# Cats Hill Classic



## pmarshall (Jul 18, 2010)

I just signed up for this race and am looking forward to it. I have been riding the road quite a bit due to trail conditions so I feel my fitness is pretty good. Sierra Rd has been my training hill and it has been good to me. This will be my first road race other than many triathlons. Any of you guys signed up or riding this? Hope to see you out there.

http://www.catshill.org/

Paul


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## spookyload (Jan 30, 2004)

Wow, I raced that in the late 80's. Pre-classic I guess. It was just Cat's Hill Criterium back then. Damn I feel old


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## ukbloke (Sep 1, 2007)

That's a tough choice for a first race! You should definitely check out the course ahead of time, especially the climb and then the descent into the last right hand turn before the start/finish line. If it is wet on the day (like 2 years ago) I'd recommending giving it a miss, especially the cat 5 as that's earlier in the morning. You might want to try a fast group ride ahead of time, like the Noon Ride on Tuesdays or Thursdays, to gain some confidence riding in a big fast pack.

I should be there with my daughter. I will only be watching, but she wants to do the kids race.


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## pmarshall (Jul 18, 2010)

Thanks for the advice. I will be riding this a few times for sure since it is pretty close by. I figure I will just ride as hard as I can for 20 laps. I watched the video and the climb seems steep but short. As soon as the rain stops, I will be there scouting.


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## ukbloke (Sep 1, 2007)

You need to work on short intervals of very high power output - basically powering up Cats Hill as fast as you possibly can and then following wheel and recovering as much as possible after that. Sierra Road is a threshold effort for ~30 minutes. Cats Hill is an insane burst of power for 30-60 seconds. The problem is that the Cat 5s will go hard from the line and try to split the field and drop the no-hopers. If you get dropped off the back you could get pulled from the race within a few laps! Also, the part that scares me is the 90 degree right-hand turn at speed after the descent. This is where the high-speed crashes tend to happen.


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## Fogdweller (Mar 26, 2004)

spookyload said:


> Wow, I raced that in the late 80's. Pre-classic I guess. It was just Cat's Hill Criterium back then. Damn I feel old


Raced Cat's Hill in the 80s and feel just as old. It's a tough crit for sure. It's a brutal cycle of redline/recover/redline/recover. Have fun!!


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