Wednesday, July 15, 2009

fini

My season's done. This has been brewing since nats...a little voice in the back of my head that kept getting louder. My good form kept the riding pretty fun but last weekend I cracked and after the tnwc I knew it was time to hang it up.


I'll have a more in depth retrospective post about this year later when I haven't had a few beers. This year I pushed through to a new level of fitness and it was the most fun I've ever had on a bike. Going fast is fun. No doubt about it.

Last year I didn't ride at all for over 2 months after nats because of a huge construction project on my house. This year I'm going to try to do at least 400TSS a week as maintenance. We'll see...it will take a long time to bleed off my 80 CTL so I should have some pretty good form for quite a while.


Sunday, July 12, 2009

Weekend

Saturday Karl, Crusty and I did a long "flat" ride...we motored out bluff to 601 then turned around and made our way to the Gmart then in...about 60 miles and I hit my lap button on each pull and did 10' for each one at around my FTP. Great fast ride and I was riding pretty strong...karl of course was killing it too.


Today I didn't ride...too many house projects I've been ignoring and sleep I needed to get. I did motorpace LL in the afternoon. I don't think I've ever seen his face contorted in pain like that. I just kept turning the screw...It was fun being on the other end of the moto.

This week I'm gonna do a hard monday-tuesday block then chill for the races this weekend.

Friday, July 10, 2009

200 TSS Thursday

With French Broad coming up I wanted to hit some Vo2 intervals again so I did 4x4' at 120% before the group ride. Felt strong. The weather was iffy so not many people showed but that was fine cuz I wanted to get some more V02 efforts in. We pretty much motored with Karl, Paul and Kevin killing it. It's a lot easier to ride at 130% of FTP with a few strong guys on your wheel.


After the taper week for Nats my CTL's back on the upswing and TSB's back to negative.
Tonight I'm gonna tow Ella around at the beer ride then tomorrow it looks like I'm riding solo.

Wednesday, July 8, 2009

tnwc slugfest

Last night I went to the tnwc with one purpose...to ride as hard as possible. A few others had the same idea so it was one of the hardest crits of the year. Instead of attacking and then recovering I just went with every break I could and got pretty fried. I knew I wouldn't win the sprint so when Jay led it out I jumped after turn 3 to make it interesting and made it t0 200m to go before detonating.

Monday, July 6, 2009

data purge

For the geeks:

The Road Race
crazy high IF and NP for the race


For reference, last years race:


The Crit
surprisingly low NP but look at the graph...lots and lots of 400-600w sprints




Pics

See the soon to be ripped off leg tattoo (and nice "tribal" arm ring...ballin!) Some more photo's HERE

Saturday, July 4, 2009

Master's Nats Crit @ Churchill Downs

Last night I slept like crap...I was wired and a bit nervous about the race today.  My race was at 11:30 so there was no rush in the morning.  I got there at around 10am and had a really good warmup then put the race wheels on and did some laps on the course.


I had to stop to get some tattoo's put on that I promised my daughter...then it was to the line.  The course was a 1/2 mile with most of the turns rounded so you could sort of pedal through them and turn 4 was weirdly banked and fast...about 65 guys started and we did 62 laps.

I'll tell you it was balls out fast and hard from the gun...and really never let up.  There were some lulls here and there but for the most part it was just crazy fast.  I saw more pedal strikes in corners than I care to remember but the group was really smooth and well behaved.

I tried to stay *near* the front but that meant about midpack.  A break of 5 guys eventually got away and held about a 20" gap.  Around the last third of the race I started feeling really good and started moving up and looking for an opportunity to go across to the break.  One guy who I was watching was the Kelly Benefits guy who Jay was chasing with on Tuesday...I knew he was strong so when he attacked, me and another dude went with him and chased.  The field eventually caught us and the gap then was only about 5 seconds and I gambled that the gap would close...Nope.  I was a little fried at that key moment and *should* have tried to bridge right then...but couldn't, and the gap went back out to 20".

At this point with 10 laps to go it was just looking like a field sprint for 6th...things started getting a bit argy-bargy and people were taking more risks to get to the front.  With 2 to go I had moved up to about 15th wheel...exactly where I wanted to be.  Then all I know is that when we were flying through turn 3 the guy to my left got in trouble and going down...I just hoped I'd sneak through but he slid out right in front of me and I slammed into him.  Luckily I landed on his bike (with him under it) so I wasn't hurt that bad but the race for me was over.

I did get up and ride the last 2 laps to finish the race...with rash down my left leg (ripping my new leg tattoo off!) and chain grease covering my entire left arm.  Whadda ya gonna do?  Later someone said a lapped rider caused the crash...I have no idea.  Now, 9 hours later I pretty sore and stiff.  Nothing a hand full of ibu and a few beers won't cure.

So I'm a bit bummed at the result but I am satisfied with how I felt and how I rode the race.  I was as aggressive as I think I could have been considering how hard it was and I was positioned where I wanted to be at the end.  

I'll do a post with some wattage numbers of both races when I get back to Columbia.

Friday, July 3, 2009

Ok...back to racing

After Tuesday's race I took Wed off hanging at the TT course with LL.  On Thursday Julie and I did a 2:15 ride where I did the first hour at tempo then followed her wheel the last hour.  The legs felt awesome and it was very hard not to ride harder (that's why I just sat on after a while).  


Today I went out for an hour and did a few opener type efforts...30-45 seconds at 150%.  Again incredibly good leg sensations...felt like I was just floating.  Very nice.  I took a huge 2.5hr nap this afternoon then hung out at the pool with the kids for a while just laying around in the shade.

I'm ready for tomorrows crit.  60% chance of rain...should be fun.  No expectations...just want to ride hard and be aggressive.

Wednesday, July 1, 2009

some thoughts...

Here's some random thoughts on the nats RR...


I saw some very "un masters-like" riding...a guy would accidentally get chopped a bit in a corner then he'd accelerate and try to throw an elbow at the dude or cut his wheel...crazy road rage type stuff. This happened 3 times...the last in the final 1k of the race.

Gordon Stihl had a horrendous crash on a super fast off camber turn where he followed a guy into a bad line...that guy lost it, took Gordon out and he went catapulting off the side of the road down an embankment and into the trees. It was so bad I was yelling at the next course marshal to get an ambulance. He's OK...just banged up and very lucky.

The "feed" zone was on a climb...but one we'd hit at 25+ mph. Carnage. I never saw one person actually get a feed, just bottles flying everywhere. Not that you needed one in a 50 mile RR with 80˚ weather.

Here's a pic someone sent Crusty...shows me (#1015) rolling in for 19th behind an ex-postal rider Clark Sheehan at top and Korioth in the middle.


TT: Ladd put in a great ride today getting 9th. Here's his START and FINISH on YouTube.