EZ

Took it easy today...did 90min, just cruised. I've been feeling pretty tired lately and need a break...gonna just do some easy rides this week then try to get a good threshold workout in this weekend to kick things off again.

TNWC #8

Tonights crit was fun. Attack and chase. A big group. I had a near crash mid race when I was bridging and came flying around turn 2 and saw a car coming so I cut the apex of the turn and jammed my pedal into the road. My bike felt like it leaped and bounced. It's amazing I didn't go down.

The legs were OK but I didn't have much motivation to do anything...I felt like I just sat around waiting for something to happen. Coming up to the end there was a break just up the road and when we caught them with 1k to go I launched, got a good gap then realized I had to ride hard if I wanted to win. Damn. I metered out the effort and got caught with about 20m to go...I gave it all I had but the wind was not in my favor, which is a killer with that slightly uphill finish.

LL, Jay & I are registered for Masters Nats in Louisville on July 3rd.

zzzzz

I left work with the idea of doing a quick threshold workout...in the 7 minutes it took me to get home I decided to take a nap instead.

Deluge

The girls went to the opera this afternoon so I had a large block of time for some bike practice. At around 2:30 I did a quick check of the radar and did a big "Uh-oh" as a large menacing band of thunderstorms were lined up on the SC/GA border and headed our way. I hustled out the door and it was raining a little when I jumped on the bike. The legs felt pretty good after yesterday and I mostly rode tempo and tried to attack the climbs a bit. I held back some as I want to do some sort of workout tomorrow. I got 2 hours in.


shit-->fan. When I got to the gate to exit it was full-on sideways blowing rain/hail...totally epic conditions. I hammered home but ended up getting completely drenched...missed staying dry by about 20'. YeeHaw.

attrition

Wanna suffer? Do 70 miles with Jay out around Lake Wateree.

I felt pretty good starting out...we weren't killing it but riding SST/threshold for long, long pulls. We averaged over 22mph for the first 50 miles or so. Things went south from there and at about mile 67 I had a spectacular meltdown on the final climb (actually I cracked a lot earlier but I willed myself to stay on J's wheel). I was glad to see the car.

It was one of those rides where after you get home you just lie on the floor for a while and when you get up your legs instantly cramp. Fun.

Thursday

Had a good day today. I got out did a loop in the fort then met up with the group ride. Legs felt OK, not great. Group was relaxed and we mostly cruised but went hard in the usual places. It's nice to see close to 200TSS on a thursday.

You can download Frank Pipp's wko files from Tour de Georgia HERE. Especially look at stage 3 where he was in a break all day. Some monster numbers. He rides for HealthNet and stayed with me last year for a couple of days between races and is loaded with talent. A nice guy too.

Some Masters Nats info was posted today HERE. Should be some interesting racing over July 4th weekend. The crit is in the infield of Churchill Downs. It's gonna be a sufferfest for sure, can't wait!

TNWC #7

Kindof a weird crit tonight. The stiff wind put a damper on things but it was from the same direction as last week. I attacked a few times, bridged a few times, missed the winning break then tried to launch at the end. It was good exercise then I rode tempo home to get a few extra TSS points (I'm shooting for 700 this week)

I've decided not to race this weekend...I'm a little burnt from 3 weeks in a row out of town and need a mental break.

Tour of Georgia

Packfill and Carnage

35+: A very hard race, very fast from the gun. I bridged to a promising break of 5 with both of the big teams represented so I thought it had a good chance...until a Columbia triathlete in the field closed the gap. Thanks brah!

Later the usual suspects (one guy who won 17 masters races last year) got away in a 3 man break and Ladd was sooo close to bridging solo (a couple seconds) but didn't make it and came back to the field. He looked like a whipped pup.

At one point my rear wheel decided to become detached from my bike. For you newbie's: in a fast crit this is generally not a good thing. It came out of the dropouts and seized up...skidding along. It's amazing I didn't crash (or anyone into me). It seems my skewer came loose somehow. I fixed it and went around to the pits and "hick frigtard official" says "you don't get no free lap for that" I'm like: my friggin wheel came out of the dropouts, don't you consider that a mechanical? He let me back in.

