2016-08-29 VC10 F11/10 10mi TT

20:17

Second fastest 10mi TT I’ve ever done but it was pretty ‘meh’ for me. I rolled in to the HQ a bit disappointed with my inability to push myself. After Sat’s club record ride and Sunday’s BBQ/boozefest it does make sense. Was about 20-30W down on Sat’s ride which was 10-20W down on my 10mi power PB. It wasn’t “windy” but it was windier today than my race on Sat and the more complicated turns had me worried about going off course so I took them very easy and lost a lot of time doing so. If I wasn’t so lazy I would’ve recce’d the course yesterday instead of beer tasting all the beers. Oh well, at least having ridden the F11/10 now, finally, I can adjust for next time.

Julian Jenkinson Memorial TT – 27th Aug 2016, UTAG 10mi

19:54, 26s PB and new Willesden CC club record. I now have all the senior male club records. I’m not sure whether I should now buy a trike, buy a tandem or have a sex change to get the rest…

On the day I really had no idea how my legs were going to handle the >300W ~20min workload of a 10mi TT when they’d been sitting far below that for 4000k of Transcon Race No4. Turns out, they were pretty bloody good!

We were there early, accidentally parked in a pub (yeah, accidentally), moved to the HQ, couldn’t find a parking spot so went back to the pub! Bought some drinks so they didn’t get the hump with us, changed and warmed up in the carpark.

The start was a bit funny with a holding pen up the road so only four riders were near the actual starter. Thanks to the bloke and presumably his son for the well wishes. The start was a bit funny with my countdown going 30s… 10s… 7s… and I’d usually start at the 5 but “oh so sorry! 2..1”. I said “don’t worry”, smacked the Garmin’s Start button and took off.

The road was lovely, it was warm, there didn’t appear to be much wind. I was sitting above where I’d planned but it felt ok so I just backed off a little and waited for the inevitable post-TCR meltdown. They had mile markers out, which I love and these seemed to be ticking by with no real trouble. At the turn I sat up and slowed right down, simply because I didn’t know the course and a wrong turn would be a total disaster. I think I was on 30.5mph avg. before the turn and maybe 28-29mph after it.

Expected there to be a huge headwind now since the ride out was so ‘easy’ I was excited to find I was actually rolling faster! “Wow, I could actually get the club record in this race” I thought to myself. I was starting to tie up though and my power tanked. I lifted it to just above my threshold thinking “if I can hold here, it might be enough to still be on for the final club record”. My average speed was right around record pace – 30.2mph. Trying desperately to lift in the final mile I was wheezing something shocking, just not able to breathe enough even if the legs were able to produce power. All of a sudden I spied the slip road and chequered flag, lifted once again, crossed the line and in huge oxygen debt stabbed at the Garmin. No idea if I’d got it I was pretty sure it was at least a PB and maybe my first 19min 10mi so the record was going to be close but might have to wait for the F11/10 race on Monday.

Back to the missus at the car I was feeling pretty caned (yet could still push 400W+ up the hill back to the HQ two minutes after the finish so clearly the legs work, I just need to be able to breathe). Inside the HQ we walked to the results screen… 19:54! *fist pump* “Yes, beat it by one second!” I said. I then suddenly had a horrible thought, what if I’d read the record wrong, so quickly checked the Willesden CC Records page and found Meurig’s 2009 record was actually 19:56. I must’ve made 19:55 my goal to beat the record and then thought that was the record. Either way, pending official results, I should have it. Pretty happy to now have all available senior male records for the club – 10, 15, 25, 20, 50, 100, 12hr and 24hr.

2016-06-25 BDCA 50mi TT (A50/6)

1:47:18

PB and new club 50 mile record.

PB by ~4min and finally got Pete Cookson’s 1995 club record. Sorry Pete!

Not much to say other than there’s minutes to be had if I can just stop my leg going numb. Torrential rain before the start made me question the point but we’d traveled up here so it seemed silly not to race. Glad I did.

2015-11-13 – World 24hr TT Championships, Borrego Springs

DNF @ ~8hrs/180mi

It seems each time I travel to the US to race the World 24hr TT Champs I come back with a different illness. This time I managed to avoid DVT but seem to have had some kind of asthma attack.

Shortish version of the race report is: it got very cold at night (I saw 3degC, someone else said -2degC) and I was only wearing a skinsuit in order to be competitive against Baloh. Around the 7hr point, I suffered some kind of asthma thing – wheezing, coughing, short of breathe – and if you can’t breathe you can’t ride. I couldn’t continue so dived into the car, cranked up the heating and put ALL my clothes on until my breathing got less raspy and I could take in a full lungful. I went back out and half a lap in, I couldn’t breathe properly again – even being covered in layers of clothes. That was it, my race was done. Back into the car and wheezed until I fell asleep. There was an idea of continuing at 10am when it would be much warmer but there were three guys still riding very strong and it seemed like a waste of time to start riding again for 11-12hrs just to get, say, 5th place. I was here to win, not fill minor places. So I officially quit the race, got some breakfast, packed up the bike and watched the remainder of the race.

We then had a lovely week in California driving from San Diego up to Santa Barbara then San Luis-Obispo via Solvang and a wine route Foxen Canyon road,  beautiful Big Sur and then flew out of San Francisco.

Shit race, great holiday. I’ve since been tested by my GP and have a poorer lung flow rate than my ‘proper’ asthmatic friend! Now I’ve been told I have to carry a little blue inhaler on all my rides and have to maintain a prescription for a preventer inhaler. Maybe all that crappy London air has finally started to kill me? Still haven’t got the tests back for my DVT since they lost the first lot! Bloody hell, falling apart…

Oh, as expected, Marko Baloh won the race but only managed just over 500 miles, where I was expecting a 520-530 mile ride, especially given there was almost no wind, compared to the year before when you could barely hang onto the bike! Maybe he also suffered from the cold? Meurig did well this year, adding another 10mi to his distance.

GS Henley H25/1 25mi TT – 18/04/2015

55:12 (PB) 25mi PB by 21 seconds (3 years ago!) and a course PB by 33 seconds (2 years ago during the Newbury RC – Pete Jarvis Memorial).

Cold, bit windy from the NE, decided against overshoes (which was silly as it took ages for my toes to thaw out afterwards) but it was dry so I used my bling Shimano shoes. New gearing setup (single 55T carbon ring) seemed fine and the cranks I installed didn’t fall off so that’s a bonus!

Not sure why there were so few racers but hopefully James gets more riders for his other events in the future.

Oxonian 50 (PB) + NHRC 25 (PB) + WCA 12 (PB)

North Hampshire Road Club 25 (H25/8)

Arrived late so I went off in rider #38’s place instead of #25. Official time of 1:09 but actual time is 56:16 which is a 25 PB for me.

Still sweating… 🙂

Winner’s time was 51:04, I would’ve come in around 13th

http://www.timetriallingforum.co.uk/index.php?s=66b0efcbb4da9403d86b6a8e78218219&showtopic=71503&pid=1003887&st=0

Results:

http://www.timetriallingforum.co.uk/index.php?showtopic=71752

http://www.timetriallingforum.co.uk/index.php?showtopic=71598

Previous 25 mile PB 59:44: http://www.thehippy.net/nucleus/index.php?itemid=1609

 

Oxonian 50

3rd place,

Welsh 12hr, missed club record by 800 yards, 2nd place?

http://sisportsimages.co.uk/Galleries2012/CYCLING/WCA12_2-9-12/index.html