Inside the Team Car: Tour de Boudicca
The Race: Tour de Boudicca
The Dates: July 24 - 26, 2020
The Director Sportif: Caroline Murray
The Roster: Jenn Real, Christie Tracy, Kae Takeshita, Anna Russell, Shanni Berger, Jasmin Welter, Amy Walls
To say the team was pumped to take on the Tour de Boudicca as the newly announced Saris + The Pro’s Closet women’s team would be an understatement. Stage races are our favorite form of Zwift racing, and after some individual stage podiums at the Tour of the Gila in May, and a sprint jersey at the Joe Martin Stage Race in June, we were hungry for a General Classification (GC) podium and a stage win! Although we were missing Caroline Murray in the lineup on her family vacation, she got to try her hand as Director Sportif (DS) for the first time. We were also excited to welcome back Shanni Berger to Zwift racing — having been finally cleared to race, albeit with a cast on her wrist!
The Tour de Boudicca start list read like a who’s who of eSports racing, and we knew it was going to be hard! 120 women on the start line is something don’t see too often on Zwift, much less IRL, which meant the pace was going to be fast and furious.
Stage 1: London Team Time Trial
Pre-Race Strategy from racer Jenn Real: “We knew that the Team Time Trial (TTT) was going to be key for the weekend’s overall GC, and so we would have to perform well. We did a practice run on the WTRL TTT race the week prior. This time, we decided for a different strategy from prior TTTs and went for shorter, harder pulls to try to gain speed.”
Post-Race Reaction from Director Caroline Murray: “The team worked flawlessly together from the start, even after dealing with two unfortunate technology dropouts. They combined their own individual strengths really well to move round the course without issue and pushed to their limits, finishing in 2nd and setting themselves up really well for the weekend stages.”
Notable Performance Data: Christie Tracy, our TT specialist, was the anchor for the TTT. She was on the front for a whopping 28% of the race, averaging 300-330 watts, or 5-5.4 w/kg for most of her pulls.
Stage 2: Yorkshire Circuit Race
Pre-Race Strategy from racer Anna Russell: “We went into Stage 2 in second on the GC after a strong TTT performance. The Yorkshire Queen’s Highway circuit is a toughie with lots of prime attack opportunities. We decided to spice things up and try an early attack on lap 1 up the grind to the sprint, to try to force a split and hopefully drop some SISU riders, to move up on GC.”
Post-Race Reaction from Director Caroline Murray: “When things don’t go to plan a lot of people would throw in the towel. . .not these ladies. After a planned attack early on in the race blew up a couple of the teams and was swallowed by the lead group, the next plan of attack was calmly brought into play. Shanni, Kae and Claire sat well in the front group throughout the short, rolling laps and took the sprints with perfection resulting in Shanni commandingly taking the Sprint Jersey for the stage! Again we suffered with more dropouts — both Kae and Shanni lost connection — and Claire was left alone in the front group. Claire sat the whole race in the perfect position, every time I checked she was tucked in the group nicely and even as a lone wolf in the final pack her positioning paid off with a 9th place final result. Since the early attack was successful in dropping a few SISU riders, Claire moved up to 4th in the GC!”
Notable Performance Data: Shanni, racing with a cast on, completely dominated the sprints. She won 5 sprints before a dropout took her out of contention for the final 2 laps. Fortunately, she had already amassed plenty of sprint points to take home the virtual green jersey. She did so with perfect timing, and by putting out 550-580 watts, or 10.5-11.1 w/kg, for 10-15 seconds, over and over again.
Stage 3: Volcano QOM Queen Stage
Pre-Race Strategy from Racer Claire Cameron: “Today’s strategy was to be aggressive and put SISU in a position to chase. However, the peloton was rolling so fast on the flats, that we felt trying to get a small group away would not be wise. So we decided to wait for the hill and push the pace the entire time up the climb. I knew that pressure would come from riders wanting to move up on GC. I knew I would need to hang onto the team’s attacks and stay on their wheels. The last 3 minutes were going to be very painful!”
Post-Race Reaction from Director Caroline Murray: “Every single lady brought their A-game on Sunday! The race was crazy from the get go and any plans of an attack/cat-and-mouse chase on the first couple of laps were squashed by the fact that the leading group was huge, and also relentless! This was good for energy conservation however. By the second lap we’d only lost one team rider, and we also knew that Claire was in for an amazing spot on the GC. The group of 50 strong ladies were holding on for dear life and we knew we had to do something to blow the group up, and boy did the team come through!
As the Volcano approached, Kae tore off the front, forcing a chase that was to be countered effortlessly by Christie. As Christie was caught, Shanni took the wheel and steamrolled everyone with her performance, taking it solo up the mountain to grab the Queen of the Mountain (QOM) jersey and take the stage win for us! Claire held off the competition, snagging a podium spot with 3rd in the GC, and the rest of the ladies absolutely smashed their weekends — definitely the strongest team out there!”
Notable Performance Data: Shanni got her cast off today and that must have given her wings, as she flew up the volcano. Shanni’s average power for the blazing fast 6 minute volcano climb was 301 watts, or 5.8 w/kg, with her final attack averaging 370 watts, or 7.1 w/kg for the final minute and a half to the top where she took the QOM and the stage win!
The weekend of racing was a great team building exercise and a lot of fun! We came away with second place on Stage 1 (TTT), the Sprint jersey (Shanni), a win on Stage 3 (Shanni), the QOM jersey (Shanni), and 3rd on the GC (Claire). These results were all made possible with stellar teamwork and could not have been accomplished without everyone chipping in all weekend. While one rider may take a jersey, and another may stand on the podium, it takes the entire team to make it all happen. That’s the true key to Zwift racing!
Congratulations to all the competitors this weekend! Huge thanks to Team REVO for organizing the event, and to Zwift Community Live for the stellar coverage. We can’t wait for the next one!