[C4 Rides] C4 at the Races Again!

[Shawn Fleming]

Central Carolina Cycling had another strong outing last night. Dave and I headed up to the Historic North Wilkesboro Speedway to participate in the NW Speedway Crit Series. For those of you that are new to road racing, this series is similar to the Lowe's Speedway Time Trial Series except that it's a Criterium-style race. In a criterium (or crit), the riders race around a short course, usually a downtown block but, in this case, a 1km oval speedway track.

This race was a blast! We raced in a combined cat 4/5 field with riders and teams mostly from the Boone, Winston-Salem, and Lenoir areas. To make things a little more interesting, Dave had an eye doc appt earlier in the day in which he had one of his pupils dilated and then, immediately before our start, he severely smashed two of his fingers while putting away his trainer. (but at least it was his birthday! Happy b-day old man)

I won't bore you with too many details of the race, so I'll skip to the end...with 2 laps to go, Dave and I both watched a hyperactive field swarm by us and basically put us at the back of the peloton. Not wanting to return to the C4 Thursday night ride having to tell all of you that we were last and 2nd to last, we laid down the hammer with 1 lap to go, determined to get back in it. Dave took an outside path and I sprinted through a crack in the field, managing to jump on the wheel of a guy on the team that won two weeks ago. 

The moves served us well as we both still had plenty of gas in the tank - enough to sprint to 3rd and 16th overall out of 30!

Looking at the results that were just posted on USA Cycling, it appears that we were the 1st and 5th place finishers in our category! (it was a combined cat 4 and cat 5 field)

Great job, Dave. This was his first "crit" race and a pretty good one considering the nightmare day he had leading up to the race.

For anyone interested in entering their first race, I would definitely recommend this. The travel distance is a little rough for those of us in the Cabarrus area, especially on a Wed night, but the oval course and laid-back atmosphere are very inviting to beginners, and friends and family can hang out in the infield while you race.

Here's a link to the series website:

http://nwscycling.com/

Hope to see everyone at tonight's ride -

Shawn 


      
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