Philly Phyler

Philadelphia, PA

Criterium /Road race - As the weather forecast predicted, Saturday was a very wet day. The rain had already started when the men's D riders set off for the road race in the morning. Unfortunately, our D rider David S. had a mechanical problem and couldn't complete the course but Nathaniel rode hard in the rain and took 16th. Due to the inclement weather and treacherous decent in the road course, the race organizers decided to cancel the road race and substitute it with crit after men's D race.

The criterium course was in the downtown Phoenixville. It was a rectangular course with the start/finish stretch being gradual uphill with a strong head wind. Our women's B racers, Katie and Zuzka rode strong in the pouring rain and took 14th and 17th. Our C rider Chewie stayed in the pack all the way till the end and took 6th with an impressive pack sprint. In a huge men's B field (82 starters!), Issao and Seth finished 9th and 10th. According to Seth, Issao is quite a talker during a race (or maybe not just during a race). Our men's captain was suffering from a rib pain and couldn't finish the race (No more soccer, AJ!). In Men's A race, Eric crashed at the forth corner and couldn't complete the race while Jason hang on to the pack and finished 26th.

Martha and I were the last ones to start (women's A). By the time we were finishing our warm ups, it has gotten really warm (~50 deg), and sunny. So, we happily decided to change into short sleeve jersey and shorts. A few laps into the race, we found ourselves drenched in the pouring rain! There was a huge puddle on every corner which made it very dangerous to take corners sharply. Throughout the race, there was a five girls' breakaway at the front and Martha and I were in no-man's land, chasing the break. Although I want to say Martha and I worked together to chase the break, let me be honest here. Martha was dragging my ass for the entire race and I was desperately trying not to get dropped. During the last lap, we actually got really close to the break, but nether of us had a lot left for the sprint and we came in 5th and 6th (one girl crashed out at the last corner). That was one of the most intensive races I have ever done. Thanks, Martha for all the encouraging words during the race, and most importantly, for your great draft!

TTT - Sunday was not wet but super cold! As usual, MIT pre-rode the time trial course before the race started. This seems to be the key for our team's success, but don't tell that to anybody! (Sheeh!) The TTT course started out with a left hand corner into a descent followed by fast right and left turns into a long windy flat stretch. Women's A team practiced the tricky descent corners a few times before we finalized our plan. We decided not to rotate during the descent and that seemed to have worked well to keep us stay together during all the turns. Martha and Katie pulled strong on the windy flat stretch while me and Zuzka tried not to be blown away into the river by the gust. Right before the last hill, Katie gave us a very strong one-last pull, which gave us a big momentum to climb up to the finish and took 2nd place. Men's A team with Eric, Jason, Seth, and Issao also showed spectacular team work and came in 3rd out of 20 teams. Men's B team with AJ, Tony and Chewie rode to 7th out of 19 teams. Men's C team got a victory! Congrats, Loomis, Michael and Tim! Men's D team with David S. and Nathaniel came in 3rd, earning some more points to the overall victory in the overall standing for men's TTT. Women's team got 3rd place overall for TTT with one team; hope we'll have more teams later in the season to dominate ECCC!