TNW - Las Vegas

On some wild notion I decided to ride the Tuesday night westside wild cat criterium training race (Tuesday Night Worlds) that is held in a neighborhood in The Lakes.  I rode it about half a dozen times in 2009, my first year back in the racing scene, and decided it was too sketchy and hadn't been back since.   It's run on city streets complete with cars, people who walk in the bike lane, slow moving non-racing cyclists, and all the other hazards of neighborhood life.  The Lakes is a mature, upscale neighborhood with a lot of trees, and a lot of grass, unlike many newer parts of Las Vegas, which have opted for a more desert friendly landscaping.  This means that in addition to the already mentioned hazards, there is one off camber turn that is always wet.  And I mean always.  The course is roughly round with two turns, one through a round a bout and is quite narrow, the other is the one at the top of the slight grade that follows turn one, and that's the one that's always wet.  From here the course swoops downhill, through a stop sign (cars enter the course from the left here, it's a T intersection), and rises gradually to the start/finish line.  Turn two is also a stop sign, and is a four way stop, which we run with impunity as well.  There is also a neighborhood strip mall where cars will exit the parking lot into our path from time to time.  Since it is a wildcat training ride, there are no real rules, and dropped riders will often re-enter the pack on the next lap.  So all of this combined makes for an exciting experience, so to speak.  I arrived about 45 minutes early after riding over there from my house, which is about 3.5 miles away.  I did a total of ten miles warming up, then lined up for the race.  We go for an hour, give or take.  I sat anywhere from about mid-pack to the back third.  One had to actively maintain position or be spit out the back.  By about half way the field size had shrunk to maybe just over half the original starters, and from here on it got smaller and smaller each time through the two turns.  Speeds were very high throughout.  It was fun, in a sick sort of way.  I finished better than mid-pack and my Garmin tells me my average speed for the 28.36 miles covered in 1:03 was 27.0 mph with a top speed of 37.7 mph.  Although I'm not racing in any more criteriums as part of a stage race (all the stage races coming up that I'm riding in do not have a criterium as one of the stages), and probably none as a stand alone race, I'm still going to go ride these Tuesday night training rides for the leg speed and general practice of riding at high speed in a group.  That is, until I feel it getting out of control like I did back in 2009 with Hummers racing us for the turn, big sticks and water bottles becoming airborne, things like that.  So for now, I rode it, survived it, and will go back for more.  Total miles for the evening was 43 and some change, so that was good, too.  Back to a climbing workout tonight.

Races coming up in April:

Tour of the Depot - April 9th and 10th - Tooele, Utah
Superior Road Race - April 16th; 62 miles, Superior, Arizona
Devil's Punch Bowl Road Race - April 23; 32 miles, Pearblossom, California

There's also a road race in San Luis Rey, California at the end of the month that is still a maybe.