2024 Oakland Grand Prix Women’s 3/4/5
Race: 2024 Oakland Grand Prix Women’s Cat 3/4/5
Date: Sunday September 15, 2024
AVRT racers: Katarina Zgraja, Hannah Chen, Katie Monaghan
Top Result: Katarina (8/25)
Course: The first right hand turn is a sharp hairpin, followed by another right hand turn, then a long straight section that goes slightly downhill, then slightly uphill, into another right hand turn, and then the final right hand turn to the final straighawayt to the finish.
Strava: https://www.strava.com/activities/12418615239
Nutrition: I could barely get any food down before the race, for some reason. 1 cup coffee, ½ slice toast with peanut butter. 1 Sis gel on the start line. 1 sip of electrolyte during the race.
Event Recap (Written by Katarina)
I knew this was going to be another very challenging race, due to the large field filled with many stacked racers. There were many repeat racers from the SF Giro (Helena, Sophia from Sprinkles, Hannah from Terun, and then additionally some other really strong riders like Gwen from Revolution, and Stephanie Hayos from Eclipse). I knew it was going to be another really hard race to do well in, so I wasn’t sure how well I would do.
We had Katie, Hannah and I representing Alto Velo. We planned to cover attacks, and hope for one of us to be in a good position at the end of the race. Since we weren't in the first race, we didn’t have an opportunity to warm up on the course. Katie and I scouted the course from the sidewalk,then went to warm up on surrounding streets.
The race started off super fast, right from the beginning. Some other racer mentioned in her strava report that it started fast and never let up. I felt that was the case as well. It took me a couple of laps to get used to the corners. I struggled in my last race on positioning and cornering well, so I focused on that in this race. I started to find good positions to be in (especially going into the hairpin turn), so that I didn’t fall behind in the pack. That was a spot where separation often happened.
Pretty much right in the first couple of laps, Sprinkles started throwing attacks. I remember looking down at my computer, we had only been riding for 5 minutes, and there was already a solo Sprinkles rider up ahead. No one had chased her down. I wasn’t worried since the race had just started, and figured there was still lots of time left. However, as another lap went by, I started to worry, as it seemed that she was gaining time on us, probably due to the tricky corners. So after a while, I decided I was going to try and bridge. I sped up to the front of the group, asked Gwen to help me chase Helena down, and we sped away. It was a tough effort catching up to her. Gwen mostly stayed on my wheel, and then as soon as I caught Helena, she sort of did an attack, which did not amount to much. We did not pull away from the main group enough, and at some point on the straight away, everyone had caught up to us.
The race continued with a high tempo, some attacks (mostly Sprinkles). In the end, nothing held as long as that first attack. I remember chasing down Sophia as well sometime later in the race. Probably why I was so dead by the end of the race…
My main focus towards the end of the race was to make sure I was in a good position, and cornered that hairpin turn well. I knew if I screwed up that corner, especially on the last lap, I (or anyone else) would be screwed positioning-wise. I found cornering on the outside for that turn worked well, it allowed me to keep my speed, and I usually ended up passing people, rather than being passed.
Back to the last lap: I positioned myself near the front of the group, focused really hard on executing a good corner. It was OK. I held my position, but I heard a noise behind me, there was definitely a crash of sorts. I continued trying to stay up front. The pace was so high and honestly I was redlining super bad already. Hannah (Terun), in the same move as the SF Giro, pushed the pace more on the back straightaway (½ way through the lap), and I was just struggling to hang onto the front group. And then right before the 2nd to last corner, Gwen attacked. I just struggled to stay close on someone’s wheel, and the group spread out a bit. I came out of the corner, and found myself with a gap. I knew it was too early to sprint (the final straight away is pretty long), but I didn’t have any options. I was pushing as hard as I could, I caught up to Stephanie and we battled it out for a bit, she ultimately pulled ahead. Sophia turned out to be drafting my wheel, and pulled ahead of me as well.
Hannah unfortunately got separated from the main group on that very first corner of the race, and unfortunately Katie was caught up in that last hairpin crash.
I was disappointed in my finish for sure, especially since I at the very least should have held that 6th place position. But at the same time it was good to do another race combined with Cat 3 racers to get a feel for the harder pace and to challenge myself. It’s always good to ride with people who are better than you :)
