Congrats, Hermes! :beer:

Nice job!!!

We done. You've had a great season so far, keep after it.

:thumb:


Very nice Hermes.
I'd like one of those but there are way to many issues with the lack of critter capacity.

Sattley Individual Time Trial and State Championship, 20K Distance



Heidi (my team mate) and I contested the Sattley ITT this past Sunday. We drove up to Truckee Saturday afternoon, and the spent the night there. Sunday morning we were up at 0500 to eat, get loaded up, and drive to Sattley, which is nothing more than a very picturesque crossroads about 35 miles north of Truckee, at an elevation of 5000 feet. We arrived at Sattley at 6:30, plenty of time to get the bikes ready, get checked in, and get a warmup. Or, so we thought. Check in was late, the folks doing it weren't ready until 7:15, and we didn't complete the process until almost 7:30. Our rolloff times were just a little after 8:00, so we were now rushed to get the numbers pinned on and get warmed. Fortunately, we convinced a nice lady to "pin us up" while we were warming on our trainers.


I got a 32 minute warmup, and then got to the line three minutes before I was to start (Heidi got there 5 seconds before her start!). My warmup had gone well, and I felt good. Ex had advised me to reduce my power by around ten watts, don't go off hard, and don't blow up, because recovery would take a long time in the thinner air. I'm glad I had the advice, but even so, I had never done any sort of athletic endeavor at high elevations (climbing up Half Dome doesn't count!), so I really didn't know how my body would react.


I rolled off at my allotted time, and after getting up to speed, settled in to a good pace and cadence. I was noting a relatively good speed, and I had heard that speeds at elevation were higher than down low because of the thinner air. I was thinking I'd post a good time! Well, the speed was up, because the start was slightly downhill, and when I hit the flat I slowed to around 22 MPH, but I was holding that just fine. The woman who started behind me passed me at the 5K marker, and I thought "uh-oh, I'm not going as well as I thought", so I tried to bump up my power a little and pick up the speed. That worked for a little bit, and then the power started to sag. I could feel lots of lactate building, and my coaches advice came to mind - "don't blow up" - so I backed off just a touch. But, I was going so S L O W. Only around 20 - 21 MPH. I hit the slight rise prior to the turnaround and tried to maintain an even pace and hold my speed going up it. Nope. I hit around 160 watts, and then loaded up badly and had to back down. My heart rate never felt high (my GPS doesn't display HR on my "race page"), but so far in this ITT, my lactate buildup, and the Pain Cave, were coming in at ridiculously low power levels. Elevation!


I hit the turnaround, and had a good turn, and got back up to speed quickly. I managed 23 MPH on the slight descent after the turnaround (I was thinking I needed 26 or so here). When I got to the flat section I ramped up the power, gritted my teeth and enjoyed the pain. I was passed by three or four men, I don't remember. The last one passed me inside of 5K to go. By then, the issue I had been having with my right leg in previous ITT's was bothering me - my leg had gone to sleep. So, in order to keep from "snatching" the pedal stroke, I geared up. That worked. Then, I pushed as hard I could over the last 3/4 mile, and I finally hit the finish line.


I did a 37:17 for the 20K, VERY slow, averaging right at 20 MPH. I was sixth of six in my age group, and two minutes slower than the woman in front of me. Ex and I discussed the result afterwards, and he pointed out that it was becoming apparent that I am a true "pure sprinter", and I have a low aerobic capacity, along with a low lactate threshold. That means, TT's (and climbing) are going to be hard for me and slower than most. Also, altitude will affect me more, because the losses I suffer will be a greater percentage compared to a rider with a big engine. Still, I like sitting in that Pain Cave, and I really like the challenge. I don't know how much I can improve, but there is room and I can make some gains. So, I will. At the very least, I can get better at pacing and become smoother (I still have issues with that).

Sattley is very low key and it was a fun time. I got to hang with Ex and two of his other athletes, and I got to spend a little time with Hermes and MEA (Hermes is the "quip master"!). The ladies in the master's ages groups are just great, and spending time with them was pretty terrific, too. Oh, and the scenery in those parts was pretty awesome.

Valygrl, I get why you race at altitude - I mean other than you have to! Great job on your ITT, woman!

Sara, looks like you have some great take-aways from the effort and learned some things. I'd call that a success.

Sara I liked the way you adapted and adjusted. You're still new at this, and yet you figured it all out on the fly. There's a lot to be said for that.

Thanks, guys.

Another takeaway I had was HOW TIRED I was when I got home last night! Altitude takes it toll, for sure.

One of the recurring themes I heard from the other ladies who were at the ITT was "You've only been racing TT's a year"? Honey, it takes three years to get good at this". I have hope.

You have hope. We have faith in you.

:thumb:

+1!

Sara, that sounds right - i still suck at TTs but this year I suck at them quite a bit less than the last couple years, and i don't think it's really about raw wattage.

Tahoe is beautiful, even if there is relatively little oxygen there. :)

Edit: I am *STILL* exhausted from my TT on Saturday.

I'm getting that message from some of the ladies who were at Sattley on Sunday. I am pretty sure, well hoping, my whole season next year sucks less than this one has so far, but especially ITT's. I don't know why I'm so fixated on them. I'm not really built for them, but there's something about them that's just raw. It's TOTALLY on me to do well. And, I'm so bad at them right now, that I must - MUST - get better. I just can't give up on something like that. I've met plenty of folks this year who have said to me "I used to race, but I quit because I sucked at it". I refuse to be one of them. There have been days this year, even within races, that I was seriously wanting to just chuck the whole thing, because I was just hating it. I get a few degrees of separation, and my mindset clears, and it's "what the hell was I thinking, wanting to quit". I got through flight school. It was hard, and I had to do it. I'm going to get through this, because it's hard, and I have to do it.

