I have made a lot of changes since last season, which I'll get to in future posts. For now, I just want to talk about the first event of the 2015 road season, the Frostbite Time Trial. The Frostbite is an 11.4 mile time trial along a very slightly rolling frontage road next to I-25 just north of Fort Collins. I did this last year, too, placing 5th in the SM5 race. This year, I'm a Cat 4, so the competition was going to be tougher. But I have put in a lot of hard work, so I was very interested to see how I would do.
As a bonus, my kids were also interested in racing this year! This weekend, my daughter was out of town at a soccer tournament, but my son decided he would take a shot at the time trial. His start time ended up being around 9am, and I was at about 12:30pm, so we were far enough apart that I could watch him do his race, and still have plenty of time to warm up for mine.
We got up bright and early to head north. The drive was more than an hour, and we wanted to have time to really wake up and have a good breakfast. We got to the parking are right around 8am, with plenty of time before his 9:10am start. We wandered over and picked up our numbers, then started to get him ready for his race. To show what a poor manager I am, I somehow managed to forget to bring his helmet. Not sure how that happened. It seemed like we had planned for everything else, but I forgot something that important. Fortunately, I had decided to bring a couple of my own helmets, my Limar aero TT helmet as well as a new Giro Synthe that I bought for my road races this year. I managed to tighten the Giro enough that it would fit him pretty well. At about 8:55, we rolled over to the start line, took care of the "junior roll-out", then got him in line for his start. And at 9:10:30, he was off and rolling. There was only one other rider registered in his category, but he apparently didn't show up, so it was just Connor, quickly followed by a lot of older, faster kids. I knew he could ride 11.4 miles, but until now we had really only been riding, not training, so he wasn't going to do it very fast.
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| Connor, warming up on the trainer |
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| Connor, at the start line |
After he left the start line, there wasn't much I could do until he came back, so I went back to the car to check on a few things, chatted with teammate Andrea Koenig for a few minutes, and then wandered back to the course to wait for him. As I stood there, many of the Pro/1/2 racers came flying by, eventually followed by the Juniors. As all the people around me were cheering for their kids as they crossed the line, I patiently waited for Connor. Since all the other juniors there were older than him, and had probably been riding for a while, I expected he was going to get passed by everyone. And he did, but that's ok. I watched these kids pushing hard across the line, and kept looking up the road, waiting for that familiar Connor-shape to come around the corner. Eventually, I was able to see him a couple hundred meters away. I cheered him on as he approached the finish, the only kid left out on the course. A few other bystanders were cheering for him, too. As he passed by at the finish line, I ran over to meet up with him. He was looking pretty haggard. He really looked like he'd had the crap beat out of him. But that's what you're supposed to look like after a time trial, so that was good. A few of the 11-12 Juniors came over to congratulate him, which was nice.
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| Connor on the course. © Dejan Smaic, Sportif Images |
We slowly made out way back to the car, and he did his best to catch his breath. Finally back at the car, he could relax a little, and change back into his normal clothes. He was definitely happy to be done. So, while he recovered from his race, it was time to get ready for mine. My start time was 12:32:30, giving me a couple hours until my start. I was aiming for about 30 minutes of warmup, so I still had plenty of time. Our new team kits hadn't come in yet, and we were asked not to wear the old kits if possible, so I just wore some older generic gear I had sitting around. Connor helped me get my number pinned on right, I had a little food, and just generally got all my stuff together. At about 11:45, I hopped on the trainer for my warm-up. I don't have a specific timed warmup that I do, but typically spin really easy for a while, then start stepping down gears for about a minute per gear, then ease up and spin easy for a while again. Then, I'll usually get in a few really hard sprints of about 10-15 seconds, then spin easy again until time to head over to the race start.
My bike for this race is my regular road bike, an Aerocat R509. I don't have the money for a real time-trial bike, so I just do my best with the equipment I have. I have clip-on aero bars that I use in time trials, to improve my aerodynamics. Also, because of my different position on the bike, my seat position is also a little different. To accommodate this, I have a separate saddle and seatpost that I use just for time trials, with a mark showing the height. So, when switching from road race to time trial, I just swap the seatpost and attach my aero bars and I'm good to go. It's not as good as a true TT bike, but it does the trick.
