caught up as well, and by the time we reached the bottom of the climb the second time around, there were nine of us in the lead group. i was dropped immediately, rode the rest of the way up as hard as i could on my own, and caught one other rider at the top. we worked together to the finish and he beat me in the sprint, but i was pretty happy with 9th place and don’t think i could have ridden much harder. david met up with a few other riders after the first climb and descent and worked with that group for the rest of the race. he was prepared to claim a small victory from his companions at the finish, but an inconveniently parked car prompted him to mistime his sprint.

on sunday, we headed into the center of state college for a flat, fast, 6-corner criterium with a very technical chicane in the middle. position was important on this course; fields string out early going through the chicane, and anyone in the back is hard-pressed to chase back on. in the D race, adam and kraus got great position near the start. adam’s effort from the day before took its toll on his legs and he was eventually pulled, but kraus continued to move up throughout the race and finished a very respectable 12th place in a race where only 18 of the 38 starters were able to finish and avoid getting pulled. in the C2 race, joe had a slight disagreement with a curb, but fortunately, a strategically placed bale of hay intervened to break up the conflict and save him from any significant harm. he got back on the bike and bravely rode solo for several more laps, but was unable to catch back up and was eventually pulled. tanner escaped the offending curb and had an awesome race, placing 5th in his first crit ever and snagging 4th in a prime along the way. we’re glad he finally started racing.

in the B race, david and i learned that we should warm up closer to the staging area. we didn’t hear our first call and were consequently the last ones to the line. the race strung out immediately from the gun, and we were left chasing as hard as we could from the back of the field. david joined a group of several other riders to chase, but ultimately got stuck behind a few too many gaps, and his entire group was pulled. i expected the same fate, but after 15 minutes of what amounted to a solo time trial with sprints out of every corner, i managed to catch the lead group and get some much-needed rest. after i had recovered, i moved up and tried one unsuccessful attack with a few laps to go, after which i rolled in for 14th in a field that had dwindled to just 19 out of 44 starters by the finish.

we had a lot of fun, almost all of us stayed rubber-side down (and we’re glad joe wasn’t hurt), and we were all exhausted when we got back to princeton last night. the team is taking next weekend off and won’t be sending anyone to yale, but we plan to be back out there at army the following weekend.

Last weekend, we hosted our own very successful race!  Turnout from both the team and the conference was superb, and despite the brutal hills, it seems that everyone enjoyed the weekend.  Overall, Princeton finished the weekend in 16th of 33 teams, thanks to the strong riding of Austin and Nick Bax in the A field.

Saturday featured the Skillman road race.  Although the loop was on the short side for a road race at 4.5 miles, the 400 feet of climbing per lap managed to break up the field in many of the races.  In the D field, Lawrence finished in the middle of the field in 20th place, just 2 minutes behind the leaders, in his second race ever!  Michael followed in 24th, Adam in 30th, Elan in 35th, and Josh in 39th (also just his 2nd race).  I (Becca) just missed out on points, finishing 13th in the Women’s C field, while Rebecca rolled in soon after me in 20th.  In men’s C, Jacob pulled the pack for most of the race but didn’t have quite enough kick in the final sprint, finishing 13th.  Alex had a great race, hanging with the pack rolling in for a strong 16th place finish.  Joe and John fell off the pack but worked together for a strong finish.  In the “killer B’s” Andrew turned in a strong 15th place finish, while David and Anthony weren’t far behind in 24th and 27th, respectively.  In the A’s, Austin finished in 20th in the field sprint, while Nick took 34th.

Sunday began with a 4.5 mile hill climb ITT in Stokes State Park, near Augusta in Northern New Jersey.  Princeton men were strong across the board, with Nick taking 4th and Austin 11th in the A’s; Andrew 4th, Anthony 15th, and David 22nd in the B’s; Jacob 4th, Alex 22nd, Joe 33rd and John 46th in the C’s; I was 10th and Rebecca 11th in the Women’s C’s; and Michael 35th, Elan 38th, Lawrence 45th, and Adam 50th in the D’s.  The results bode well for next week at Penn State, which features a grueling 5-mile climb in the Black Mo Road Race.

We then moved to the Sussex County Fairgrounds for the longer-that-average crit, a 1.5-mile 7-corner course that featured one short rise and a steady headwind on the back section.  In the D’s, Lawrence turned in a strong 11th place finish, Adam rolled in at 19th, and Elan followed in 23rd.  In Women’s C’s, I managed to pick up a few preme points in my 8th place finish, and Rebecca turned in a strong 18th.  The Men’s C featured a very strong race from Jacob who ended up 5th, while Joe had a great race hanging in the large field ending up 32nd.  Alex rolled in 49th, and John 51st.  As usual, the B’s had great races,with Andrew and Anthony barely missing the points in 16th and 17th, and David finishing a strong 33rd.  Austin ended up 20th in the A field, and got the attention of the always verbose announcers for his attacks to keep the race interesting.

