With loud music booming from outdoor speakers and cheering crowds situated in the center of campus, groggy students could have been forgiven on Sunday morning if they momentarily thought Spring Fling had come a bit early this year.
Instead, 15 college cycling teams descended on the Hill for the Tufts Criterium, the third and final leg of the eighth annual Boston Beanpot.
The first two legs were held on Saturday with two other Boston collegiate hosts. A team time trial and the 14-mile road race were held in Grafton, Mass. at Tufts' Cummings School of Veterinary Medicine.
Overall, the Tufts cycling club team finished 15th out of 34 schools. Each of the three components of the race demanded a different set of skills and offered a new challenge.
"The criterium is based on sprinting and accelerating into and out of corners," junior Glenn Ferreira said. "The road race is more about prolonged effort and climbing well. The team time trials are about pacing well. Since it's a team event, it also about communicating and working well with your teammates."
The Beanpot is organized by representatives from six Boston area schools: BU, Harvard, Boston College, Northeastern, MIT and Tufts, with students from Northeastern in charge of the weekend's logistics. Tufts senior Jason Koza headed the planning for the criterium and attended the weekly committee meetings with students from all six schools that began in
the fall.
The Jumbos were well represented at the criterium, with 18 riders competing in seven of 10 races. The best performance of the day came from senior Judy Wexler, who captured second out of 26 riders in the Women's A race, the top division for female collegiate riders.
Last year, Wexler finished ninth in the Women's A race, but her results from earlier this season had hinted at a breakout accomplishment.
"I'd been riding with these girls for a few weeks now, finishing in the top 10 and the top five," Wexler said. "So to come in the top three [last week] was a huge breakthrough. It gave me a lot of confidence and it kind of opened up a new world of possibility."
"Judy Wexler had the team's biggest success," Ferreira said. "She did well in a race last weekend, but a lot of the leading riders weren't there so she didn't want to get too excited about her performance. But she really proved herself against them [on Sunday]."
The conditions varied over the course of day, as periodic showers made the course slippery at times and provided for some treacherous conditions. In particular, the Men's D race was decimated by several crashes.
Each criterium race consisted of a set number of laps around a one-kilometer, six-corner course beginning on Professor's Row in front of Health Services. The second turn, at the corner of Curtis Street and Whitfield Road, is well known among college cyclists as a challeng-
ing bend.
"It was really tough in the middle [of the day]," Ferreira said. "The last four laps of the Men's D race there was a crash every time heading around turn two. The course is one of the most technical and difficult out there."
Other notable results for Tufts included a respectable 20th-place showing in the Men's C2 race by Koza and a 19th-place effort in the Men's D2 race by junior Ben Mitchell.
Over the years, the Tufts Criterium has evolved into one of the most anticipated events on the Eastern Collegiate Cycling Conference's (ECCC) schedule.
"Everyone in ... the ECCC really anticipates the crit," Koza said. "It's become better and better organized every year with more publicity. And we provide jerseys and podiums for the winners - we have a medal ceremony for them after each race. It's a really fun, community-based atmosphere."
But despite the joys of riding in front of fans and supporters, Ferreira believes that racing at home did not offer the traditional advantage that hosting teams usually reap.
"It wasn't much of an advantage because everyone gets a chance to ride the course at least once beforehand," he said. "I would call it more of a home disadvantage because I woke up at 4:20 a.m. to help set up the race when my competitors were still sleeping."
For Wexler, however, familiarity with the course allowed her to remain focused despite the poor conditions.
"The other girls may have been a bit more cautious because of all the crashes in previous races," she said. "If I hadn't ridden on this course before it might have fazed me ...It's an intimidating course and if you don't emerge from the downhill with your bike-handling skills intact, it's not a very forgiving course."
