you can't win unless you know it's a race: cat 6 triumphs against unwitting opponents

opportunities for this seem to have been a bit scarce of late. had the tables turned on me the other week tho - 125km down and on home stretch, i'd gone hunger-flat and got passed, then dropped by some dude on a flat-bar with panniers! shameful, bro.

daaamn I straight up smoked about 10 undergrads in a row, what with their rusty chains and seats way too low.

dude in the fancy tights, and optic vomit jacket avec backpack: you seem nice enough sayin hi as you pass me w/ intensity. however you are wearing goggles, and its in the high 30s. i think we need to race this one out. or pistols. your choice.

http://www.good.is/post/cat-6-competitive-commuting-turns-bike-rides-into-races/

speedway of choice lately is a designated bike-friendly road w/ mild uphill false flat, brief cobbled 'sector', and roundabout which can be used tactically by canny riders. practically always some competition due to the road crossing a major arterial, with packs of 20+ building at the lights at peak hour. recent highlights:

• pipped at the death by girl wearing floral dress, riding scott CR1 - unusual combo, should've got her number maybe?
• had taken the good bike to work, used it to just hammer everyone into submission - like shooting fish in a barrel
• caught the wheel of hipster wearing head-to-toe black approaching roundabout, he skilfully used traffic to kick away and held the gap
• made lead selection and launched attack on pave - dropped chain u_u

the girl in the dress/cr1 combo reminds of the time about 15 years ago when two cuet girls in sundresses blew by my friend and I- they were taking (imo) ridiculous chances on the fucking _portal_. this combined the actual risk of death and teh sexy in awesome ways.

because like

http://www.utahmountainbiking.com/trails/images/pics-trails/b-pois05.jpg

i had some homeless people at one of the sketchiest corners in sf cheering me on as i sprinted to make a light

on the way home from the hospital, exhausted by the concept of cooking, riding no handed and loudly ordered a pizza on my cell phone while passing a roadie

like a boss

next week, riding no handed and eating pizza

this might not count at all but figure this is the best place to post it:

went out for a very mellow recovery ride yesterday, just spinning and enjoying the views and the nice weather when all the sudden this mouth breathing chubby dude comes around me like it's the ride of his life... there is a short 5-6 minute climb coming up and I figure if he's laboring this hard on the flats with a tail wind, he's bound to blow up on the hill. sure enough, 2 minutes later, i spin past him on the hill while he's pedaling in squares in complete o2 deficit. i hit the summit and then i'm back in my happy place, just enjoying the nice day for about 10 miles and then what do you know, he's back, louder than ever, but this time he has some words for me. he coughs out "you got me on that hill, but i knew i'd catch you on this stretch." please bear in mind that i'm on a mellow 16mph, 110bpm avg relaxing little ring ride after doing 90 minutes of sprint/tempo intervals the evening previous. i just let out a "ha" and then watch as he labors on, really burying himself to win this epic race in his head.

so i can do 1 of 2 things here, i can let him go and finish my ride in peace...

eh what the fuck, i didn't like his tone. i let him get about 30 seconds on me and then i slowly start reeling him in. he doesn't notice for a while but then he looks back and he gets out of the saddle. i realize there's another short hill coming up, so I start timing my attack. he's only going about 20mph and I get about 5 seconds behind him and I can tell he's squirming and breathing hard. As soon as we hit the bottom of the hill I put in a small dig to get him to respond, and then I slowly turn the screw until I hear him crack, replete with a miserable groan.

I finished the remainder of the ride without seeing him again.

Good work

i thought you'd let me win shasta ;_;

i. spinning down the coast on tuesday morning by myself - pack of ten moving a tad faster overrun me. i settle at the back of the group to see if they roll turns or anything like that, but it looks like some wheelsuckers on the back of a couple of good riders. then a group of 20 comes ripping past - deep carbon wheels all over the place, very srs business. i remember that this is meant to be training rather than sitting on and attack the slow group, dispensing of them comprehensively, then spend the next 5km in lone pursuit of the fast group... never quite got on. probably a better workout, i guess!

ii. out for a couple laps of the boulie on friday morning, saw figure up road on flat-bar w/ panniers wearing lampre jersey furiously spinning away - got close then put it in the BIG RING and tore past up the incline. if that's his secret training then scarponi's not going to have as good a giro as everyone thinks, imo.

http://fatmexicancyclist.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/03/fat_cyclist.jpg

Three roadies passed us (us being myself and my colleague Pete Hodges, who was monstrously hungover) at the top of the hill into Topsham from the coast route, and then got caught in traffic in the village, so we were level as we left the village and they crossed over to join the cycle path which runs on the pavement at the side of the road. I stayed on the main road and decided I was going to beat them to the M5 flyover, almost exactly a mile ahead, vaguely fearing that Pete might have a heart-attack (his bike's a cross-thingy, much chunkier tyres than mine, and though he's several years younger and a couple of stones lighter than me, he's hungover). Two of the roadies clocked what we were up to and took us up on the challenge; the other wasn't with them and didn't really seem to care. I beat them to there, and slowed a bit to check on Pete who was 50 yards behind me and just ahead of them. They then had to crossover back onto our side of the road at traffic lights, so I realised we were going to beat them to the point where the path heads away from the main road if we kept it up; so we did. One of them got beeped at by a car for cutting the traffic lights in order to try and catch up, but it was futile; we'd beaten them over a nearly 2-mile stretch, and Pete and I were splitting up to head the opposite directions home, so we let the roadies cruise past us. Most satisfying.