Valygrl, I wonder if I can wear an O2 bottle at Sattley next year?

valygrl, nice effort and keep working on the turnarounds. Just be careful. I used to say to people that if they wanted to try racing, try TTs because they are very safe. Now I keep reading about and seeing people crash at turnarounds. :eek: Better to be slow than on the ground, but I know that you can figure out how to do them better.

Hermes and Velo Diva, great racing and congratulations on getting to ride in "bear" jerseys for the next 12 months. If you do the 110+ tandem at nationals you'll have to work on your marginal gains. Turns out this guy who works at Boeing (and his partner) won the tandem TT and road race at Bend last year and he told me they are going to Ogden to defend their titles.

sarals, except for the gifted few (and I hate those people and you know who you are :D), it takes a while to get better at anything in this sport. Also you get to have years where you go backwards, like my year so far. All you can do is keep going if you really like the sport. People who quit because they weren't any good, never gave themselves the chance to become better.

I like TTs partly because you are racing against yourself. You can reasonably compare times from race-to-race at a particular course. Yes, weather conditions can affect your time greatly, but if you race on a particular course for a number of years, you can get a good sense of how you're progressing -- even if riding on a Shiv makes you go slower. ;) Also, I say this with the full realization that no matter how much you improve, you still end up comparing yourself to others. My happiness at going under an hour (58:30) in a 40 Km TT was tempered by the fact that I was still something like 8th out of 12 with that time. :o

Cleave, thanks! Beautifully said!

I forgot to congratulate Hermes and Velo Diva for the win on the tandem yesterday. It was impressive! Velo Diva was nothing less than awesome, as she always is, on that TT bike. And I got to ride in her category. That was a treat, let me tell you.

Yeah, Cleave, good years and bad years. At my age I can't afford too many more bad years. I can't afford to look back either, I need to just keep setting goals and moving forward. I had an exchange with Shovel the other day and I was lamenting the whole season and hinted I wanted to hang it up. I was thinking that way, too. Sattley changed my mind, because it refocused me on why I started this in the first place. I recalled that I had wanted to see what I could do, and I wanted to be a bike racer, to be able to race my bike. At Sattley, it was apparent that, even though right now I'm a back marker, the other masters ladies have accepted me, and they encourage me. That means a lot. Then, too, Heidi and I were taking a little cool down ride on our road bikes after the TT and we were talking about how we bike racers are somehow different, how you can always spot someone who races their bike by the way they ride it. Not the posers, but the active racers. It's a brutal sport, in so many ways, but to be only half way successful is so gratifying, and then to be accepted as a racer by others is an honor.

Next season will be better.

Nice, Hermes! Is there a picture somewhere?

Sara, people are driven by different things in this sport. Different motivators, different priorities, different passions. I think if you asked ten racers why they race you'd get at least five different answers besides enjoying the competition. Everybody enjoys that. Find what drives you to race your bike, then focus on it.

:thumb:

There was a photographer on the course who is posting photos to his website and he has not posted the tandems or the teams yet.

You do have that warmup photo... :)

Moved pic

I think when you're behind the wheel of the daddy, you can sit up as high as you like.

Finally.
 

No podium this weekend, but something I've been looking for since I started. I feel like I really, no-kidding, raced this weekend. Before I showed up and tried. This weekend was the real deal.

TT Saturday morning, 3.8 miles. I was running late, just got in a short warm-up but showed up at the line on time. I started out at higher watts than I have before, told myself to cool it but holding the power I had planned felt way too easy, so I let it creep up. I had forgotten to note the mileage on the Garmin at the beginning of the TT - hey, I'm still a Cat 5! - so I looked for the 1 km marker. There wasn't one, and I came around a bend and saw the finish line tent a few hundred meters ahead. I had enough power left to accelerate, catch another gear and accelerate again, and I was nowhere near knackered at the finish. Even so, I was about 20 watts higher than my last best.

Crit Saturday afternoon. I screwed this one up, for some reason let the group ride away when I didn't have to. I don't know what I was thinking...perhaps more accurately, I don't know whether I was thinking. Subconsciously avoiding riding in a bunch the first time since I broke my collarbone? I got pulled along with about five others when we were about to be lapped, but still got credit for the race.

Sunday morning road race. I had decided I wasn't going to get dropped this time regardless of the pace. For the first time, it worked. I moved up and back in the group, stayed out of the wind, took wheels, kept up with the surges, figured out where they were going to occur, stayed hydrated, and actually sprinted at the line. I missed the friggin' 1 km sign, or I would've had a better sprint. :rolleyes: All through the RR, I was wondering why it didn't feel so hard this time. The speeds were about the same as other road races I've been in, the surges were actually faster. We did two laps of a 15 mile circuit, with a 2-1/2 mile lead-in and lead-out for a total of 35 miles, and I could've maintained the pace for another lap...which is what the Master's and Cat 4s raced. (ETA: RR was 1:30, TSS 141, IF .97)

I still finished in the bottom third of the GC, but that wasn't the important thing. I raced rather than participated, and actually thought (the crit being a notable exception) while I was doing it.

Nice, Chuck.

Sounds like you had fun.

Boy, howdy! :D