Beautiful day, and with the recent rain, it should be a fast one. I was so nervous beforehand I couldn't finish my breakfast.
Went out for a very truncated pre-ride with my teammates, the course is super fast, much smoother than I've ever seen it before.
I got out of the gate, and settled into a comfortable, yet fast, pace, around 178 bpm, just trying to stay smooth. Basic strategy was to not completely kill myself on the straights, but really go for it on any techy section. I was killing it on the downhills, and flying around curves. Took a drink from my bottle at the wrong moment and dropped it. Great, a half lap without fluids. Good thing Dan T was supposed to save me with another bottle following lap one, except I totally missed it. Checked my Garmin to see a 52 min first lap. Fastest I've ever done, and a shock. It all felt very slow, remember, slow is smooth, and smooth is fast. So I'm having a great race so far but I'm going to have 1.5 laps without fluids of any kind. Good thing I'm not hungry. Except that I am. Very hungry.
Then, the unexpected happened, I see Dan standing over by the guardrail. Seems he booked it about two miles just to hand me my bottle. After the race, he gives me the quote of the day: "You NEVER leave your wing-man."
Stayed steady on lap 2. Found myself in no-man's land. No one anywhere near me. Hard to push when there's no one to catch or run away from. Sigh. Started running out of energy due to hunger, but I kept on it anyway. A gel would have been great, but I'm not that smart. Ran it over 20 mph at the finish.
Finished in 18th place in Expert/Elite SingleSpeed at 1:47 & change. Solid result. Great start to the season. I'm very happy with it.
Just a few years ago, I was just killing myself to do this course under an hour on a geared bike, my old Gary Fisher, let alone two laps at well under an hour each.
Garmin file:
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