Ten years ago today, I did my first road bike race – which I consider to be the first race I did, despite the two terrible mountain bike races I did in the fall of 2003.
I missed out on the first ECCC weekend at Rutgers, so my first race was at Penn State. This was also when I first developed my general hatred for Pennsylvania, a hatred that would only grow stronger as I spent several weekends driving a billion friggin hours to and from bike races in the land of Erica Allar.
Anyway, at my first road race ever, it was really cold (and, as we were going to Florida next, my idiot 18 year old brain only packed for warm Florida – not frigid Pennsylvania). The hillclimb TT was shortened because there was too much snow at the top. I don’t remember anything about the crit.
I do, though, vividly remember the circut race. Matt Piotrowski, then a junior (I think?), and now a coworker of mine, gave me a congratulatory pat on the back towards the end of the race. What he didn’t realize, though, was that I was on the brink of exploding.
Right after he patted me on the back, I got dropped.
So, with that, let’s look at what my first road racing weekend was like! Maybe later in this here post I’ll wax nostalgic about all the great things that cycling has done for me in the last ten years – or I’ll just go off on a tangent about dicks.
Thanks to the wonder of archive.org, here are the results.
ITT
Men D 31 Starters 4.8 Miles, 1100'ITT Pts. 1 686 Zach Via UNH 21:31.18 11 2 633 Edward Naughton UNH 22:44.88 9 3 654 David Maitlin Penn State 23:17.92 7 4 684 Joshua Kissinger UNH 24:29.33 6 5 634 Drew Szeliga UNH 24:43.91 5 6 682 Matt Piotrowski UNH 24:46.97 4 7 630 Nathaniel Brahms Harvard 24:57.36 3 8 607 Stewart Ellis Harvard 24:59.05 2 9 679 Ander Kazmerski Rochester 25:06.55 1 10 627 Nathaniel Craig Harvard 25:13.62 11 683 Gerald Obey UNH 25:21.13 12 687 Ryan Kelly UNH 25:26.22 13 672 Max Rietmann Cornell 25:29.85 14 631 Jonathan Tan Yale 26:01.96 15 677 Peter Nix Rochester 26:06.27 16 632 Blake Holt UNH 26:14.68 17 660 Mike Garvey Penn State 26:16.29 18 656 Heinz JurgenPunge Rutgers 26:26.30 19 619 Stephen Maxwell Harvard 26:28.83 20 655 David Miller Cornell 26:34.18 21 601 Pieter Van Lieu UMass 26:36.95 22 635 Ricky Silver Skidmore 27:05.24 23 661 John Cawthorne Penn State 27:11.22 24 662 Aaron Nathan Cornell 27:18.26 25 678 Brian Anderson Rochester 27:19.36 26 623 Nicholas Qiang MIT 27:40.60 27 689 James Miller Cornell 27:44.43 28 690 Ryan van Hoff Dartmouth 27:54.41 29 681 Jonathan Rupp Cornell 28:09.10 30 688 John St. Onge UNH 28:59.74 31 680 Andrew Potter Cornell 30:38.18
A fun thing to do here is guess “Who won a collegiate hill climb TT in 2004?” SPOILER: Mike Barton. It was Mike Barton. Duh.
Another fun thing to play is a game of “Who is still racing?” Nice to see Cosmo turning in a SOLID mid-field finish in the Bs.
Crit
Men D 38 Starters Crit PoiSprint Points 1 686 Zach Via UNH 12 8 2 682 Matt Piotrowski UNH 9 5 3 619 Stephen Maxwell Harvard 7 1 4 683 Gerald Obey UNH 6 5 607 Stewart Ellis Harvard 5 1 6 691 Regi EndriukaitisDrexel 4 2 7 611 Justin Kline Drexel 3 8 630 Nathaniel Brahms Harvard 2 5 9 653 Eric Miller Penn State 1 10 621 Abe Gissen Tufts 11 633 Edward Naughton UNH 12 634 Drew Szeliga UNH 13 687 Ryan Kelly UNH 14 662 Aaron Nathan Cornell 15 672 Max Rietmann Cornell 16 692 Richard Katz Columbia 17 679 Ander Kazmerski Rochester 18 641 Jon Menzin Columbia pulled & placed 19 623 Nicholas Qiang MIT 20 620 Matt Dysart Tufts 21 660 Mike Garvey Penn State 22 677 Peter Nix Rochester 23 678 Brian Anderson Rochester 24 689 James Miller Cornell 25 690 Ryan van Hoff Dartmouth 26 694 Noah Ashbaugh Penn State 27 601 Pieter Van Lieu UMass 28 654 David Maitlin Penn State 29 684 Joshua Kissinger UNH 30 635 Ricky Silver Skidmore 31 658 Karan Gill Penn State 32 631 Jonathan Tan Yale 33 661 John Cawthorne Penn State 34 610 Michael Ondik Drexel 35 671 Timothy Reissman Cornell dnf 627 Nathaniel Craig Harvard dnf 688 John St. Onge UNH dnf 693 Steven Place Drexel
I didn’t get pulled NOR DID I CRASH in my first crit. I got that going for me.
