Race Report: Owasso State Championship Criterium Race

Race Report for the State Campionship Crit Race

The event was in downtown Owasso, OK. The course was a figure 8 sort of layout, with fairly narrow streets so the sprint runnout was also pretty narrow. Slight uphill in the straight section from corner 4 up to 5, so a slight downhill from corner 8 back to the finish. Weather was great–sunny with a very light north wind.

BG on race morning started in the 160s. As this was the state championship race, I had some extra nerves and despite an increase in basals to 120%, my BGs climbed through the 170s to 193 just prior to the start. Took a short bolus of insulin to help combat that and drank only electrolyte (no carb) replacements with my water throughout the race.

54 racers started. Corner 3 had some water in it which the race organizers feverishly tried to dry out with leaf blowers, but despite these efforts there were multiple slide outs through this (and corner 6-7) that resulted in some broken bikes and a broken collar bone of a fellow competitor.

I had a flat with my front tire on the first lap going into corner 5 and rode it around back to the wheel pit–switched out wheels and was ready to go when the group came around for lap 2.


midway through Cat 4 Crit State Championship, photo courtesy of Rob Ragan

Rode mid-pack (20-30th?) for about 25 minutes. There were two guys off the front, so coming out of corner 4 I surged up to the top 5 and moved to the front through the next lap. Surged coming out of corner 4 again and bridged up to the first two (one of which had been shelled and was coming backwards) coming out of corner 8 headed back to the finish line.
Worked with the leader through the rest of the race to stay away from the chase group, which had split into a group of about 10 riders, a 30 second gap, and then the rest of the remaining field.

With two to go, another racer bridged up to me (riding about 5 seconds behind the leader for the last 3 laps) and then made a move with 1 to go, eventually beating out the race leader on the line by about half a wheel. I followed closely behind to secure a 3rd place finish, with a gap and then the chase group of 10 sprinting for 4th place.

Between nerves and me riding anaerobically when I was off the front with the other racer left me with a finishing BG of 279. A small bolus quickly had me back down to 102 about 35 minutes after the race.


3rd place podium spot

A great race and am looking forward to the road race state championship a few weeks from now!

Whoot!! Big congrats! I can't begin to imagine the work and dedication that goes into preparing for a super-race like this. Amazing BG management too ;) Kudos Bradford.

Awesome! Way to go Bradford! I think that at this time of year, particularly on the weekend, w/ lots of runners doing longer runs for longer races, that bicyclists look happier when they go zooming by on the trails!! Congratuations on the finish!

Thanks guys! It was a fast/hard race, but it was a lot of fun.

And yeah AC any time someone's got two wheels under them I think they're happier than those long distance runners :-D
You have any running races coming up for which you're training? Or you just doing some maintenance running right now?

Chicago Marathon 100712 and a half in early September, betweem 2x 20 mile training runs, to get back in “race” mode although @ 10 min/ mile I’m not exactly “racing”!

Congrats!

Nice AC! Good luck with the marathon and half mary! I haven't done any long distance running in a while now but reading about your races is giving me a bit of that itch...I might have to jump back up and do another 1/2 this next year!

Last weekend (18 miles) I pulled over for a pit stop and ran into a buddy, a guy with whom I'd run a bit last year (mrs guy had tunk then and now "promoted" to T1...they ran Milwaukee!) and we were commiserating that a 1/2 is a really reasonable distance, still a challenge that knackers you but less of a grueling commitment than the 26.2 lifestyle. As long as I get a decent time this year...heh heh heh...