Race: 2024 Dash for Cash Crit - Women 3/4
Race: 2024 Dash for Cash Crit - Women 3/4
Date: June 1, 2024
AVRT racers: Steph Hart, Hannah Chen, Katie Monaghan, Rina Fujieda (guest rider)
Top Result: Steph 2/15; Hannah 4/15
Course: 0.8 mile loop through an office park in Pleasanton. The rectangle course manages to have just 3 corners (barely) with the last one a gentle sweeping bend (copied from the Men’s 2/3 recap)
Strava: https://www.strava.com/activities/11550979366
Nutrition: Pre race coffee (Kicking Horse’s Kick Ass blend, pour over brewed at 90 degrees C with 800um grind setting)
Race Recap:
[Steph’s perspective] With a relatively few teams represented, the plan was to make the race hard from the start, and hopefully orchestrate some sort of leadout in a reduced field. For better or worse, the race got moving from the gun, with Shantalle Tupaz attacking from the start line. Helena Merck (Super Sprinkles) went with her, and by the second corner of the first lap I realized that I should probably follow the move, as Helena was by far the strongest rider in the field. We held a strong pace the first 5 minutes of the break, but realizing that Alto Velo and Super Sprinkles teammates behind were unlikely to chase, we settled into a 3 person rotation line for the remaining 35 minutes of the race. In hindsight, I probably put out a little too much effort here as I kind of wanted to save my legs for the 1/2/3 race, but riding in a break on a fast flat course is basically my favorite thing.
With 1.5 laps to go we caught the main chase group with Hannah and Katie, and after Helena rotated off the front, I attacked hoping for some chaos with the chase group that would slow down Helena and Shantalle. My 1 minute power only got me so far, and with half a lap to go, she and the rest of the lapped chase group caught me. Hannah offered to lead me out, but we were all a little confused on what the rules were for lapped riders, so Helena and I kind of just rolled into the finish line where she outsprinted me for first.
After this, chaos kind of ensued as it was unclear if Katie, Hannah, and the other 5 or so lapped riders had another lap to go. Hannah and Katie cranked out another fast lap, but the results were pulled from when Helena and I finished. Lessons learned- if the race organizer incentivizes lapping the field, we should probably figure out the rules before hand.