Race: Wards Ferry Road Race 4/5
Date: May 24th, 2025
AVRT racers: Shai Traister, Gregoire Denis
Top Result: Gregoire (7/20), Shai (8th/20)
Course: 5 laps of a 12 miles/~1100ft loop of hills and descents with no flat sections. Pretty bad pavement made this race really bumpy with sketchy turns partially covered by gravel.
Strava: https://www.strava.com/activities/14584394589/
Nutrition: Two bottles (one frozen) with 60g of carbs. 2 bottles from the feed - one with 60g of carbs one just water, 2 gu gels, 1 cookie.
Race recap (written by Shai):
There was no Masters cat4 field, so I signed up for the cat4/5 open field. This race got cancelled in the last few years due to low participation, but this year it seemed like it was taking place. I wanted to support the race, plus I remembered it as a fun course from the last time I raced it in 2019.
The race started with a neutral roll out, but as soon as the race actually started the pace picked up considerably and became all strung out. I was in a good position towards the front and I saw one guy in the front pulling the group with nobody else taking turns. I figured this was due to inexperience of a cat5 racer or some excitement at the beginning of the race when everyone still had fresh legs.
We hit the first climb (0.9miles @ 7%) and at an all-out pace and although I felt that I could hang with the group upfront, I knew we still had a long way to go and that there is no way this can sustain. I slowed down a little bit, and when Gregoire passed me I slotted behind him to get some draft. Even after slowing down this climb was 3:40m @ 371w. After the climb we could still see the front group (which didn’t slow down as I expected), but soon after came a long descent and they were gone, never to be seen again.
I continued riding with Gregoire - a couple of others joined us but we were able to drop them in one of the climbs. With the road being so bumpy it was hard to get a good draft due to the continuous swerving to avoid potholes and due to the bikes constantly bumping that required a bigger gap for safety. Gregoire did the bulk of the work with me taking pulls as much as I could.
It was starting to get pretty warm so I tried to stay hydrated as much as possible. I gave Drew 2 frozen bottles at the start to hand me at the feed zone. These were awesome!!! Thank Drew!! In addition I grabbed neutral water from Drew’s invention of the bottle handing tool which worked like magic - I grabbed 2 bottles and poured them over myself to cool down a little.
On the 3rd lap my legs started to complain and I could feel them starting to cramp. This was bad news because this was like the middle of the race and I still had 2 more laps to go. I told Gregoire that I must continue at Tempo pace on the climbs and we slowed down a little bit which allowed the 2 dropped riders that we dropped earlier to catch up.
At some point Gregoire’s bike computer fell to the ground and he stopped/turned back to pick it up. I continued on with one of the other riders, assuming he would probably be able to catch up at the pace I was riding. After some time I was dropped by the other rider and continued solo. Gregoire caught up to me and I told him I was cramping. That reminded me that I still had a Gel and that cookie in my pocket. I ate both. Gregoire continued on, and I kept going at the best pace I could manage without cramping.
On the last lap i was starting to feel a bit better - I guess nutrition does help 🙂- and I started picking up the pace - to my surprise I was able to even do some VO2 efforts without cramping. As I was getting close to the final climb I noticed one rider from my field ahead (the same guy that dropped me on lap 3). I managed my efforts and steadily closed on him - legs felt good. After a short recovery I launched an attack and cleared ahead to finish 8th, one place after Gregoire.
Brutal race, but fun nonetheless. Definitely tubeless tires and as wide as possible for the bumpy road.
In hindsight I learned that Gavin Sherry (aka - the newly crowned OLH KOM holder) was racing in my field (he registered day-of so I didn’t know), which explains the hectic start of the race. It also explains why the front group didn’t slow down after that fast climb. Gavin ended up 20 minutes ahead of a group of chasers. Good for him, but what is he doing in a cat 4 race?