The race started out tame for about the first of 62 laps (half mile laps)… then it got fast. A few futile break attempts went and then were caught. No way was anyone getting away from this pack, unless they were going to go super sonic. Imagine my surprise when a small group motored away from the field. Once they got 20 seconds, it was a foregone conclusion that they were going to lap the field. I made one attempt to spark the field into chasing when they were about 10 or 15 seconds up, but there were a couple of teams there that had multiple guys in the break and multiple guys left in the field, and they were able to control things.

Another group of 3 or 4 slipped away and lapped the field as well. I made a few appearences at the front, but spent the rest of the time hanging on for dear life. You had to pay attention the entire time, because you were either setting for a turn, turning, or sprinting out of a turn and hanging onto the person in front of you.

Eventually the laps to go worked there way down into the single digits. I never made my way back to the front to really contest the sprint. With 4 or 5 to go, things opened up, and the pack started to split. I ended up closing the gap to stay with the main group. The last couple of laps were a a blur, but I finished strong. Nothing great, but nothing bad. Just out of the top 20 at 21st. I’ll take the result given my 5-6hrs/week of training that I have been doing ;-)

All in all, it was a great trip. The kids enjoyed staying at a hotel. No one got hurt too bad (Noah squashed a couple of fingers in the window, but he rallied), and everyone seemed to have a good time at the race.

I started at the back of the large field, but managed to get myself to the front on the first lap. We went sort of fast up the hill the first go around. Evidently, this was to be repeated each lap.

The fast stretch approaching the hill, the hill, and the slight uphill following the hill sucked it out of me on each lap. The rest of it wasn’t so bad. After staying towards the front for a lap and a half, I decided to move up on one of the downhills on each lap, and then filter towards the back going up the hill.

Each lap ticked away slowly, but I was managing to stay in there. I was definitely deep in the pain bucket, but with the field sprint getting closer and closer each lap, I was able to surpress that pain for a while longer.

Problem was, I was pretty much all-in by the time the sprint rolled around. Fueller took a hard pull at the front of the pack, that about shot me out of the rear of the pack with a couple to go(or one to go, I don’t remember). The last lap I was somewhat lazy, and I started to wiggle my way up towards the front. I got on Eduardo’s wheel for a while, but then I took a different wheel on the outside. I was a couple behind Vandeven as we rounded the final corner, and somewhere in the top 20. I managed to bump bars with someone through the round-a-bout, but that didn’t really phase me. I lit up the sprint coming out of the chicane, but I was in too much traffic (my bad for not being further up). Vandeven and I just about rode up someone’s ass. He went left and I went right into someone elses ass. I wiggled out of it, and blew past some folks coming into the line, but it was only good for 12th place. Vandeven managed 7th, so I will go left next time.

The p/1/2 race was insane.

I sat up, let the pack catch me, then I hopped onto the back as it was single file. I lost contact next time up the hill. I chased a bit, but then decided to take it easy, recover and get back in it. Not quite the confidence builder for Winghaven, but it happens.

The rest of the night was spent hanging onto the back. The race wasn’t that hard at that point, but my legs screamed at me everytime we had to go even remotely hard.

I am guessing eating sheet cake everyday for about 6 days in a row, amongst a bunch of other crappy foods, and a good chance that I didn’t have enough water in my system, combined with the heat, and the fact that I really haven’t been riding all that much… made for a bad night.

Wednesday I commuted home from work. The legs still felt like gobbly goo when I put in the harder efforts.

Today I commuted back into work. The legs felt iffy at first, but then started feeling good. So I am hoping I am over my bad spell. I’ll take tomorrow off, and get an opening ride in on Saturday, then look forward to a hard race on Sunday.

I’m also giving some crazy thoughts in going to Kentucky in July for Master’s nationals… stay tuned.

Saturday I got out for 1:20 late in the afternoon. I needed to get some intensity in, so I rode out to the flats and did a few intervals. Just did a total of 3 efforts, each 3 minutes long, with 3 minutes of rest in between. I averaged roughly 350-360 Watts for each effort. My legs and lungs screamed and then I just limped home.

Sunday I managed another solid 1:15. I didn’t do anything structured at all. Just rode. I ended up out by Ridge Rd again, so I at least climbed the hills down by Castlewood. It was a nice early morning ride.

My legs didn’t feel so good at all this weekend. Hopefully I’ll be good to go for Winghaven though. Even though I am not training anywhere near as much as I would like to, I feel I should be far enough along to start performing a bit better in the 3s races.

Today is Tuesday, it looks like the sky is going to shat on us again. I’ll have to check the weather in a couple of hours and debate on whether I drive out to the TNW and race, or go for a hard ride closer to home… or set up shop in the garage (yuck).

It was a little chilly tonight at TNW. 60ish, humid, plenty of wind, and a small field made for some serious hurt.

Things didn’t take too long to get started. A few folks were keeping things animated up front. A 3 man break went a little bit up the road with no Sharks in it, so I hit the front to spark bringing it back. Cooper and Justin followed suit and we got it back together. Things went back and forth for a while with no one getting away. There were a couple of attacks put in up front that caused the pack to shrink even further.

Eventually things settled down for about 30 seconds, and then all hell broke loose. I don’t even remember what all happened. I know Justin got in the main break of say four or five guys, and the rest of us were in cover mode. Within a couple of laps, it was all split up. The group I was in was pretty small with Cooper trying to bridge up. I made one hard pull and took a swim in the pain bucket, and Cooper bridged after that.

I swung back into the small second group, and had to sit on it for a couple of laps before I could work again. We chased and kept the group within 10-15 seconds or so forever. We finally got somewhat organized, and as we got closer, more guys started popping. I put in a last ditch do or die effort with about 4 or 5 to go, and got us close, but no cigar. One guy from my group managed to bridge up, but the rest of it splintered.

I am guessing about 10 or 12 of us finished tonight, and I don’t think there was a group larger than 4 that crossed the line. I was in the red the entire time. My normalized power tonight was a new record. 53 minutes with a NP of 337 W. My average was 273 W.