After suffering the pains of terrible cramps and the indignity of being told my time was not taken as it did not appear I was actually racing, I went back last night to try again. Conditions were excellent with very little wind and after my lengthy warm-up I hit the course. Unfortunately, things started out badly with a mechanical issue as my chain jumped to the small ring and stayed there! I fumbled a bit and was seriously considering jumping off and pulling it back on when it slid back of its own volition. Of course, I was spinning so fast that my speed immediately jumped to 47 km/h! My heart rate was 172 bpm and stayed there for most of the course. Max was 181.
I passed my 30-second man not far before the turnaround (big deal--he appeared to be riding a mountain bike!) and found that I could keep my speed around 38-40 km/h on the leg back. No sign of cramps until I got to the last 400 m when they began to return but at this point nothing was going to hold me back.
Final result: a new Personal Best of 22:43, which gives me an average speed of 39.6 km/h. I need to knock off 13 seconds next Thursday to finally get to the magic average of 40 km/h. I think the prospects are good: except for disaster last week, I have improved my speed at every time trial this year. I am once again ahead of 71-year old Hermann the German (barely).
The season will not last much longer. By the time the 80 riders finished and we got our results it was already become dark. We have two tts left at this rate.
2 comments:
The mechanical could have easily cost you those 13 sec. I'm keeping my fingers crossed for the next two TT. This is a great result. PB's are always very uplifting and encouraging. :-)
Thank you for the encouragement! I am pleased with the progress so far but think I can do a lot better. I am already considering changes for next season. One of the great things about cycling is that you can always get better!
Post a Comment