I battled back to the front and somehow ended up on Ryan Jenkins wheel near the end. Trouble is everyone else wanted to be there too so I had to really fight to hold my ground as these asswipes tried to bump me outta there. I was not going to go easy. Coming into the sprint things got congested and I ended up 20th. Blah.

Cat 3: 2 hours after the 35+ I felt horrible warming up...no surprise here. Once the race started I actually felt really good and even better as things progressed. I think that was due to the slower pace. This race was a whole lot easier than the 35+. There was a lot of attacking...I went off once and Toby bridged and we had a gap for about 30s before the yahoo's chased us down.

As the race progressed my legs felt great but mentally I sort of lost it. A loss of motivation to battle. With 3 to go I decided to either be at the front or at the back. I knew things were going to get pretty sketchy. Hmmm, I choose the back! I cruised for a while, chatted with Casey a bit then followed a couple of guys to see if they could go the distance and drop me off at the front. No go. I ended up drifting back and just doing the last lap with enough room to avoid any crashes.

Carnage: I sprinted easily to the finish and just before the line there was a tangle of bikes and a couple of guys went down. Hard. It seems Brian H's steer tube/fork broke and he augered (he's ok)...his bike shot out to the left and conveniently ended up in front of Ladd sending him airborn. I roll up, jump off my bike and LL's laying there in the fetal position, moaning. Lang's there (ER doc) and we roll him to his back...we check him out, convince him that he's still alive...he's OK, just minus a lot of skin. It sortof looks like he was drug behind the pace car for a couple laps.

It was actually quite a spectacle with a big crowd at the finish line...LL put on a damn good show for everyone. Near where we parked some dude let us borrow a garden hose and I did the ER scrub on him (this is going to hurt me more than it hurts you...) then basically poured peroxide over his whole body. The pictures show about half of the road rash he's got. At CVS the tegederm to cover everything cost about $60. Think of him tonight when you're sleeping comfortably in your bed after your relaxing shower. ;-) Casey finally won a womens race (right after doing the cat3 men)...it's about time! ;-)

the routine

1 hr ride with a few openers, clean bike, wash kit, shave legs...ready to rumble.

Day of rest and calories

No riding today...Jargarita's and burritos at Yo. Yum.

I'll do an easy ride tomorrow then Ladd and I are going to do the 35+ and 3's race on Sunday. I'm thinking of May 3rd as a trip to the Mtns. Anyone up for a 400TSS day? Save the date...

Change of plans

I started out with the group ride but felt pretty tired so I turned off to do an easy loop. It's time for a few easy days. Sunday is the Charleston crit (I'm skipping saturday's race). After next weeks Tour de Moore (possibly Athens Twilight) there's not much going on until June so it will give me a chance to take a break and reload.

My CTL's been a bit stagnate with all the racing so it will be good to have a 6 week ramp up before Masters Nats.

I'm also really ready to head to the mtns.

<--Charts are current as of today

Wednesday cruise

I met Nick and Casey and we did the "thursday" route except we came up Horrel hill and back in through the fort. Mostly tempo/threshold...which means I was suffering following 129lb-Nick up the Elon climb. The legs didn't really show up today...after last night they stayed home in protest. My PE was high but I suffered through since it was a totally stellar day with nice sun and no traffic.

My weight today is 145 lbs, last year I raced (poorly) at 155...I haven't been this light since I caught a nasty explosive bug in La Paz, Bolivia in the mid 90's. Now that was a good time.

TNWC #6

I was going to do a 20' threshold interval before the race tonight...I'm glad I didn't. The wind was blowing pretty strong and it's one of those winds where you think a break doesn't have a chance (and usually you're wrong).

10 min into it Jamie attacks and Toby, Sammy and I get across and we start driving it. We're all working well and I ended up pulling most of the downwind backstretch and trying to keep it at around 28 mph. When you hit turn 3 the wind hits you like a slap in the face.

After a while Jamie dropped off...then Toby was gone. Sammy and I still had a huge gap and we were still working well but I was wondering if we could hold off the pack for 25 min. I was trying to take pulls into the VO2 range at about 120% of FTP (around 330w). Sammy was absolutely killing it tonight and I give him a lot of credit to the break's success. Very impressive effort by him.