At 12:15, I headed over towards the start line, with my son in tow. Since it was just the two of us there, he was told to just hang out with the officials at the start/finish line until I was done. I rode around a little bit, keeping my legs moving until about 2-3 minutes before my start time, and then found my place in line. First race of the year, and I was a little nervous. I'm not really sure why. Time trials are pretty straightforward. It's pretty hard to screw up; just go as fast as you can. I think I was just nervous about my fitness. I had been riding the trainer so much, I had only been comparing myself again myself for months. It was finally time to see where I stood against my competition.
At 12:32:30, I was off. I feel like I got a pretty good start, out of the saddle to get some speed going, then settling in and slowly shifting down to a comfortable gear. The first half of the ride heads south, gradually downhill, and in my case, into the wind. This was my first time out on the roads with my Limar "Speed Demon" aero helmet, and it was surprisingly loud. It was actually annoyingly loud. The wind was just screaming in my ears for a little over 5 1/2 miles. I was keeping a steady power output of about 305-315 watts, and a speed of about 22-24 mph. Not terribly fast, but I had a headwind, so I just had to trust my power numbers to keep me on track. I could tell I was doing ok, because I began to pass some of the riders who started ahead of me. And I was passing them pretty quickly, too. I worried that maybe I was going out too fast, but I knew if I kept my power steady that I could hold that for the entire race. Since it's an out-and-back race, you have the opportunity to see your competition coming the other way during the race. I eventually noticed teammate Keith Collins on the other side of the road. He had started a couple minutes ahead of me, so I assume that meant I was getting close to the turnaround.
At around mile 5.6, you come to a cone in the middle of the road, and a few race marshals cheering you on. Do your best to keep up some speed around the cone, get out of the saddle and push it hard to get back up to speed. From there, it's another 5.6 miles north, and uphill. Fortunately, I now had the wind at my back. I stuck with the same power output of about 305-315 watts, but now my speed was anywhere from about 27-34 mph. And I was still occasionally passing other riders, which just feels good. At some point, with a few miles to go, I managed to get passed by one rider. So, with one other rider definitely faster than me, and a teammate who was also likely faster than me, and about 18 other riders out there, I wasn't really too sure of my chances. I was just hoping for a top-10 finish. I would be satisfied with that.
About a half-mile from the finish, I started to really push it, eventually cruising at 450-500 watts with a couple hundred meters to go. As I hit the 100m-to-go mark, I saw my son cheering me on from the sideline, along with Keith. That was really nice to see. I pushed through the finish, almost plowing into a group of riders who were just sitting in the road chatting. I rode around for a minute, trying to catch my breath and get all the spit out of my mouth. I met up with Keith and my son, and we slowly made out way back to the cars.
I got changed, got the bikes locked back onto the car, had a little something to eat and drink, and then we made our way down to registration to check the results. As I walked over, we saw Keith was already there. "You finished right behind me! Third and fourth!" he said. Holy cow, that's not what I was expecting. Seriously, I would have been happy with a top ten, but a fourth place in my first event of the year was pretty amazing. I finished 25 seconds off the podium, behind Keith. Third place would have been nice, but looking back, I just don't think I had another 25 seconds in me. I think I have it everything I had, with nothing left in the tank at the end. So, as I told my son after his race, "You can't do any better than your best". And I think I did my best, so I can be happy with that.
With kids sports starting now, I've got some parenting duties for the next few weekends, so I'm not sure yet when my next race will be. In the meantime, it's back to training. I'm about to start the last phase of my training for this season, building up to my "A" races, so I'm expecting a whole lot of hard work for the next 8 weeks. Stay tuned.
Note: If I find any photos of me during my race, I'll add them later. Nothing yet...
Race: Frostbite Time Trial
Category: MM 40+ 4
Result: 4/21
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