This past weekend at the Tour of the Catskills was a breakthrough for me in more ways than one. When I took time to think about my success this weekend I realized that the Catskills has been something of a watershed race for me in my cycling career. In a random succession of circumstances the TOC has been ground zero for some of my life’s greatest disappointments and now one of my most rewarding successes.
2010
I raced the inaugural TOC in 2010 when I a first year U23. In 2010 I experienced my coming of age as a cyclist and tasted success by winning a bronze medal in the National U23 Time Trial. I trained very seriously that year and I pushed myself to an entirely new level of fitness. Inspired by my own potential, I trained harder and longer, ate less and dreamed bigger dreams. And then, the week before the Tour of the Catskills, my maltreated body turned against me. It was the first onset of the Chronic Fatigue Syndrome that would eventually ruin two years of my cycling career and change my life profoundly. The fatigue passed that weekend but not forever. I will remember the 2010 Tour of Catskills as the first dark cloud in a storm of illness and lost opportunities.
Sprinting in ahead of a certain Floyd Landis in 2010
2012
Sprinting to 3rd in the 2012 TOC TT.
In 2012, I had recovered from the worst of the CFS and I entered the Tour of Catskills with good form. On paper the TOC is a great race for my strengths with its flat time trial and mountainous road stages, so I harbored high expectations. I had an excellent ride to place 3rd in the opening TT and planned to make a move for Yellow on the climbs of the Devil’s Kitchen stage. On a brutally hot and humid day, I snuck into the early breakaway and gained an incredible 5 minute lead on all of the contenders heading into the day’s 4km final climb, the horrible Devil’s Kitchen. I was one climb away from becoming race leader and claiming the biggest result of my resurgent career. But just like two years earlier, my dreams began to unravel in the Catskills Mountains. This time the unraveling took minutes instead of months as my core temperature shot up with the exertion of climbing 20% grades in 40-degree heat. I collapsed halfway up the climb and my perfect day ended with me sitting in a ditch. I was devastated. Not bike racing devastated but complete self-worth devastated. I had rapidly convinced myself that I had defeated my demons and that success was inevitable. Success is never inevitable. Once again, the Tour of the Catskills was the site of a major personal derailment.
Beyond any of the ups and downs of this 2013 cycling season I have had one major success: I got my health back. With time, effort and the right guidance I have felt solid and strong all year and have finally been able to train and race with consistency and normalcy. I had been hoping desperately for this to translate into a breakthrough in my racing and at this weekend’s Tour of the Catskills it finally did. It was another watershed weekend but this time it was purely positive. I don’t usually write typical, blow-by-blow race reports but here I will because, well, for once I kicked some ass and personally I think that is pretty interesting.
In Friday’s opening 20km test I finally got my time trial back on track and was good enough to win and pull on the yellow jersey. I was elated and relieved but I also knew that I was in for hell in the next two days if I wanted to keep the race lead. On stage 2, I was attacked from all corners on a constantly hilly parcours that featured the savage Airport Rd. climb. I had no teammates and about 10 riders within 1 minute of my lead. I followed move after move and seemed equal to the task through the first 105km. And then the lights went out. Things got ugly. I had gone to hard and eaten too little and I bonked hard. I felt strong one minute and the next I could barely pedal and it was all over. Amid my suffering I searched for calm and forced my attention to the next stage, a return to Devil’s Kitchen.
Midway through the next day’s 150km Queen Stage, I had begun counting down the kilometers until the finish line. Team BikeReg was controlling the race to guard their yellow jersey and it seemed like the race would be decided when the pack hit Devil’s Kitchen. I didn’t feel that great and in a bad mood. And then it started to rain torrentially. After a harrowing 90kmh descent in the midst of the showers the peloton seemed to lose it’s impetus in a moment of self-pity. I didn’t think about the situation, I just attacked. There was 70km to go in the race and the breakaway of 6 riders was 3 minutes up the road. I could hear riders yelling and calling out my move as stupid and crazy. I just rode and watched them disappear in the hills behind me. I caught the break in after about 20km of controlled effort and we were able to hold our advantage despite some arguing and senseless attacking. (Just a quick aside for the Champion Systems rider who called me a doper as we started the climb: I told you I would drop your ass and then I did, next time keep your ugly, libelous mouth shut). We hit Devil’s Kitchen and for the first time in three attempts at the climb I was totally in control as I rode away from the rest of the breakaway on the horrifically steep slopes. I crossed the summit with a minute gap and I desperately held on for the most rewarding win of my career. Maybe this is the start of something big, maybe not. Either way, it felt pretty damn good.
Jordan Cheyne 