The Tour of Somerville is one of our favorite races and it is our third year in a row that we have been going. On Memorial Day we used to spend time with family that is super close to us but the Somerville crit made us break that tradition (but we were still with them from Friday evening to early Monday morning). One of the things that makes the Somerville crit so special is the big crowd which makes it extra fun to race. With us were our Star Track teammates Brian, Des, Lily, Logan, Viv, and Will as well as some of the older Star Trackers, Mia Deye, Jayden Lee, and Justin Pac. Coach Pete and Coach Brian were there too and lots of parents of course who all cheered us on.
My Junior 9-14 Race
This race had 7 laps and the Women’s 15-16 field was racing with us but they started a little before us (I think it was 30 seconds, but I am not sure). The race was super surgy, attacks were followed by going super slow. I launched an attack coming out of the last turn on lap 2 to pick up the pace – at that time we were going 35 km/h despite coming off a downhill. Everyone took the turn wide and so I found a great inside lane that gave me a head start. I went quite hard hitting a max power of 570 watts (which is for me 15 watts/kg) and hit a speed of 47 km/h. This made everyone chase real hard and kept the pace high for a little but shortly after we crossed the finish line, the speed sank again and at the end of the straight fell below 30 km/h.
At the end of the sixth lap, coming out of the last turn into the bell lap, my Star Track teammate Lily started an attack, which Akira from Dave Jordan Juniors immediately followed. Once I noticed that they got a good separation from the field, I chased it down but surprisingly no one initially followed. I was hoping to work with Akira and Lily but this didn’t work out – since the girls are scored separately from the boys, they were worried about each other, not concerned about helping me to succeed on a breakaway. Anyway, the field caught up with us on the first turn on the last lap.
Once it came to the finish sprint, I dug hard but did not have much to give and came in 11th out of 24 (there were an additional three DNFs).
What I could have done better was staying closer up towards the front and drinking more water. It also would have been better to not launch the first first attack to have more energy for the final lap. Who knows, perhaps I could have held the break? That would have been really something.
The GoPro recording of my race is on our YouTube channel here.
Ari’s Junior 9-14 Race
Ari was in the 9-14 race with me and stayed at the front most of the time and worked hard to chase attacks down. He was hoping to get a breakaway started but none of the riders from other teams wanted to work with him. To make things worse, he missed the laps count and thought there was another lap to go and this put him somewhat out of position for the final sprint and he finished 8th. What confused him was that the race was just 21 minutes long while it should have been 25. He was super frustrated. The race footage from his GoPros is here.
Ari’s Jr. 15-18 Race
Ari also raced the Junior 15-18 race which had 18 laps for a total of about 34 km. Our teammate Jayden and Logan raced that one too. This race was much faster and Ari’s average speed was 43.7 km/h per Strava while for the Jr. 9-14 race the average per Strava was just 38.4 km/h even though it just had seven laps. Kelly Benefits got an early break which everyone missed at the start except a rider from Audi Primal Denver. The break held for the entire race – our teammate Jayden tried to bridge towards the end of the race but couldn’t. They were just too far ahead.
Ari finished the race with the peloton, coming in 22nd out of 27, an additional nine riders started the race but DNFed. He didn’t miss the lap count this time! When he raced the 15-18 field last year at Somerville he got pulled after five laps or so and he was happy to keep up with the field for the entire race this time. I think he was the youngest in the field. Not bad bro.
