Pescadero Road Race
My club puts on the Pescadero Road Race, so last saturday I got to work instead of race. But I got to ride lead moto, which was a lot more fun than being a course marshal.
Being not that experienced at it (this is the second time I’ve done it), I got assigned to the women’s combined Cat 3/4 and 35+ race. They normally don’t get lead motos at all, so I suppose it was an upgrade for them. The two fields were full so the pack was about 75 racers. Someone put an orange “RACE OFFICIAL” vest on me and during the pre-race talk given to the women the lead official introduced me (the women clapped) and noted that I’d be enforcing the centerline rule. So I sort of had a field promotion to race ref.
The most important thing about being a moto, besides not crashing, is to not get in the way, which means don’t get caught on the downhills. Bike racers can go faster than all but the very best moto riders on a technical downhill and this course is very technical. So the trick is to get ahead of the pack or at least in a large enough gap between riders that you won’t get caught. Or behind the pack. But on a hill course the pack will constantly be losing people out the back on the hills, so behind is not the best place to be.
I had a couple crashes to deal with- not much I could do, and my job was to keep with my field, so I had to go on after telling the women that someone would be along to pick them up. I didn’t get anyone for a centerline violation, they were being good about it, but I did have to eject a cat 5 guy from the women’s field. He even argued with me about it. What a dweeb.
Doing lead moto for this race used a lot of the skills that I’ve developed in the last 30 years of motorcycling. I did a lot of slow riding up hills, using my trials skills to ride a straight and predictable line so riders from other races could pass me. Downhill I was going as fast as I thought was safe in order to keep out of the way of fast riders behind me. It was more tiring than riding- when I got home I took a two hour nap.