Course: There are many options at Fort Ord. Lately, the most popular has been a 20 mile clockwise loop with about four main climbs. If the race is run counter clockwise bring your serious climbing gears.
Course Description: This is a classic hilly road race with several fairly major climbs and a whole lot of rollers.
Road Surface: The road is in good condition.
Gearing: At least a 39x21 and maybe a 23 depending on the direction of the course and your climbing ability.
Facilities: Porta Cans at registration.
Weather: It is almost always foggy and cool during the summer here. The sun may or may not break through during your race. Go for the layered look in case it gets hot (and it can) during your race.
The weather here can really be a shock, especially if you're coming from the central valley. I remember laying on the floor, roasting in my house one year and then about four hours later freezing my butt off in Salinas the night before the race because I had forgotten a sweatshirt and long pants.
Feeding: For the clockwise loop, the feed zone is on the first climb about .5 miles from the start. For the counter clockwise loop the feed is just over the top of the hill that clockwise feed zone is on.
Rules Specific to this race: Most of the course should have a full road closure.
Race Advice: This is mostly a race of attrition. The climbs are hard enough to separate the chaff from the wheat, but not hard enough to shatter the field. For the clockwise loop, you start with a moderate climb of about a mile followed by a straight steep drop and another climb in about a mile. This is the hardest climb of the clockwise loop. It's pretty long and has a few steeper pitches. At the top you'll loop by Laguna Seca and finally take a long stair step descent and a right turn at the end of the base. There are a couple of rolling hills that will make your legs hurt and get surprisingly large by the end of the race. After another right turn you run across MORE ROLLERS. IT NEVER STOPS! You're pretty much always going either up or down on this course.
About fifteen miles into the course you'll start a fairly long descent and make a hard (>90 degree) left turn. Here you'll start climbing again. To me this is THE tactical spot on the course. It's a good stiff climb and from the top it's only about four or five miles of basically flat roads to the finish. I've twice won the district old fart road championship by attacking on this last hill and riding in solo on the last lap. If you can get a gap and time trial some the race is yours.
This race really isn't super tactical. The riders will decide pretty quickly whether or not they're up for riding this one aggressively or not and start riding accordingly. What this usually means is that a few riders will do a lot of attacking and the rest will do a lot of chasing. The 1/2/Pro race is the only one that really long enough where the riders will play tactical games a maybe let somebody go for a while with the idea of bringing them back later. So for most of the races if you're strong you'll either have to do a lot of attacking to wear the riders down, or save up and give one blistering attack later in the race when everybody is tired.
If the race goes counter clockwise, there are two main obstacles. The first comes about twelve miles into the race. It's a long stair step climb up towards Laguna Seca. It's kind of a long grinder. The second obstacle is usually the finish hill when they go this direction. It is the finish hill because promoters and officials are cruel and evil people. It's steep (about 15%) and straight and pretty long. I remember sprinting for the district championship (Senior) after 100 miles. The sprint started at the very bottom and by the top we were going at about walking speed in our 23's. EVIL! I'd ALWAYS bring a 39x23 to this race. And I'd use it every time we went up this steep hill whether I felt like I needed it or not. Why kill your legs early in the race when it doesn't matter.
In either direction this is a classic course for doing the drift. Early in the race start the climbs in the front of your group and go just a little easier than everybody else. Slowly drift back in the pack and save your energy. After the climb work your way back up front and do it again on the next hill. Remember they're not giving out KOM or stud points for leading the group over the top of a hill.
This course (either direction) is really relentless. It's always up and down and will slowly beat you up. You definitely can't fake it here. You've got to have the legs to do well. By the way, I recommend this race highly.
Specific advice for women racers:
Lodging: I usually stay in one of the Motel 6's in Salinas. Salinas is only about 15-20 minutes from the back gate where registration is set up. There is also a Motel 6 in Sea Side on Reservation Road and Highway 1. If you like to spend lots of money there's always Monterey. Be careful about Salinas though, I paid $80 to stay in a dive last year because I didn't make reservations in time...
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Corrections and additions, please email me!
Kevin Metcalfe
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