2025 Cantua Creek RR - Women’s P1234

Race: Cantua Creek Road Race - Women’s P1234

Date: Feb 15, 2025

AVRT racers: Robin Betz, Steph Hart, Lousie Thomas

Top Result: Robin Betz (3rd/9)

Course: Approx. 48 mi and 1250 ft of elevation. The course consists of two out-and-back laps with good pavement. The section of road is mostly straight and flat with some rolling hills near the start/finish. The finish is 0.8 miles with a 3% gradient.

Strava: https://www.strava.com/activities/13636128515

Nutrition: Two 400kcal bottles of Robin’s race fuel: cyclic dextrin + country time lemonade

Recap:

[Robin]: Alto Velo and Terun were the two represented teams, each with 3 riders. My goal was to get an upgrade point, which required placing in the top 3, and my best chances of that versus this group would be to get in a break or at least make the race really difficult before the final finishing climb.

About a quarter of the way into the first lap, attacks started going. We had some great teamwork with a counterattack ready to go, and it was fast and furious for 3-4 attacks before settling down. I was pleasantly surprised to find myself ready for another counterattack each time with energy to spare. This dynamic continued through the turnaround at the first lap.

At different times all of us ended up off the front either solo or with a Terun rider. I was surprised to find Terun would chase when we both had riders off the front but guessed they wanted to go for a podium sweep or something.

At one point I found myself off the front with a fair gap with a Terun rider Sarah and convinced her to work with me a bit. I felt pretty good and convinced her to work with me to grow the gap. We traded pulls for a while until the climb at the end of the first lap. On the way back I saw we had a good gap to the field but Jen Tave was trying to bridge.

[Louise]: In the “chase” group we kept the pace fairly easy once Robin and Sarah got away; since both Alto Velo and Terun had someone in the break and the solo riders looked tired the breakaway seemed like it would stick. However, as we approached the hill at the end of lap 1 (of 2), Jen attacked. It’s extremely difficult to keep up with Jen going uphill on a good day, but this was made even harder by getting caught up with a different field at the turnaround point and so Jen got away from us. 

[Robin again]: Sarah entirely stopped working with me at this point. I tried to encourage her by saying she would almost certainly win vs. me, but not vs. Jen, but she was just coasting. I had forgotten a key piece of information which is that Jen is (somehow) a cat 3 and they need to get her upgrade points so she can race Redlands, so she was the protected rider that day.

After it flattened out I wasn’t sure what to do, but I knew if the group caught me there’s no way I was going to be able to get top 3. Jen catches us and we keep working together, so I am okay with it. After the last turnaround I think about how to maximize my odds of doing well and start pretending to be tired – moving my upper body more, taking shorter pulls, and making loud breathing sounds when I fall back.

This worked well as they attacked me a few times but I’m impossible to drop on the flats and wasn’t actually too tired. At the final climb I do my best but they both gap me easily and I roll in for third.

I was very happy with the outcome of this race and our teamwork. The only thing I would have done differently is going harder on the flat when I saw Jen chasing, even if it meant giving Sarah a free ride to first place, as a flat TT with wind is where I’m proportionally strongest.