Race Report: 2024 San Ardo Road Race Women’s P123
Race: San Ardo Road Race Women’s P123
Date: August 17, 2024
AVRT racers: Kristin Hepworth, Chris Davis
Top Result: Kristin 5/7
Course: 3 laps around a 23 mile, slightly hilly, rectangular loop on terrible roads.
Strava: https://www.strava.com/activities/12173677327
Nutrition: Oatmeal for breakfast. Gel at the start. 2 Gels and 4 bottles of water.
Recap: Not only was this the longest race I’ve ever done (70 miles), but this was my first P123 race since upgrading to cat 3 a couple months ago. I signed up because there weren’t any women registered in the shorter 3/4/5 race and I wanted to race again with NIky.
The day of the race I arrived in San Ardo and saw a message from Niky that she wasn't going to make it. I decided to give it a try anyway. I was racing against 3 really good Terun Elite racers and I was intimidated.
Alex Obrand (Terun) didn’t waste any time and launched an attack right away. It was tough chasing her uphill. I managed to stay on, but not everyone did. Our small group of 7 turned into 5. The Terun team took turns attacking. Gwen (Revolution) bridged a lot of these attacks. The pace was much harder than I’m used to without any time to recover – it was brutal. I tried to save my energy as much as possible. I did not bring enough food to sustain the effort for 3 hours of intensity, so I tried to ration it. I started to slip back at one point and Alex offered to pull me back to the group. Super nice. I guess It was obvious to everyone I wasn’t a threat by that point. :)
I managed to stay with the group for the first 1.5 laps, but the second time through the bridge from hell (like seriously, the road on the bridge is unrelentingly jarring), Terun attacked. Gwen bridged up to them, but I couldn’t jump fast enough. Slowly, I watched them slip away and found myself as a chase group of one.
Based on who was in the group, and it being my first P123 race, this didn’t come as a surprise and I realized I was now training my mental game to continue the chase. I had 11ish miles to go before I passed the start line (and my car) and was tempted to just pull off and not complete the 3rd lap. The mental intervals continued and I reminded myself about my cycling goals and hoped that sticking it out and still pushing myself hard would help me in a future race.
I was out of fuel, but hoped to grab a AV bottle with mix from the feed zone before beginning the 3rd lap. Unfortunately, I never found the nice guy passing them out. I grabbed neutral water instead and made a note to know exactly where the AV bottles will be handed out next time. The first half of the third lap had a nasty headwind. I could see the ladies up ahead and tried to stay optimistic. I passed a few solo racers from other groups and got passed by the men’s race on their 4th and final lap. I heard a “go Kristin!” as they passed. I don’t know who said it, but it gave me the mental juice to keep pushing. I saw two different guys with flats get picked up by a big van. I’ll be honest that there was a moment where I thought it would be easier if I just got a flat so I could get a ride too.
Thankfully the 2nd half of the last lap had a nice tail wind and I finished in 5th place, a few minutes behind the lead group. I ended up on the podium on my first P123 race with some very strong racers.
I was reminded how teamwork and nutrition are so crucial to success. When things don’t go as hoped these kinds of races can be humbling and discouraging, but I don’t regret doing it. It was a good racing experience and it was great to race with this faster group who I know will continue to push me and make me better.
