Welcome to the B5 racing blog! I will try and keep this updated with Thursday night race reports and tips. Have a question about racing, training, tactics? Send it in. Some one else probably has the same question - so let me know and we'll post it.

2007 B-LOG Entries

Email your comments, questions suggestions, etc! Thanks! - Mike M.

05/08/08 - Rush

Mark Blakley set up the winning move (again) by riding everyone off his wheel. Even with Blackley and Lytwynec off the front, the rest of the group remained animated with lots of attacks from various riders. I was impressed with the guys I was riding with in the breaks... good sharp attack followed by a solid TT effort. Nice job!

Tip: Crossing wheels. If you cross your front wheel with the rear wheel of the rider in front of you - don't panic... don't brake hard or drastically steer. Stay calm and let the situation correct itself. If you are leaning your front wheel on the rider in front of you, your natural reaction will be to steer away... don't do that.. you will go down. For example, if you are on the left of the rider in front, overlapping wheels and for some reason you are rubbing wheels, your instinct will be to steer away to the left, but that will only cause the angle of your bike to go in the wrong direction.. straight down onto the pavement! Instead, keep your bike as straight, or even steer slightly to the right and lean your front wheel on the riders rear wheel to push yourself upright. If this is confusing, take your bike and lean the front wheel against a wall. Lean the bike and then see what happens to the angle of your bike when you turn the handlebars.

Good luck at Bristol, see you next Thursday. MM

05/01/08 - Riga Explosion

When an explsion happens, pieces fly out in all directions. That's what we happened in Riga due to some decent attacking. The early acclerations were hard - sending riders off the back and a solid break of 2 off the front. The break stuck with a solo chaser and a group of two coming in for 4th and 5th just ahead of what was left of the peloton. GREAT RACING!

For the 4th and 5th placed riders, sorry for myextra yelling (encouragement?!). You had a nice gap, but the group was closing. Remember, if you made the effort to create a break, don't waste the opportunity. The effort to the line has to be an all-out-tip of the saddle-saliva hanging off your chin effort. There is no time to pause think about giving up. It pays off to ride beyond your limits.

Euro Pro Do's and don'ts: DO attack and counter attack. Be aggressive. It should look like the Belgian classics you've been watching on Versus. DON'T go into a faux TT position (forearms on your tops) on Thursday nights - that's a crash waiting to happen. DO put your hand up when you have a flat. Hold your line and move calmly over to the shoulder. DON'T toss your water bottles. Our races are for training.. we're not finishing up Ventoux.

Nice job everyone. Let's keep it up next Thursday!

04/24/08 - Mendon...

Another big field! Great to see all the new faces. Again, a fast night that ended in a bunch sprint. Andy (Full Moon Vista) put in some nice attacks throughout the race... and there were a few other good moves during the race, but we need more attacks. As the season progresses and everyone gets comfortable in the peloton - keep trying to attack. It takes some time to learn the timing and the effort, but once you get it, your racing and results will improve tremendously!

Tip: Only be at the the front when it counts! A lot of riders ride at the very front of the pack because they're afraid that they'll miss a move. It may seem counter intuitive, but the best spot to be is further back. If you're at the very front, you're in the wind all the time wasting energy. When the attacks happen, you're surprised and you end up having to react & close the gap with everyone on your wheel.

The view from the back is much better... you can see the attacks forming... you'll see a rider moving up, looking back for traffic, shifting up a gear or two. When the rider jumps, you're right there and you can attack with him/her.

See you all in Riga.

04/17/08 - Warm Chili.

Wow! What a field! With all the upgrades to cat 4 last yr, I was expecting a small B5 group for our first night. We had a huge field. And the cat 4 field was just a big. Welcome to all the new riders!

2 warm up laps and then 5 laps of racing saw some spirited attacks by Mark and Mike, but in the end, the night was settled in a field sprint with Andy (Full Moon Vista) taking a well deserved victory. Nice job!