FBCC Road Race

81.5 Miles, 11 laps, mostly flat and fast with two climbs. A three man break got clear early and built up a solid lead of 2:00, but that fluctuated down to a minute on a few occaisons when the field really hit the climb solidly. The pace wasn't too bad but it was hot out and that slowly wore on everyone, and late in the race a couple of singe riders and a group of two bridged to the break which was sitting only 1:00 off the front of the pack. As far as I know there were seven riders in front at that point, with 3 laps to go. The pace was solid on the smaller of the two climbs and there were a few attacks on the gradual downhill off the backside and I was sitting second wheel going through a right hand turn as we switched roads, and this was where the riders crept off in the previous laps, so I attacked out of the corner, got a gap and put my head down, its kind of rolling and curvy but very fast. I managed to get out of sight and could actually see the lead group pretty quickly. I made it within 0:25 of the break and looked back and saw four more riders coming, so I eased off and we quickly caught the group on the next lap, putting 12 riders in the lead. Just inside of one lap to go, 3 more riders bridged across including Justin England, so that more or less assured that we wouldn't get caught. The pace wasn't too bad the last time up the final climb, no one attacked, so a 14 man sprint. Justin attacked with 800m to go and everyone covered that, and maybe 450m to go I countered, got a slight gap, sat down and put my head down and ramped it up with all I had and BAM the legs locked up almost immediately with cramps. I had to stop pedalling almost immediately and unclip and dangle my legs toward the ground. Kind of unfortunante, but thats racing. I don't think I should have made that move anyway, I should have been confident enough in my sprint to be patient and wait for that. I liked the course, I ride those roads a lot. Again, I miss the priveledge of teammates like I have in the collegiate races. But overall, I was happy that I got myself into the winning situation, even if coasting across the finish line in 14th is quite far from what I had in mind. Tomorrow is another day and another race, and the legs are good, so we'll see what happens.