The ‘100’ is cursed. After the SCCU 100 in 2010 where I rode in trainers after forgetting my cycling shoes I didn’t think it could go much worse. Cue phone call at 6am: “the car won’t start”. *le sigh* Here we go again.

Thankfully Scherrit grabbed us a minicab pretty quick and we were on track to make the start in time. It was going to be tight so I was already changed when the cab arrived. Signed on at the HQ, filled pocket with gels while Scherrit and Mal prepped the bike and put numbers on. Rode to the start line with some guy who was on a 4 hour Sunday outing. Didn’t really warm up.

The first 1.5 hours went well. Pacing was pretty good save for a bit of toing and froing with another rider I decided to eventually try and drop.

Between 1.5 and 2 hours it all went pear shaped. Total glute failure. At the time I thought it might have been that I was riding too hard but it was most likely the 20mm bar height drop I’d finally got around to doing. On the road bike, going to midfoot meant dropping the saddle and bar height 20mm. We’d done the same to the TT bike save for the bar height drop. Not noticing any issues doing openers I’d left it. Big mistake. I couldn’t actually use the aerobars and even pedaling whilst on the start bars was excruciating. Instead of doing the sensible thing, stopping and trying to stretch out my glutes I rode a whole lap at about 20kph, pacing less than my 24hr TT average! I asked Mal for some ibuprofen which had helped during the 12hr with the same issue but we didn’t even have tools due to the rushed start so that was a no go.

By the time I’d got back to my team I was pissed off to say the least and the closest I’ve been to giving up in a race. I sat on the side of road and did some glute stretches, restarting a bit later to see if it had made a difference. Actually, it had and I was able to get back on the aerobars and even generate some power. 30 minutes later though the problem was back so I stopped with my team again and did some proper glute stretches – you know the really dignified ones with your arse in the air and your legs crossed like some kind of tantric yoga wizard. This lot did the trick and I was able to finish the race without stopping again, even making the same power as the first hour.

I don’t know my official time yet but I guess around 4:30. I was aiming for 4:10-4:15 and was on track for that at the half-way mark, actually PBing the 50mi distance in the same ride but after the total collapse in the middle it was nice enough to salvage a fairly lame 100mi PB.

Cycled the numbers back to the HQ and we had lunch at the Hen and Chicken Inn while waiting for a minicab back home.

Massive thanks once again to Scherrit and Malwina for giving up their Sunday to coax a whinging git back onto the road. You guys rock! 🙂

tl;dr

I set some PBs. Don’t ever adjust things before a race. Own a car (no Fords :P).

www.timetriallingforum.co.uk – Hounslow 100

UPDATE: Results are available.

25: 1:02:24

50: 2:06:51 (PB)

100: 4:28:07 (PB)

The visor on the Kask K31 never properly fitted my beautiful face. In taking a leaf out of Rupert Murdoch’s Cycling Team book this year is all about the aggregation of marginal gains. In this case it involves gaffa tape to the rescue! Not the best looking solution but it beats buying a new helmet.

Hate riding a time trial bike around here!

Perhaps hate is too strong a word but damn, everything becomes more annoying on a TT bike! Riding out of London, don’t bother using aerobars there’s too many blind drivers and peds to dodge. I rode a short loop out west (~4 hours) and I would cancel the Olympics right now if I could use the money to fix the potholes out there! The fscking POTHOLES! ARGH THE POT HOLES!

If I had any money left over it would be put towards High Wycombe and perhaps an MDMA transfusion into their water supply. I swear that place has a higher percentage of a-hole drivers than anywhere else over here. I mean, the rest of London and surrounds is full of selfish, blind, morons behind the wheel but in High Wycombe they’re also malicious.

The rest of the Olympics funding would be used to remove the 47,000,000 fscking traffic lights from High Arsehole to London. I really don’t see how any traffic moves at all, ever, when they’re all fscking red. Every hundred metres 40kph, 0kph, 40kph, 0kph.. argh! FFS! I’m going to send the bill for my brake pads and rims to the local council. Oh, but they clearly don’t have any money to pay it, given the state of the roads..

Only 6.5 hours to do tomorrow.

Interesting reading about how to estimate frontal area (CdA) using a power meter and some weather and terrain data.

Check out Jason’s other aerodynamic testing articles too.

jasperga.blogspot.co.uk – chung method

Or, just call drag2zero and book some tunnel time..