We could see a small chase 15sec or so behind and near the end I used some tactics and told him to slow things down so that we hit the line at exactly 45:00 (the race was 45' plus 2). This saved us a lap then I drilled it for 1:30 to bring the gap back up.

On the last lap I said that we go hard till turn 3 (and into the wind) then we'll drag race it side by side to the line. I thought that was the best way to finish a long break instead of monkeying around. As expected Sammy beat me in the sprint (he told me later that he was cramping pretty bad at the end). It was a great race. Very hard, so hard that I didn't take one drink the entire race!

Walnut Grove

Ladd 7th, Me 8th, Brian 11th. I felt pretty good today but still coughing a lot.

Today's race was 55 miles through 2 laps of a very hilly 27 mile circuit. Ladd, Brian and I did the Cat3's. Smallish field (40 riders or so). Toby S. and Brian H. were there too.

100m into the race we get to a stop sign...lead car goes left and the 20 y.o. brainiac's at the front go right. The moto official was laughing his ass off. So the field does a big U turn...

Half way through the first lap Brian gets away with one other dude. He was out for a long time (20 miles?) and I rode a lot of easy tempo on the front of the field. I think he had up to a minute gap. At one point Ladd rolled up to the front and I gave him a gentle push on the hip cuz I wanted him to do some easy tempo...instead he thought I meant attack and he took off with 2 others. It was actually a good move and they got a decent gap. I won't say I was "blocking" cuz I hate blocking but I rode a lot near the front and got yelled at a few times. ;-)

Late in the 2nd lap everything came back together and things started getting hard. Ladd was not having a good day on the hills (give him a break, he's 180 lbs) so my goal was to make sure he got to the finish in one piece with the main group. He'd get gapped then I would pace him over the climb then drill it to close. Over the last big climb a group of 8 or so had 5 seconds and they were drilling it...I buried myself to close that gap. The problem was that there was a roller right after the catch and I had to dig real deep to stay with the group. That really hurt.

The sprint was pretty bad for me...poor position and too many matches burnt earlier. Ladd went with another dude with half a mile to go but it didn't work out. I was outta gas and ended up finishing right behind him. I made $25...not bad for 2.5 hours of work.

PreRace

Tomorrow I'm going to do the Walnut Grove Road Race with Ladd. We're gonna do the 3's cuz Ladd needs a couple more points to upgrade to a 2 so we'll see if we can make that happen (funny to think he was a 5 last year). Gonna do an easy ride today...would probably do more if the weather didn't suck.

craptastic

The last 2 days I've been just trying to get some miles in. Julie and I got out yesterday for a rare ride together...then again tonight for a loop before the group ride. Gotta love grandparents.

The group ride was a bit of a fiasco...most people wanted to do the regular thursday ride but we ended up on an easy tour of stop signs in LR. I rode threshold on the front between stops to at least get a workout in. Next week we'll be back on track with the regular ride.

TNWC #5

After the neutral lap tonight I went to the front and did a short hard effort to get things started then Brian B. did a lap and when I looked back we had a huge gap. Everyone just let us ride away. Cool. The break started with 5 of us, then 4, then 3, then it was Nick and I riding so others would have to chase us. I didn't think the break really had much of a chance...we weren't exactly drilling it. But it was a good 25 minute interval.

Once caught I chilled for a bit then followed a couple attacks, attacked a couple of times then just settled in for the sprint. Austin was away late and I thought a counter once he was caught would be good (I was trying to talk big Matt into launching me) but instead I ended up just looking around for Derek's wheel, found it and sat there. Around here if you want to win a field sprint you've GOT to be on Derek's wheel. He's an ex track national champ and 100% fast twitch. A pure sprinter.

Derek gave me a super smooth lead out from turn 4 and I jumped at 50m, gave it a go...but came up half a wheel short and got 2nd. The officials noted that since he showed up to the crit 20min late--he's officially relegated and I'm awarded the win. I'd still like to beat him ONCE in a sprint.

I felt like total crap all day and riding out to the course but once the race started I felt great. Still coughing...