Hey, who won the Men’s A crit? (Mike Barton. It was Mike Barton). Also featured in the Men’s A crit was Joe Kopena.
And Cosmo was in a break that lapped the field in the B race.
Circuit Race
Men D 42 Starters 18 Miles RR Pts. 1 686 Zach Via UNH 51:28 20 2 653 Eric Miller Penn State at 1:20 16 3 654 David Maitlin Penn State 12 4 611 Justin Kline Drexel 1:23 8 5 692 Richard Katz Columbia 5 6 691 Regi EndriukaitisDrexel 4 7 696 Keith Kirkwood Delaware 1:30 3 8 683 Gerald Obey UNH 2 9 697 John Kirkwood Delaware 1 10 630 Nathaniel Brahms Harvard 11 621 Abe Gissen Tufts 12 619 Stephen Maxwell Harvard 13 682 Matt Piotrowski UNH 1:45 14 687 Ryan Kelly UNH 1:50 15 607 Stewart Ellis Harvard 2:00 16 631 Jonathan Tan Yale 3:00 17 634 Drew Szeliga UNH 3:10 18 695 Adam Cohen Skidmore 19 633 Edward Naughton UNH pulled & placed 20 620 Matt Dysart Tufts 21 684 Joshua Kissinger UNH 22 658 Karan Gill Penn State 23 645 Andrew Webster Delaware 24 677 Peter Nix Rochester 25 656 Heinz JurgenPunge Rutgers 26 635 Ricky Silver Skidmore 27 671 Timothy Reissman Cornell 28 641 Jon Menzin Columbia 29 693 Steven Place Drexel 30 694 Noah Ashbaugh Penn State 31 601 Pieter Van Lieu UMass 32 679 Ander Kazmerski Rochester 33 690 Ryan van Hoff Dartmouth 34 610 Michael Ondik Drexel 35 678 Brian Anderson Rochester 36 688 John St. Onge UNH 37 655 David Miller Cornell 38 627 Nathaniel Craig Harvard dnf 623 Nicholas Qiang MIT dnf 643 Steven Anton Delaware dnf 660 Mike Garvey Penn State dnf 661 John Cawthorne Penn State
Hrm. I finished ONE MINUTE AND FIFTY SECONDS DOWN in an EIGHTEEN MILE CIRCUIT RACE. WHAT. If I remember correctly, there was some sort of wall-ish climb there or something. I have no idea what the course was. Because it was 10 years ago. And I got dropped. In my third race ever.
Who won the Men’s A race?
It was Mike Barton.
Anyway. That was the first race. Then I went to Florida, crashed and broke my frame (which I found out later and raced Beanpot and UVM on a borrowed cross bike), and gave myself a knee wound that is still a nasty scar to this day because I continued to crash on it, never letting it heal.
You may also notice in the results is one Drew Szeliga, co-founder of the Drew and Ryan Announcing Experience. We’re still BEST FRIENDS.
Bike racing has brought me MANY BEST FRIENDS. Oddly enough, Cosmo and I could have had several more years of BEST FRIENDSHIP had we hung out at Penn State that first weekend, but, it was not to be.
Bike racing (and riding, which is required for the continuation of my mediocre results) has brought me/led me to/enabled the following things (that I am thinking of off the top of my head):
- Fitness, and an ass that just won’t quit.
- Possible immortality, due to fitness.
- From collegiate cycling, an ability to race on little sleep and junk calories (Pop Tarts).
- My wife and our currently unborn child (as we met at a UNH cycling team potluck that I went to, with no food, when I was one year out of college).
- This child will LITERALLY owe it’s existence to cycling.
- One internship at a trade magazine publisher in Oxford, CT (as I met the owner on a group ride. I did not drop him.)
- Tip, kids – don’t always try to drop everyone, as they may end up offering you an internship.
- My career (tipped to me via Josh Austin/John Healy, both of whom I knew through cycling).
- Most of my friends (as noted above).
- As a result, the improvement of my job skillz (thanks Colin).
- Caffeine addiction.
- The development and refinement of thousands of complicated dick/poop jokes.
- Probably skin cancer on my nose.
- Ownership of one car for quite a while, thus enabling me to be a pompous dick about carbon footprints.
- Yes, I understand the carbon footprint of a supply chain that brings me a bike and components from China. Shut up.
I could really dig deep into this list (bike racing led to my job which led to destroying my eyes from looking at a computer screen which led to me getting glasses and thus looking sexier), but you get the idea.
Bike racing may seem like a totally silly hobby (silly by some metrics, but those are the same metrics that consider golf to be a totally reasonable hobby), but bike racing is like some sort of parasite that infects your body and directs you down a path towards health and awesome decisions and, if you’re lucky, an uncanny ability to find a dick joke in every sentence.
you have job skills?
No love for the teammate who lapped the field? And won the omnium?? Huh. I see. #still racing.