GamJams.net: Where Mid-Atlantic bike racers roll

The Good, The Bad and The Ugly: Blair Berbert on the Tour of Walkersville

by David Kirkpatrick, Features Editor

Of the many things that more experienced and successful racers have to teach, pre-race mental preparation and post-race analysis are two of the less appreciated aspects.  As an experiment, GamJams will periodically solicit a pre- and post-race analysis from members of the peloton who we wish we had more chances to learn from.  The pre-race portion is written and sealed prior to racing.  After the race, the subject will debrief the race and compare the events and outcomes to his or her predictions and prognostications. 

Coming off an excellent third place at Jeff Cup, Blair Berbert from Kelly Benefits Strategies/LSV Amateur Racing takes us behind the curtain for the Good, Bad and Ugly of the KBS/LSV approach to and execution of the 2010 Tour of Walkersville. 

The Good, The Bad and The Ugly: Tour of Walkersville
by Blair Berbert

Pre-Race Forecast

Walkersville tends to play out a little differently than Jeff Cup. For one, the season is officially underway and it always seems like there are fewer start-of-the-season jitters as the pack rolls out. Also though, the course and the size of the field come into play. The most decisive feature of the Walkersville course can be the wind. 2009 saw very strong winds coming across the course, being especially tough in the section immediately after the feed hill, where riders were being shoved pretty hard into the right gutter (which ultimately caused several crashes). The weather can't always be counted on to deliver the wind, however, so the most consistent course feature would have to be the yellow line, which comes especially as a shock after having the whole road to move around on at Jeff Cup. Walkersville does have a smaller field limit than Jeff Cup, but the yellow line still makes positioning extremely important. Being 20 guys back at Walkersville is a very different situation than being 20 back at Jeff Cup, and the former position won't really allow you to race when the moves start going.

The race will generally play out as most MABRA races will - tending towards a lot of attacks until a solid move gets up the road. Whether or not that move sticks is going to be primarily up to the mood of the riders in the pack and the team dynamics in the break. Roughly speaking, the big teams (NCVC, Haymarket, Harley, Kelly Benefits) will all try and stack any good move that goes. Similarly, once riders from those squads find themselves in a move, they may be reluctant to work unless the odds are very much in their favor. This can have the side effect of neutralizing pretty much anything that gets up the road as folks in the break wait for reinforcements to bridge. At the same time though, if you get a good combination off at the right time and on the right part of the course, then it can pretty much immediately roll As at Jeff Cup though, this early in the season, people can do things that are unexpected - pull "wild card" performances. I don't think people are going to "let" Joe D. roll again, as he will be a marked man, but the more that people key in on and attempt to neutralize specific riders (for example, Russ Langley, Josh Frick, Chuck Hutcheson, Dave Fuentes, Joe Dombrowski, etc.), the more it opens the door for others to slip under the radar and put in a great performance.

The Good, The Bad and The Ugly: Mike Githens on Jeff Cup

by David Kirkpatrick, Features Editor

Of the many things that more experienced and successful racers have to teach, pre-race mental preparation and post-race analysis are two of the less appreciated aspects.  As an experiment, GamJams will periodically solicit a pre- and post-race analysis from members of the peloton who we wish we had more chances to learn from.  The pre-race portion is written and sealed prior to racing.  After the race, the subject will debrief the race and compare the events and outcomes to his or her predictions and prognostications.  For the debut edition, Mike Githens of Your Ad Here p/b Bicycle Pro Shop offers his before and after look at The Good, The Bad and the Ugly of Jeff Cup 2010.

The Good, The Bad and The Ugly: Jeff Cup
by Mike Githens

Pre-Race Forecast:
Teammate 1, sounding profoundly profound, “Its Jeff Cup. THE Jefferson Cup Road Race. The Clash of the Titans. The Holy Grail. You win and that’s it—you’ve made it. Have you seen that cup?”

TM 2, slightly sheepish, voice cracking, “Or just an early season race to tune up the legs? Right? I can just use it as a tune-up? A tune-up?”

TM 3, an octave higher, bouncing, akin to a golden retriever, “But no, no, dude—it’s JEFF CUP. JEFF CUP! Man, ya know JEFF CUP?!!”

We’ve all been there, the team meeting before the first “big” race of the season. And for us in MABRA-land, it’s that time again: Jeff Cup. So what do you do with a race like this- an early season icon, made more difficult by the unpredictable weather and constant barrage of attack-counterattacking than the course itself?  Do you treat it as an early season race to train through or seek eternal glory?  To the Jeff Cup haters, as much as you want to deny it, Jeff Cup is a big race. It fills up in 3 seconds flat.  And you know you will be there, so stop your hating. There are those with good early season form looking to absolutely and unequivocally rip the legs off of their once-upon-a-winter friends. And then there are those whose fate is to end up on yougotdropped.blogspot.com.  Damn those photographers.

Love it or hate it, you will be there.  A race is a race, right? The point is to win. How will you do it?

Here’s the Good, the Bad and the Ugly of Your Ad Here p/b The Bicycle Pro Shop.

Our team is new. And we are the opposite of deep. These attributes make winning a race like Jeff Cup difficult. But not impossible.  There are 8 of us and we are fit. That’s what we are telling ourselves at least.  For starters, the race is predictable, and by predictable I mean predictably chaotic… absolute mayhem. Some years a break goes on lap 2, other years on the last lap, maybe not at all this year. The point is pre-race strategy only goes so far. But it is worthwhile none-the-less.