After the Shippensburg race weekend got cancelled due to inclement weather, the second day of the Hell of the North was cancelled as well. But regardless, MIT cyclists were eager to attack the ITT and criterium of April 14th, and had dominant performances in both events.
Read Dustin’s account of the weekend and Men’s B Crit below:
Going into this weekend, I was pretty apprehensive about what it might bring. The forecast continued to look grimmer as the weekend drew closer and by Friday, the weather gods were calling for temperatures in the mid-thirties and some mixed precipitation. Sweet. Awesome. Great for cornering hard in a crit with a new bike.
The ITT in the morning went well with MIT sweeping many of the top spots in all categories and pulling in a huge number of Omnium points. Go Tech! And as we transitioned over to Dartmouth’s Frat Row to get ready for the crit, things dried up and it actually began to look like we could have some good conditions for racing. We had a blast watching the early races with Coach Nicole providing commentary on strategy and suggestions on critical points in the course. She turned to me, Berk, and Quinn (aka the Killa Beeeees aka MIT Men’s B riders) and asked, “So what’s your strategy? Do you guys know what you’re going to do?” I replied, “Yeah we have a detailed agenda. Many planning. Much strategy.” We of course hadn’t discussed anything.
The race kicked with a fast few laps and then things settled in until the bell rang for the first prime lap. Berk attacked like a bat out of hell and 4 riders chased. As soon I saw them hit the finish line, I sprinted out of the group to draw up next to the 5 riders yelling “Let’s go, let’s go we have a gap, time to work!” in classic Liam fashion. Everyone gave me a quick glance and sat up, ready to head back to the pack. Except, of course, Berk who is always down for getting #rekt.
Now, Coach Nicole might say it’s stupid to attack 10 minutes into a 50-minute race in a two-man break with a teammate since the pack would almost certainly work hard to shut it down. But when in bike racing, YOLO as bike racers do (or maybe YGDS as some might say). So anyway, lap after lap we steadily grew the gap 2 seconds here, 5 seconds there. Until finally with 2 laps to go we turned the corner and there was the pack. We had lapped the field and, we were absolutely thrilled to find, the Quinn Bee was sitting at the front – totally wiped after a long day of blocking and shutting down attacks.
As it turned out, we had executed team strategy perfectly, with Berk and I working together very well at the front and Quinn doing everything he could to keep the rest of the race from catching us. I’d never had the opportunity to cruise casually across a crit finish line shoulder to shoulder with a great teammate and I don’t expect it’ll happen again soon- it’s definitely something I’d recommend giving a try if you ever have a chance. Sometimes you just need to decide to go for it in a race and once in a blue moon it works out exactly the way you’d hoped.
Read Tori’s account of the Women’s A/B crit below:
This weekend marked the first time this season that we had 3 women in the A/B race, since Amy just upgraded to the B’s! With no Sunday races, we stepped up to the crit ready to empty the tank with whatever we had left. In our race, and early attack split the field and resulted in a break of 5 riders, including myself and Emma. We rode a majority of the race with just the 5 of us. Despite getting caught near the end, an RPI rider attacked again and we re-formed the break with a substantial gap. Getting into the break (twice!) and riding there for most of the race had taken quite a bit out of my legs, and so I used what I had left to lead out Emma into and out of the final corner, and get her in position for the sprint. Her bike skipped a gear near the very end of the sprint, and she took a close second to the RPI rider. I rode in for 3rd in the Women’s A category and 5th overall. Coach Nicole was there, and provided great strategy and insights (and much-needed hot water) all day. The team had an incredible showing today, and I’m really excited to see what we can do in the final weekend of the conference season!