Pedalling Squares

Esparto TT, August 24, 2003

Description:
The course is 18 miles, sort of a goofy out and back, where the finish is about 2.5 miles up the road from where you start. The middle of the course is hilly, but all big ring stuff. When Patrick and I surveyed the course, it wasn't windy.

My set up was just my LandShark with clip-ons, a Zipp 440 tubular on the front and a Zipp 404 tubular on the rear. Not nearly as fancy as some of the punk-ass juniors with their Cervelos and Zipp dimpled discs. Oh well, it's not the machine, it's the motor, right?

How it went down:
I got a shorter warmup than I would have liked because of the way they did the start times, but oh well. I got to the start line, took a moment to collect myself. They give me the 5 count and soon I was off. I assumed the position and resolved to take this like a man. I quickly rolled up to 30 mph and soon heard my HR monitor beeping at me, telling me I was over 170 bpm - that was a good thing. I decided to ignore the cyclocomputer for a moment and just settle into a good rhythm. I did that and looked down - still 30 mph! Cool. I caught my minute man at about the 6 mile point, so that was good. Then I caught my 2 minute man a few miles later in the hills. I did a horrible turn-around and started back. There was definitely a little headwind now and with the hills it felt really slow.

I lost focus a few times here and let my HR dip a little low. But I was also really trying to hammer the hills and not lose any time so I needed some rest. So I crested the last of those, took a sip of water, reassummed the position and motored on. First I was going 20, then 22, then 24, 25 and stabilized there with about 4 miles to go. After coming up over the overpass, I knew I had less than 2 to go, so I ramped it up to 27. I could see the finish. I jammed it down into the 53x12 to make it look good when I crossed the line.

There was some confusion about whether or not that was the finish line. They had actually goofed up the pro1/2 field and they ended up riding 3 miles further than everyone else. So anyway, when they finally posted the times, they had my finish mixed up with my 2 minute man. So they switched us, but then they had me finishing in 38 minutes - way too fast. So then I drove out to the finish tent in BFE to rectify the problem with the officials. The only explanation they could give was that they must have inverted a "6" when it should have been a "9". Pretty accurate way of timing, huh? So when they changed that, they had me at 41:42, which sounded about right. I forgot to check my time at the finish because it wasn't clear to me that it was actually the finish.

Anyway, there were lots of protests, but when the dust settled, I got 2nd by 0.8 seconds. I guess I should have rubbed Vaughn's head beforehand for good luck - he got a bronze by the same margin over the 4th place guy in the District TT. Oh well, I collected my VeloPromo T-shirt (black with yellow and pink - yuck!) and $40 (2nd place at Leesville was only worth $15!) and got the hell out.

Do you remember me?

Stats:
Avg HR: 173 bpm
Avg Speed: 26.1 mph