Solano Classic 2002 - California, USA

Today was my first race with the Verizon Wireless-Cervelo team. The team is based on the East coast of the USA, and will race predominantly on the east coast, however we decided to open up the season with a race in Fairfield, California.

The core five girls on the team includes two Canadians, Erinne Willock from Vancouver Island, and Julia Farrell from Toronto, two American residents, Petra Ford from New Jersey and Hiroko Shimado from Connecticut (however Hiroko is of Japanese origin) and an Aussie, me.

Todays course suited the all-round cyclist. It had plenty of rolling hills, headwinds, crosswinds, with a few steep climbs. We started in Fairfield, (a town about 1.5hrs north east of San Francisco) and headed out on a 100km loop, finishing back in Fairfield. It was a big field with 109 girls lining the start line. My plan was to contest the sprint jersey, cover all early attacks and try to get in today's break. I chased down the first 3 attacks and then bridged across solo to Anne Simplonis. We had about 10sec on the peloton but were caught by the peloton only 500m before the first sprint. I tried to recover and managed to get 4th in the first sprint.

The peloton was aggressive with counterattacks immediately following the sprint. I was desperately sitting in, trying to recover from the sprint. At the 20km mark, the terrain started to climb gradually. The road was narrow with large cracks, potholes and a solid headwind.

A group of 7, including Bessette and Bruckner (Saturn) Palmer-Komar and Pryde (Talgo America) and Sydor (Canadian National) managed broke away up the first KOM. Minutes later, Judith Arndt attacked on her own, crossed to the break and they were never seen again. She timed it perfectly because with the climb and headwind, we all watched helplessly as she disappeared. Unfortunately Verizon Wireless-Cervelo missed the break, although not before a gallant effort by Erinne.

The feed zone was just crazy. There were riders weaving and dodging everywhere. I saw one girl ride straight into one of the feeders and literally took him out. Riders that had passed their feeders were braking and trying to grab a bidon from the neutral feeders. I grabbed a bidon and then headed to the left to avoid the carnage.

The peloton were not particularly interested in chasing the break and the time gap quickly opened up. The 2nd KOM was uneventful, however was really steep and my legs felt shattered as I grovelled over the top just off the back of the peloton. I chased hard and was easily back on by the bottom of the descent.

A short while later, someone yelled out "Bee swarm" and coming straight at us down the road was a huge swarm of big bumble bees. They were flying in our faces and being allergic to bee stings, I was thankful that I wasn't stung.

With 10km to go, I moved up to the front of the peloton. Erinne manoeuvred in front of me and kept the pace on to lead me out. With 2km to go we did a sharp left hand turn and Erinne miss judging her speed, put her wheels in the gravel but skilfully stayed up right. With 1km to go I moved up to 2nd wheel, hard against the left side of the road. Just before I decided to come around her, I saw Kiesanowski (Diet Rite) coming down the far right side. The girl in front of me sat up so I headed across to the right and managed to finish 10th in the bunch sprint, which gave me an overall position of 18th. The peloton finished 12min29 down on the winner, so unfortunately GC contention looks doubtful now.

Lyne Bessette won the race from Judith Arndt and Kimberly Bruckner, a complete domination by Saturn.

29 June 2002
Stage 2	20km (12 mile) individual time trial	Conditions: strong SW winds, 23C, sunny

We had a 25min drive to the start of the time trial course. The riders started in reverse GC order with the first rider heading off at 9am.

The course was challenging and quite technical due predominantly to the winds, two sharp corners and a few nasty hills. Straight off the ramp, there was an 800m gradual uphill climb followed by a short descent and sharp left hand turn. The next 5km had gradual undulating hills but with the cross tailwinds it was really fast. At the 7km mark, we did another sharp left and had two long unforgiving hills to climb over. At the bottom of the 2nd hill was the 10km turn around mark.

I didn't have a good day out today. I certainly slept well, and ate well (never an issue there), but I didn't do my usual rollers warm up (as we didn't have any with us) so I hadn't lifted my heart rate enough. Also, I really suffered in the wind today and just had no strength. My results reflexed how poorly I felt, finishing 31st, 4mins 24sec down on Kimberly Bruckner, who narrowly beat Bessette and Arndt ­ another clean sweep by Saturn. My result today lowered my GC position to 30th.

30 June 2002
Stage 3	60min criterium	Conditions: steady winds, 23C, sunny

There were still 95 girls in the race so it was really important to get to the front and not get stuck down the back where it is harder to ride. The clockwise course was about 1km long and was designed like a U, with 8 turns, 6 right handers and 2 left handers. The top 3 GC positions were held by Saturn and were not under threat, however I knew Saturn would be looking for another stage win, and would be trying to set up a break with Saturn in it.

In the first 10mins, Bruckner attacked with two other riders. I came around the bunch and sprinted across, and with the bunch hesitating we soon had a 15sec gap on field. Bruckner was driving so hard I was hardly able to pull a turn. After being away for three laps, a young boy decided to rollerblade right out on the course heading straight for us. I was 4th wheel and watched as the first two girls made it passed him, while the girl sitting 3rd wheel slammed on her brakes and having no option, I did likewise. We both swirved violently, and only narrowly avoided him. I almost lost it as my back wheel locked up. I sprinted back to Bruckner but the bunch was closing in so I sat up and recovered.

The rest of the criterium was made up of countless attacks, but all breaks were closed down. There were a number of primes (sprint laps), however I wasn't able to contest any of them. The final lap was hectic and on the 3rd last corner, two Amoroso girls touched wheels in front of me and wiped out across the road. I manoeuvered out of their way and sprinted hard to get back to the remaining peloton as we reached the final corner. It was too late to get positioned for a good finish but sprinted hard anyway to claim 20th. Teutenberg (Saturn) won the criterium from Arndt (Saturn).

Overall our team finished in 8th place. The GC results for the Solano Classic are: