Shippensburg Scurry Weekend Summary

Shippensburg was the destination for ECCC race week 7, and Columbia Cycling had “an amazing weekend in the historic farmlands of southern PA.” (Thanks, Anna J.) We were without some of the usual suspects, who chose to catch up on work (doubtful) / spend time with their girlfriend (less doubtful) / get lost in Harriman State Park (starting to sound realistic) / take the Multistate Professional Responsibility Exam (just — no). In any case, the rest of us were approximately punctual for the Friday 3 PM call time — even those of us biked up from Brooklyn or drove in from Greenwich. (Aside: I’m willing to bet we’re the most geographically diffuse team in the ECCC, especially when Jim is thrown into the mix.) Cue montage sequence of our great teamwork to put on the roof racks and transfer the contents of the trailer to the van (we killed the CU Sports van with the trailer hitch on the way to the X-Pot last week), and we were on the road. Before long, we were in a magical place where the vegetation grows naturally, as opposed to NYC’s Greenstreets program, which, valiant as the effort is, gives one the impression of being on a movie set — and those things on the horizon? Those aren’t buildings, they’re mountains.

Rest stop.

With Michael C. and I tag-teaming the van driving, Michael M. driving an unnecessarily full follow car, and a New Yorker reading the New Yorker, we made good time and arrived at the hotel just in time to see Yale getting off their coach bus. (A casual enquiry revealed that the cost of the bus for the weekend amounted to one quarter of our annual budget. No sponsor envy here. Speaking of, if there are any hedge fund managers out there looking to sponsor a collegiate cycling team…)

Truckin’.

Shippensburg is indeed historic: Gettysburg is 30 miles away and our Saturday morning walk in search of coffee took us by Locust Grove Cemetery, burial site of twenty-six African-American Civil War veterans. The Sheetz mentioned at the bottom of that link was where we found coffee, and also this:

This horse takes unleaded gasoline only (photo courtesy of Michael Carroll).

That’s right, we were in “veritable horse [poop] country.” (That one’s courtesy of Jim, who chose to Just Yang It and recon the course last weekend instead of riding the X-Pot, and in doing so he added to the Legend of Jim, which deserves at least one blog post of its own.) The weekend’s first race was the Shippensburg Campus Criterium — an actual criterium (ahem, MIT), with a hard left-hand corner, an exposed sweeping downhill section on the back of the course, another tricky left-hander that was the site of some final lap carnage in the Men’s A and Women’s A/B races, and a kicker up to the finish line. With the start/finish line situated right in front of some dorms, Shippensburg made a bid to join Penn State and Temple in the elite group of ECCC schools that wage early-morning war against their hungover student body, employing such weapons as awful blaring techno and hyperactive honking by the pace car.

Hopefully we’ll get a race report from one of the other Columbia cyclists, but my race went as follows: Attack up the hill and open a bit of a gap going into turn one, look behind on the back stretch and see that the peloton isn’t having it, sit up. Repeat multiple times. Inexplicably go to the front and drive the pace on the second-to-last lap, sink like a stone, spend most of the last lap moving up, hold position in the sprint. Also, my rear tire exploded during the middle part of the race — somehow the bead came off the rim, the tube exploded (it sounded like a gun shot) and wrapped around the cassette, and I skidded upright for a good 25 yards or more (thanks, winter rollers workouts). Thanks to Michael M. for helping me switch out my wheel when I was totally gassed from the uphill 400 I ran to get to the pit. Other adventures included going up on the sidewalk to avoid a crash (thanks, inconsiderate NYC taxi drivers?) and bunny hopping back onto the road before I obliterated the finish line camera.

Here’s a how we all fared:

Women’s C: Anna Janas, 5th
Women’s B: Lucie Vagnerova, 6th
Men’s D: Michael McGuire, 7th
Men’s B: Jim Yang, 13th; Ben Reddy, 15th; Michael Carroll, 16th
Men’s A: Dylan Lowe, 5th; Nathan Dugan, 10th

The crits somehow finished ahead of schedule, so we had a couple of hours to kill before the mass-start hill climb in the evening. Activities included:

– getting dressed up to review patent applications in the shade

Hard at work in tweed.

– discovering that being sold in a small plastic container in a snack shop does not guarantee that eggs are hard-boiled

Fooled again.

Some decided to save their legs for Sunday’s Horse Killer Road Race, but the rest of us liked the idea of a seven-mile mass-start hill climb, so away we went. Michael M. acquired a gigantic bowl of ice cream from the ice cream truck that was patrolling the scene, and I considered scrapping the hill climb and eating ice cream instead. Nathan had some serious bad luck, being on the receiving end of some riders in the Men’s A field playing dominoes during the flat prologue, winding up with a fractured seat stay and a rear wheel that will never roll again.

Results:

Women’s C: Anna Janas, 6th
Men’s B: Michael Carroll, 10th; Ben Reddy, 12th

The road race on Sunday was out in the middle of Pennsylvania farm country, with the strong cross- and head-winds playing a major role in the races. As hard as the winds made the races, the real brute was Horse Killer Road climb, which lived up to its name and killed this horse — half a mile at an average of 12% somehow understates the brutality of the climb, which is actually three steps that spend a good deal of their time in the 14-18% range. My race isn’t worth writing about but others did well so hopefully they’ll post a race report.

Results:

Women’s C: Anna Janas, 5th
Women’s B: Lucie Vagnerova, 1st
Men’s D: Michael McGuire, DNF (crashed out by a swerving rider in the sprint)
Men’s B: Jim Yang, 7th; Michael Carroll, 16th; Ben Reddy, 17th
Men’s A: Dylan Lowe, 2nd

Also, honorary Columbia rider (the honor is all ours) Rose Long (Mount Sinai) absolutely crushed it in Women’s A this weekend, winning the hill climb on Saturday, and soloing away to win the road race by 46 seconds. Here she is attacking the last time up Horse Killer. (Thanks, Velo Quips.)

That’s about it. Thanks to Shippensburg Cycling for a great weekend. Next up, Army race weekend.

Update: Here are some great photos courtesy of Jan Valerie Polk.

Nathan charging up the kicker in Saturday’s crit.

Anna making the hill climb look easy.

Jim somehow climbing Horse Killer Road in the drops.

Ben dying a slow death, i.e., a horse being killed.

Michael C. having a good time on Horse Killer.

Lucie practicing her fiercest look at the top of Horse Killer Road.

Dylan (wearing Anna’s glasses) winning the field sprint for 2nd place in the Men’s A road race.

Rose telling all to bow down before her.

 

 

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