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.

We man handled a few climbs during the ride. Melrose (part of it, we had to turn around when we met Coop), Woods, St. Paul, Marshall and whatever miscellaneous vertical that comes in the middle of all of that. I threw myself way into the red hanging with cooper going up Marshall.

Anyway, later that afternoon the family drove up to the Shark to get a new bike. Not for me, but for Ethan. He is about to turn six, and has outgrown his Like-a-Bike and it was time for a real bike. He was hesitant in getting one, but we got him talked into going. As soon as he saw one, he got excited. We brought home a Releigh with coaster brakes, and a rear hand brake.

We got home and he wanted to try riding it. With butt on the saddle, he couldn’t touch the ground. After about 10 minutes of me walking with him, getting him used to things(like not accidentally deploying the coaster brakes), he was off and riding. He got good enough, that I grabbed my bike and we spent about 30 minutes riding in circles in the cul de sac. It was good times.

He has trouble getting started, and will fall over from time to time when he stops, but for the most part is good to go. I am a big fan of the Like-a-Bike, and will start Noah on it as soon as he wants to(he is only 2 right now). The idea of never having to deal with training wheels is a good one.