Tour of the Gila Race Report

Tour of the Gila Stage Race
5 day stage race in megatropolis Silver City, NM or "Silver" if you are a local.
Cat 3, Field 75, place 25th GC
Teammates: Jesse Bastide

Quote for the week, "I don't know how I could live in such a closed up city if I didn't have the Internet and Walmart. Because Walmart is like a mall you know?"

Close runner up to quote of the week on a followup to Jesse's question can we cook in the kitchen, "well I don't cook. The oven and dishwasher are used for storage." Jesse's rebuttal, "we just need to boil some water." "well i guess that will be fine. But you can only use these plates." Sure enough they were used for storage, think ziplock containers and other junk. We all shared 3 bowls, 3 plates and 3 sets of utensils for the week. Nothing else available.

Our 3rd rated quote came on Friday after the tour's longest stage as we were eating and zoning out of reality, " So are you a creationist!?" Umm, "well I respect multiple views." "I'm not, as you can tell by my Darwin fish. How can the Univ of Western NM bio dept chair be a creationist? I just don't get it!"

There were many close calls to make the top 3 so it was really tough decisions by the jury.

This is a pretty spectacular race. Lots of climbing and great competition and the fun of 6000-7500 ft above sea level. The race this year was an NRC event with all the top domestic pros in place ala Tour de California. If you want to make a name for yourself, this is the place to do it. Also had Team Rawanda and a pro team from Mexico. The fields were mainly Colorado, Arizona and New Mexico riders. A few Californians in there to mix it up a little bit.

Jesse and I arrived in Silver at our host house on Tuesday afternoon. Our host house was a trip with plenty of laughs to keep us going for years to come. More on that later. Silver is a huge metropolis of 10k people and mexican and chinese restaurants and your cowboy steakhouse. We cruised on to downtown and got some local mexican food with Jesse's wife and ran into the Toyota United guys at the eatery. Pros and their entourage were everywhere around town the whole week. It was pretty cool.

Wednesday's stage was the tt, 16.15 mi out and back with some climbs and fast descents. The notice of race indicated that you should have at minimum a 55x11 for the tt. Stupidly forgetting the aero bars that Zach S had set aside for me(thanks Zach!) dawned on me when I awoke on Tuesday morning before my flight to Tucson. I have been running a compact 50/36 since January. Unfortunately, my FSA 53/39 rings didn't make it in time. I was 3rd to go and Jesse was right behind me. Caught my 30 man in the first 3 miles but he passed me back on the climb. So I set out on the TT with my road setup in a 50x11. It was pretty sick setup. I think I was the only one running such a manly setup. Definitely spun out pretty early, but I was ripping it up the climbs until the turnaround when I pulled a muscle in my right pectoral region(as I found out later). Basically, I made the turnaround and all my breaths were super short and sharp. Kinda of felt like an asthma attack(i guess). I worked as hard as possible burying myself further into pain. I knew before I would go into the TT losing time b/c of setup but I knew the race was long and the tt wasn't going to decide things.

Stage 2 was an epic 116km one with a cat 1 climb to the finish. A 10mi climb with 2100+ ft of vertical and some spots up to 19% finishing up around 7400 ft. Stage started out pretty fast with some attacking at the first feed, then settled down until a nice little crash on the flats. Jesse and I just managed our way around it. Goal was to stay rested as much as possible before the final climb as it would be decided there. Final climb started out hard, and I made my way to the front and worked hard staying in the lead group. The 2nd part of the climb was super steep and hurt really bad. The highlight for me was dropping the Colorado guys and the TIAA CREF rider on the climb. Finished 28th . I probably past redline with 3mi to go. The signage to the top was off by a lot so when it said 1 mi to go, you would go 3/4 mile then see a sign that said 1k. Climb was relentless. When I crossed the line, I collapsed on the ground for about 10min before I could get breathing normal again and partake in some fine water, powerade and watermelon. Jesse arrived about 1.5 min later. It was a point to point race so we had to make our way back down the long climb and hope for a ride back. Fortunately, we both found rides quickly. Rode back to the host house, ate, and slept.

Stage 3 was 127km loop around Pinos Altos with almost 6k ft of vert. The first major climbs were between mi 13 and 26, then some rollers and good long descent. I got dropped at the feed(top of last climb). Bombed the descent then drove and collaborated with 5 others until we caught the peloton around mile 45 or so. It was an incredible effort. Legs got better and I made the selection on the cat 3 climb from mile 60 to 70. Probably 20 of us. When we got to the rollers at the top I attacked twice for kicks. Legs felt good and thought I would try something. Then it got fast as we descended to the finish. A small breakaway for 4 riders got away earlier on in the day, ended up 9th in the sprint finish for our group, 14th overall. Pretty jazzed about it. particularly hanging with the CO boys and coming back after the drop.

Stage 4 was a downtown crit. Pretty good course, two short climbs. Kept in the 50x23 on the climbs. Lots of bitching from riders because of rubbing elbows. Rubbin' is racing I say. The crowds were good and the promoter was throwing out some sick primes, $50-100 ones. Jesse missed on one ufortunately. I was trying to stay rested before the final stage so I could improve my GC to top 20 and be in the money. On the last lap I got pinched on the inside by a TIAA Cref rider and settled for 26.

Stage 5 was stage 3 backwards with a cat 2 climb (3mi avg 7.5%) at mile 53-65. Then a long descent then rollers, then an uphill to the line. Felt good going into the day, and stayed near the front protected from the wind. As the road went up, I couldn't respond as I wanted. Continued to ride hard, Jesse fell back and helped me up as he was in the break earlier on and was up the road a bit. At the top of the climb I was alone and just bombed the descent and passed 5 guys who were probably upwards of 1.5 min ahead of me. I was averaging 330-400watts over the last 10mi to keep my place on GC.

It was a great race. Climbs were hard, but nothing more than what you can do here. The 6-7k ft of vert and the 8? crossings of the Continental Divide are what made it difficult.

Race stats care of SRM:
Total Mileage for the 5 days: 359
Total KJ: 12,191
Avg Watts: 196

So host housing can always be a trip....We had a real job in our case last week. Women was in her in late 50s/early 60s probably, two giant rotweilers and didn't cook. I don't know think she worked either. We definitely had the most secure home in in the gang infested Silver City. 2 locked gates, and 1 locked door to get into the house. Shag carpet and Tour of the Gila stuff everywhere in the house. We spent most of our time outside the house if we weren't sleeping b/c it was just toooo weird. Came away with a lot of great quotes. When we came home on Saturday, we got blasted with Camera shots as soon as we walked in the door. Then we were asked to sign her tour poster. I kind of felt pro. We got our printed pictures before we left along with Tour of the Gila cowbells. Pretty sweet dude.

All and all a great trip.

you can check out the race site at, www.tourofthegila.com Check out the race profiles and other stuff.

Cheers,
Matthew