Chapter 24

From the start, the final day of the Classic was different. From the weather, which broke gray and overcast, through the ‘quacking’ in the pack, everything felt and sounded very much different than the past two days. The four of us rolled up to the start line in our adopted team kits. The three ‘Road Queens’ wore their Queen of Hearts jerseys and I wore the King (and believe me, someone was going to see Elvis today if I had anything to say about it)!

The start was pretty much anticlimactic in comparison to the grand send off of day one. I think the race organizers were getting worn out, as all they did was wave a hand, and we were off. At once, we formed up into what I had always called the bubble formation.

On a major stage race, like le Tour, the ride leader on any team, especially if he was wearing the leader’s jersey, would ride inside a protective bubble of other teammates on the flat roll in to any mountain stage. Slowly, as the road pitched up, riders would peel off until the last few climbers remained to lead up the hill. Finally, as the pace got too great for even them, it was left to the leader to pull out and take over the stage.

Jane, Beth and I formed the bubble, with Melody in our center. The formation served the dual purposes of breaking the wind and keeping our designated climber out of trouble. I used my race elbows to fend off anyone we overtook, and anyone who wanted to pass had to expend an enormous amount of energy to ride around all of us in a clump. Since the objective of the bubble was to make other teams hurt if they wanted past, so much the better.

As we approached the actual penultimate climb to the summit, Jane and I peeled off and started to drift back. Beth pulled Melody uphill like a woman possessed. They set a blistering pace that even the men had a hard time holding. You could see pride warring with reality as they fought to hold on to the wheels of two women! We were shedding studs left and right as they finally gave into the pain. At the foot of the final push to the summit, the road took a sweeping left-hand turn and then headed uphill one last time. Just as Beth and Melody entered the turn, one or two of the studs put on their move and tried to burst around them. This was the move I had predicted, and our entire strategy was based upon it happening. We had hoped that they would try to burst wide around the two of them, and the set-up was textbook. The ‘Boss’ couldn’t have done it better! As they drew even with Beth’s frame, she started to drift wider and wider, thereby forcing them to ride more and more hill. Meanwhile, Melody burst underneath Beth and charged up the short side of the turn and into the final hill.

I had spent months marveling at how well Melody could climb. Now, I saw a gear I don’t think she even knew she had. She flew out of Beth’s shadow like a rocket. Legs pumping as she stood to gain the full advantage of her positioning. Too late, the ‘boys’ realized what had been done to them, and also realized they were totally caught with their shorts down. I couldn’t help but smile at a plan perfectly executed. By the time Beth allowed them by her, Melody was already more than fifty meters ahead of them with a full head of steam. You could just see the wind get totally sucked out of the sails of the three guys and one woman that had tried to take us on the hill.

This ride wasn’t over, though; we still had an alpine descent on the other side. While they all lost effort, the three of us slowly overtook them and entered the descent without bothering to stop at the lunch stop. This also caught them flatfooted, as I think they had counted on being able to regroup on the summit and ride as a unit. We had already made allowances for that.

Melody was flying downhill, but not full out. She was holding back a bit, waiting for the three of us to catch her up. We pulled into a pace line with me in the front to break a big wind hole and rode downhill like a sled. Just as planned, Melody felt us start to fly by and jumped onto the end and tucked. From that point on, it was all over but the shouting, which we did with abandon as we flew downhill.

The four of us roared into the finish area in full flight and only started to slow as we passed the finish line and called out our numbers to be logged in. That is how you put the hurt into someone on a mountain stage!

Damn, but if I don’t just know I’m ready to become a coach after all!