Solo Today, Yesterday Was Actually Fun, Though

I'll start with yesterday. I headed out with the normal Saturday group, hitting up the sprints I could. Not much exciting going on there, except we had a horse run out in front of us at one point, and a duck ran out in front of me a little later. After the petting zoo, I headed out with my teammates and a few others for a few more hours. I felt pretty good the whole day, and definitely busted myself. Stats after the post...
Today was a bit different, as I headed out solo for 3.5 hours. I had no power, and the stats will show. Nothing exciting at all happened today other than I had no power whatsoever the entire ride, and basically had to force myself to get what power I did outta my legs. Now for the stats:

Saturday...
Time-4hrs. 27mins.
Dist.-82.99 Miles
Avg.-189 Watts
Norm.-253 Watts

Sunday...
Time-3hrs. 27mins.
Dist.-58.6 Miles
Avg.-180 Watts
Norm.-210 Watts

Two almost solo days...

Saturday was like any other Saturday local ride for me. I rode with the Habersham Bicycles crew for about 20ish miles, and then set out for another 45-50 miles on my own. I can’t think of anything interesting about this ride other than I had no flats or cramps, which is always good. Yesterday was set up to be a bit longer ride. I left the house to ride over to another more “mountainous” part of the county so as to make a loop and ride back with the hopes of having a total of about 4.5 hours worth of riding (Saturday was 3.5). Once I got over there, I met Sammy Arial, who rode with me for about 30 miles, and definitely added some good ole’ companionship to the otherwise lonely day. After all was said and done, I ended up with 4.25 hours for yesterday, with that being 7.75 hours for the weekend, no cramps or flats, and about 140 miles. Definitely a productive weekend!

Nice and Easy

Last night I rode the Tuesday Night Throw Down with the various local folks and teammates. Usually it's a pretty fast ride, hence the name, but last night me and a few others decided to drop off early and take it easy. It was quite the pleasant ride, and was a nice break from the monotony of hard training that usually takes place on Tuesdays. Afterwards, we had a nice wait at Johnny's Pizza, and an hour-sih later we finally got to enjoy some pizza. Good friends, good food, good fellowship...Who could ask for more?!

A good weekend...

So this weekend was the “Union City Stage Race” with the road race yesterday being the Georgia State Championship. Might as well start off with the TT and go through the weekend…

The time trial was a first for me, in that I was the first 2/3 racer to go off. This means I had no one to chase, which I guess could be a bad thing. I feel it was also a good thing, though, in that I had no one to chase in vain and risk blowing up and screwing myself for the GC. I headed off on my merry way, for the 10 mile mind game. I guess the hardest part of the whole TT was not looking over my shoulder to see if I was being caught, but concentrating on keeping my head in that magical aero position as much as possible. I hit the turn in less than 10 minutes, and THOUGHT I had it in the bag. What I didn’t realize was that there was more climbing on the way back, and my effort was a bit too hard on the way out, potentially toasting me on the way back. After the first “big” rollers I hit some 250-270 watt recoveries to regain what I could, and then busted myself going up the 1k-ish climb to the finish coming in at 22:30. Power was 326avg., 336norm., and avg. speed was about 26.6mph. Good enough for 8th place in a large field of good time trialists!

The team then loaded up and headed over to the criterium course where we would spend the rest of our day laying around, fellowshipping, and racing. I was the first to go out with the 2/3’s, and had a good race. I got my best 2/3 finish to date, which was 6th, and held my position in the GC, which, of course, was 8th. The younger guys represented with Reilly Mahon getting a solid pack finish. Star took a firm grasp of his MAR jersey in the 35+ race, and definitely is going to make it as hard as he can for someone to take it from him. The older guys are always interesting to watch, as they work together so well in throwing guy after guy off the front to wear down the pack and get the right person in place for the MAR points and pack sprint at the end. My power for the crit was 254avg., 301norm., and avg. speed was 25.3mph.

The road race yesterday was a first for me in a few ways. For starters, I think it was the first road race I’ve done which was over 60 miles (66.5). Second, it was the first road race I’ve done without a teammate to help out. My strategy today was spelled out by the ever-so-wise Matt Schectman, which was “Don’t do any work and don’t cramp”. Pretty simple, yet powerful, words, lol. The sitting in part was easy, as I stayed up in the top 20 for the entire race minus when I dropped to the back in the feed zone to attempt to get a bottle, which failed miserably. No biggie, as I had the “emergency” bottle in pocket, and drank some good ole nast..I mean tasty Union City water. I quickly moved back up to the front 20 of the pack in the next few miles, and continued to watch the break add one here and there to reach a total of 8 in all, which we never caught. I rolled in with the pack, giving as hard a leadout as possible in the final 1/2k to string out the pack what little I could to minimize a crash chance for that 9th place sprint. I ended up 19th on the day, 7th overall, and had a pretty dang good weekend! The numbers for the road race were 202avg. power, 279norm. power, and 24.6mph avg. speed.

All in all, the weekend was good, and I'm glad I didn't crap out like I've been known to do, lol. The rest of the team did really well, with everyone having a good showing and good overall finishes. Next up is Lagrange!

The Stage Race

So this weekend is kinda the first stage race I’ll be doing as a 3 where I won’t be working for someone (only have done one other stage as a 3, but was working for a teammate). I’m anxious about it, but at the same time a bit nervous, as the road race Sunday is quite the monster at 91 miles. Of course this in no way compares to the Cat 1, 2 race which is 114 miles, but it’ll still be tough. I guess the only plan of action I can truly follow is to stay hydrated, make sure to eat some, and stick in the pack not doing any work. If I can manage to survive the entire race, I’ll stand a good chance at the state championship as well as a really good overall finish in the stage, granted I do well in the TT and don’t get dropped in the Criterium on Saturday.

And the Shout Outs Go To…

Stephen Dean and Star Bridges for the weekend. Stephen pulled a nice 3 lap break at the end of his race (solo), but got caught on the line by one person. He ended up with a well deserved second place and was pretty dang happy. Star stayed up front (and on the front) for most of his race, trying to go off on a couple breaks and such, and came home with 6th place I believe. My weekend was eh, with my Sunday crit ending with me being caught behind a nasty crash (get well soon Adam from Harbin!), and not finishing. Yesterday was a bit better, with me still only pulling off 29th out of a 80ish field. I still have a ways to go to being pretty competitive in this 2/3 game.

No Posts

Because nothing has been going on. This has been one of the most uneventful weeks ever! I rode every day this week, lost some data from Tuesday and Wednesday by not downloading it right, and….I guess that’s it. On a side note, there’s a drug check going on here near the highway. There’s a big sign on the side of the highway right before the exit ramp that says “Drug Check 1 Mile” or something similar. They’ve arrested a lot people in two days from this! Obviously as soon as you get off the highway and round the curve there’s a caravan of local authorities there to greet you. Yesterday the towing guy said they had impounded 31 cars on the first day, and I heard yesterday was more profitable. Sorry rednecks, no meth for you this week!