Snicklefritz

ugh. Has anyone had days where you wake up feeling like S@#%, but you do really well in your race in spite of it? ...and then other days where you feel like you did everything right, have a good pre-race ride the day before and warm-up the day of, and then just can't get your body to perform??

I had one of the latter today. It left me absolutely stumped. I felt good going into the race, was well hydrated, ate properly, etc. etc. felt good in the warm-up and very good for several days prior, but after 10 minutes, I knew I was toast. Has this ever happened to anyone? If so, any ideas why this happens or how to figure it out?

Jesus Christ

yes. i mean no. actually, i don't know yet. the results aren't posted.

Jet-man

Of course -this happens to everyone. The key is to try to get through the $hitty time and hoepfully feel better. I've won races when I was contemplating dropping out - just thought... "I'll go one more lap..., one more lap... might as well try attacking since I'll likely not finish anyway - hey, I'm off w/a few guys - may as well hang on for a lap or two before dropping... starting to feel a little OK, maybe I'll go for this prime to at least make $50... that wasn't too bad, maybe I can win this thing..." And of course sometimes just going 1 more lap becomes what feels like impossible and you get to ride off the course back to the car hoping that people you know didn't see you punt on the race....

EventServices

1989 World Road Race: Greg Lemond says he felt like crap throughout and was playing that game of "one more lap, one more lap". Then he won.

Sometimes it's good to turn your brain off and let your body do what it wants to do. Sometimes it will surprise you.

Jet-man is right. And I only add that it's good to park your car on the backside of the course so that if you decide to pull off, you can disappear without mention by the announcer.

Flaneur

EventServices read my mind! If i'm suffering in a circuit race, i'll look for a quiet place to puke;-)

I don't feel the compulsion to finish any more; I listen to my body and it swears at me:-)

R600DuraAce

Yeah, just today. Everything went just wrong. Temperature was below 30F this morning. Only 4 hours and a half of sleep. The sleep issue isn't the problem. The temperature was so cold in the morning added with some nasty wind I wanted to turn back home. I was surprised I could even get my ass out of the bed this morning at 4:30am. Race started at 6:30am, BTW. I managed to ride to the race. While riding there, I got a hunger knock. Pulled out my after race meal (peanut better and jelly sandwich). I should have known better since I didn't take a rest day before the race and continued to do active recovery ride (with wind gust up to 30 mph) after my Thursday hard day. Managed to sustain 241w (4w/kg) for 52 minutes straight. With the race, the 3/4 field was only 24 strongs. Most of the guy just went through the motion like they didn't want to race. The race was boring and slow.

Right now, just trying to get my senses back together and hopefully making some training structure changes to avoid situation like today.

Warblade

One thing that I have found that helps before a race is to not eat anything very substantial 30mins before and have a quick couple bites of a powerbar 3-5mins before the start. That way anything substantial will have been dissolving in my stomach and the powerbar will give you a little added boost for the start of the race but it won't upset your stomach.

caloso

Heh. I got thrashed in the Masters 4/5 race and then in the very next race I got thrashed in the Elite 5 race. I guess I'm just a masochist. (That and I'm cheap and I didn't want to eat the $10 fee for the second race. And I convinced myself that it's worth it to move up to Cat. 4 as soon as possible. )

After 3 laps of the first race I was hurting and all I wanted to do was not get dropped. And not crash. And after awhile I thought about just making the front group if it got split in the crosswind section. And then I thought about maybe moving up and trying for a prime. Never got the prime but I hung in there. And then in the second race I just sort of got used to the discomfort. There were some young guys wearing the jersey of my alma mater and I thought, I'm just going to hang on to their wheels for awhile and see if I can hold out for another lap or two.

And hey, whadya know? I hung on. I was nowhere near the top 10 but it was a pretty resepectable showing for a middle aged guy with hairy legs and 10 pounds to lose.

caloso

Hah. Saturday's race was in my hometown and I could have just pulled off and ridden back to my house. Good thing I didn't think of doing that.

galen_52657

If you could turn it on and off it would be easy! There is a lot of mental tenacity involved. Other crap going on in your life can spill over into your racing with good or bad results. I have had races when I just did not have the stomach to dig in and hurt and let the race get away from me. If I am not sore and tired the next day, than I did not really put in a good effort. The best days or the days when you feel good, race well and feel like Superman!