Paris Roubaix vs. SLO Roubaix

A comparison of sorts though truly Tom Boonen's performance in the 2012 PR was incomparable as has been his racing all spring. One race is in France and is the "Queen of the Classics" the other is in San Luis Obispo an is a fun club ride/race. One takes 6 hours of suffering to complete the other about 4 hours. The French version has roughly 20 sections of atrocious pave, the central coast version has a gravel climb and descent of about 3.5 miles each time and a gravel road section a few miles long. Total length of the Paris Roubaix well over 200K, while the length of SLO Roubaix is barely 100K. Still we had as much fun as possible. Here's how my SLO Roubaix went. I dropped my chain at the start of the climb early in the ride, and hence had to chase the group up the hill. I managed to catch and pass 3 or 4 of the sixteen riders with much effort. Then some pretty hard pace-lining on the flats to the Las Pilitas climb. This section sucked for me. I was on my touring bike with cyclo-cross tires. Everyone else was on road tires. I felt like I'd brought a knife to a gunfight as they say. I was dead last and dead by the top of this climb. Then a downhill to the gravel road. I entered the gravel first and really put the hammer down. Here my bike choice seemed genius and I ended up in the front group of four. I finished this section 2nd but could have easily won it if I'd know where the gravel ended. Lost my front wheel twice in the same corner, but somehow managed to keep it upright. From Pozo we climbed back up - I wasn't last here -somewhere in the middle. Then ferocious pace on the rolling flats back to Santa Margarita. That was hard and I eventually snapped despite repeated pushes from Tyler. Then back down the grade where I finally finished the section first. Once again I entered the dirt road first and really bombed it. I was solo till the bottom flatter section where Tyler caught me. I kept pace with him and came around at the last moment to hit the pavement first. A good day totally spent by the end.