All in all, it was a great weekend for the Princeton team and the ECCC in general.  The predicted rain held off, and although a bit chilly some of us still managed to get a little sunburned!  We owe our coach Jon a huge thanks for putting together a great weekend, and to the team, parents, and alumni who helped on race day.  We couldn’t have done it without you.

The team started Spring Break off right with a good showing at the Philly Phlyer this weekend.  Andrew, Anthony, and David teamed up for the men’s B Team Time Trial early on Saturday morning and put in a nice 3rd place finish (just 2 seconds out of 2nd place).  Aside from the MIT A team our guys looked the best out there, and MIT gets to work on their aero position in a wind tunnel, so it isn’t really a fair comparison.

In the road race, Alex hung with the pack for most of the 19-mile race in a huge field (the men’s C race had 75 starters!) and rolled in not far behind the main group.  The jump to the larger C field from the more reasonably sized D’s had definitely been a shock for him, but he’s up to the challenge.  Becca finished at the tail end of the peloton, which was good enough for 10th place in her mini-field of 17 women’s C riders who went 12.6 miles.  In the killer B’s, Anthony and Andrew turned in great pack finishes after the 25-mile course, while David couldn’t quite catch the pack after getting stuck behind a crash.

On Sunday, we ventured to the Temple campus for the crit.  Alex had to contend with another ridiculously large field on a fairly narrow course, but managed to avoid crashes fortunately.  Becca had a good race in the women’s C race, picking up second place in a prime and finishing in the middle of the pack sprint.  Andrew had an exciting B race, picking up points in a prime and involving himself in a few short-lived breaks and multiple chases, ultimately finishing with the pack.

We can’t wait until our home race next weekend, and hope to see all our fans in the area out on the course!

Andrew in the crit.

Alex in the RR.

Lining up for the TTT.

Five Feats of Strength weren’t enough for Nick Huang ’11. New Jersey winters weren’t enough for Nick Huang. He decided it was time to conquer the South Pole.
Following in the footsteps of Andy Jackson ’93, Nick shows that the best way to keep warm is with a Princeton Cycling sweatshirt.

Nick Huang ’11

Andy Jackson ’93

Well, it’s midterms week and I have a lot to do, but I wanted to keep the site updated and let everyone know how things went this past weekend. On Saturday, a group of us headed into New York City for Columbia’s Grant’s Tomb Criterium. Sunday was the Duck Country Circuit Race in Mountainside, NJ, hosted by Stevens.

To start the weekend, Anthony, David, and I decided to double up and race the USAC cat. 4 crit on Saturday morning in addition to the afternoon’s collegiate B race. Standing on the start line at 7:30 am with over 100 other cat. 4 riders (yikes), it was below 30F and very windy, but at least the sun was out. The race was pretty sketchy, as we might have expected. There were two crashes and many more close calls. I survived and finished with the pack; David got caught in a crash early but was more or less unhurt, got back on the bike, and kept riding; and Anthony flatted with 4 laps to go. Not a great start to the day. The afternoon’s B race ended in a bunch sprint, and we all finished with the pack. Anthony grabbed a couple of prime points along the way. On Sunday at Stevens, I was the only Princeton B rider. The race was short but hard, with lots of short surges that pretty much fried my legs by the end. I managed to hang with the pack as about a third of the 38 starters fell off the back, and I crossed the finish near the rear of the main group of about 25 riders.

Michael Kraus and Adam Klosowiak had an awesome race in men’s D2 on Saturday and showed that they are improving rapidly, both in fitness and in racing IQ. They stuck together and stayed in good position near the front for the entire race. This race also came down to a bunch sprint, and Kraus finished a strong 7th to score some points while Adam was only three places back to round out the top 10. Adam also took second place in the second prime. Great job, guys!

Jacob Lapenna and Joe Turner raced in the men’s C2 crit on Saturday, where Jacob continued to demonstrate his strength to the field after last weekend’s adventure. He hung in patiently for the first portion of the race, then launched a vicious attack and spent the next few laps solo off the front, mounting a lead of 15-20 seconds at one point and collecting a prime in the process. He eventually got reeled in, but stayed on the front and dragged the field around for the rest of the race, finishing with the pack. Joe also rode a tough race and worked well with a few other riders in a chase group. On Sunday, Alex Creely joined Jacob and Joe for the circuit race. Jacob sat in for a while despite a small field and a slow pace, and when he finally attacked, the field shattered, and only one rider was able to beat him to the line. Alex posted a great 4th-place finish, coming in second in the first chase group, and Joe was only a few places back as well. Good day for our men’s C contingent.

Becca Thorsness had a strong race in women’s C, on Saturday, working well with the other riders and collecting a top-10 finish to score a few points.

Austin Roach raced in the men’s A field both days. On Sunday, he decided that racing wasn’t enough of a workout, so he rode there and back as well for a nice long day of training. He still managed a solid pack finish in the race.

Next weekend, a few of us will head down to Philadelphia for the Philly Phlyer.