You lookin at me?

I came home from work early...it was 70º. I came through the door, stopped, looked at my bike, paused...then kept walking. No riding today.

results

35+: Jay 4th, Ladd 6th, Me 7th, Brian 12th
45+: Lang 7th
3's : Sammy 4th (I think)
4's : Marc 4th
chicks 1,2,3: Casey 4th (2nd on Saturday)

Report:

Last night I came down with a pretty bad cough...one of those "there's something in my lungs" type of constant coughs. I didn't sleep well (if at all). 4:30am, 6 shots of espresso, pseudoephedrine, and lots of calories then meet Brian for the drive up.

The 35+ race is 90 miles: Two 45 mile laps. Couple of big rollers but nothing that selective. A pretty large field...60-70 riders (maybe more). We roll out and immediately we're hammering. I think a team decided to keep the pace high to prevent an early break.

On lap #1 at about mile 30 I'm feeling pretty bad...just tired and coughing. My legs felt good and I was riding near the front but I just felt kindof sick. I really really considered stopping at the first lap but then I had a 15 minute talk with myself and decided to stick it out. I'm glad I did. The second lap I felt progressively better and the legs started feeling really good. I was still coughing but only when we were going slow. Near the end I was feeling very strong.

With the large field it was tough to stay near the front. Everyone wanted to be there and with about 8 miles to go it turned into battle royal: if you weren't fighting for every spot you would lose 2. It was pretty nerve racking...and fast.

At 1k to go we were pegged at about 32 mph so no chance to get a leadout organized or for any late attacks. I had good position at about wheel 15...we take a hard right at 600m to go and it's then a full on sprint (it's the same every year). I'm weaving my way up through the crowds then see Jay...I go past him in the right gutter and he follows me but we get boxed in a bit and he loses my wheel then we free lanced it from there. If I would have had a clear shot up the gutter I think Jay could have won it. C'est la vie.

The power data isn't that interesting...a very high VI of 1.47 with lots of hard riding and lots of easy riding but what I did notice was that I spent 30% of my total time putting out a wattage of 0-20w (over an hour). That's good conservation.

Pre-race-day

Ella had a ballet rehearsal so I did a 30min spin on the bike at the Blatt ctr. Still not 100% but we'll see how it goes tomorrow. Our "stategy" is going to be that Ladd marks a certain 35+ hammer. Jay free lances and Brian and I ride near him at the front and do what he tells us to do. Lang will be gunning to be first 45+. I hope I survive.

Today's Rock Hill crit was eventful: Ladd crashed in the 3's race, took a free lap then won in a late 2 man break.

Nutty crashed in the 4's while in a break and took a not-so-free ambulance ride to the hospital: broken clavicle, which Ella says "why does nutty always break everything?" Major Bummer Dude.

reload

Had a decent 2 hr ride today. Mainly just cruising but I did one hard 10 min effort (at just above FTP) and the legs were not happy. Head and Lungs were good. Near the end of the ride I was beginning to feel like a bike racer again. If the weather's ok I'm gonna do a 2 hr spin tomorrow.

Music: I listened to a couple of new albums today. REM's Accelerate is pretty good. I stopped listening to them about 10 albums ago but they've sortof gone back to their roots. If you liked them in the late '80s & early '90s then check it out. If you were born in the '80s...nevermind.

I've usually can't stand Moby but his new disk is actually quite good and great for cycling if you can tolerate electronic dance music.

rain delay

Rain and a very sickly wifey made me skip bike practice today. Not a big deal at this point. The forecast for Sunday is stellar.

turning em

Today was the first day back on the bike after a 4 day forced rest. The head and lungs felt good but the legs...not so good. I counted on this and just cruised around the fort pretty easy.

I went to the doc yesterday to rule out strep throat since it was absolutely killing me at night. As is the usual...once I got home I started feeling a lot better then this morning I felt sortof normal.

Now how do I get my legs back race ready? I think I'll just do the group ride tomorrow and ride hardish to blow it out then friday/sat just do some easy miles. This would put my TSB at around +10 for the race sunday. A bit higher than I was planning but it should be perfect if my legs are good.