mackin so hard on the paths on the way home, almost got hit by a car after passing and running an orange light. im normally v. cautions, but this was nearly:

http://youtu.be/vJXU7EVXs2A

http://www.thisislondon.co.uk/lifestyle/article-23950294-the-chain-game.do

i mean http://www.itsnotarace.org/fcn-calculator/

screw you hipster on the fixie w/purple chromed handlebars doing a trackstand for minutes at the light, i still smoked your ass

Did you do a trackstand for minutes at the lights? If not it's 1-1 at best.

would never trackstand at the lights even if i could trackstand. damn i wish i could trackstand though.

once i rode on the track and learned that its like 1000 times easier on a proper fixie imo, it lost it's allure

I have a fixie. Dunno if it's proper. I think I been learnin' wrong though - just trying to stop dead still instead of rolling back and forth.

I can just about trackstand on my fixie but it's ungainly and laughable and wouldn't impress anyone at the lights.

my trackstand is flawless, geared or fixed

flawless

Hott.

imagine runway modeling, in freeze frame
at the stoplight that's what they call vogueing

I'd post a trackstanding photo from the fix at this point, but I'm at work.

Did you do a trackstand for minutes at the lights? If not it's 1-1 at best.
― Mark C, Tuesday, May 24, 2011 9:27 AM (5 hours ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

nope, i had to clip in, so he def had the advantage on the early start

Bump.

Sorry I crushed you going up that long hill, but those pistons tattooed on your calves might as well be bulls-eyes.

That was so I could find this via the iPhone app.

Nipped down the shops, sans helmet & chamois shorts but avec gloves & Rapha handbag, for bottle of wine tonight. There's a 3/4 mile stretch of straight riverside cyclepath. Roadie dude in luminous gillet with arm warmers & 3/4 bibs is 1/4 mile ahead of me as I come off the bridge onto the path. I've just been to physio & told Friday is a rest day, no cycling. This guy is really hunching, elbows on his bars like he's time trialing or something but he's doing 18mph tops. I'm not allowed to come out of the saddle or into the drops because of my shoulder, but I've got to beat him because gillets are unacceptable, which means a 2-mile diversion. I catch him after 1.5 and leave him trailing way behind by the time i swing back to get to the supermarket. I'm sweatier than I expected by the end of it, but I deserve that bottle of wine.

I've become such a cycling twat.

gillets are unacceptable

?

i thought that was a kind of fish

xp was piston tattoo guy wearing a Ritte kit by any chance? They got a dude like that down here who is fast as balls on the track.

no, this was a bigger chap in street clothes in SF.

/gillets are unacceptable/

?

Yeah, where I live & work gillets are almost universally an accessory for a particular type of debauched junior Tory-boy student rah. I have real difficulty seeing them as a cycling essential!

is this some weird britisher term for vest?

Also known as a body-warmer over here. Gillet is a French term I think. Sleeveless thingamajig.

Might help if I could spell it.

http://www.rapha.cc/gilet/

Lightweight sleeveless top put on when it rains - a kind of early spring / autumn piece of clothing that you carry around and whip out when needed

Or a Gideon Osborne fan signifier.

oh, a vest. i don't wear mine too much, but there was a period in 2000 when a windstopper gilet was PRO

padded down gilets are definitely a thing in the UK among young men who will grow up to own land/wear sports jackets/follow the rugby world cup. cycling gilets are a totally different thing though.

piston bro vs gilet twat: fite

I own a gilet got from REI's bargain bin and I have to say it is the least used piece of cycling kit I have. This is probably because the change period between wanting a short sleeve jersey to wanting a windproof long sleeve is about a week long round here.

follow the rugby world cup

otm

ha

Running errands on Market Street when I'm surprised to see a guy I already passed come up on my left. Oops, nope, different guy, much faster. Riding fixed with clipless pedals. I push a little harder, he keeps accelerating, I reach for my downtube and get a few more gear inches. We're side by side when we approach a stopped cab, with a curb on either side. I slow down, he's nervier and finds the gap on the left. Cab pulls away, I'm now in his draft and considering if and when to come around him (dangerous because of streetcar tracks) when I realize I'm about to pass my destination on the left and pull over. Probably for the best, I don't think he was working as hard as I was and riding that fast on that section of Market is fucking idiotic anyway.

He wasn't unwitting, but I got completely smoked by a middle-aged recumbent bro. I could tell he wasn't even trying hard!

It doesn't really count as cat 6ing as we were riding together and had, 10 minutes previously, done an across the road sprint. However I think I pulled off my finest bit of race craft yesterday evening, made all the sweeter my besting Dr Pinarello 'my buddy works at SRAM look at my SRAM Red, Qarq and ZIPP' Dogma.

I gapped my buddies at a stop sign, didn't really go that fast until I saw them over my shoulder so did a 1.5km breakaway until a little hill. They almost brought me back on the hill but I used my knowledge of the hill to spin up as it flattened out towards the top and pegging it down the descent and up the next hill. Cancellara besting Boonen on the Kapelmuur it wasn't but it felt like it.

Best of all at the top of the last hill I pulled left to do a couple of laps of the park but they tapped out and called for the pub.