Time Trial'n

So that was cool! Wait, let me back up. Somehow Excel Man and I got to throwing smack back and forth early last week about this Time Trial today. A little over 9 miles, supposed to be 15k - pancake flat, usually a little wind - anyway, Excel Man steps up and says how he's gonna crush me at this time trial.

Then, his wife, GEL gets into the smakadge picture. I wish I had a shot of it other than on my phone, which is not easily transferable to blog land, but she puts a poster on the ramp of my lawn equipment trailer with the words, "Beat Bigun" on it! Yea, a friggin poster! I laughed my ass off - granted it was boiling hot already, but it made my morning. That was a good one, GEL.

I get there at around 5pm for a 6:30 start - a little out of place since this was my first TT - and I get signed in. Since I'm new, I'm the 5th one to go - 42 folks there total - with 30 second intervals. I get the steed ready and off I go for a 9 mile warm up of the route. Wait, let me back up. Excel Man shows up just before I leave for my warm up, so figure I'll be a good sport and see if he wants to warm up with me. "No", he says, he's only going to warm-up about 3 miles max. Kinda wimpy warm up if you ask me, but since no one ever does, I do my route recon. The little yellow bike to the left is my steed, BTW...Excel Man rides that blue Trek below...

Nice cross wind in the beginning, glad I have the wheel cover. Then it's 2.5 miles or so of wind in your back. NICE. Crank it here. Turn around has some sand in it, so be careful. Then it's into the wind almost all the way back, until that short area with the cross wind. Road condition is newly paved. Not a closed course, but the cars are giving us the whole lane when they can. Good people.

I get back, and BS with Excel Man for a while. The RD on the PA says, "5 minutes" - wow, that went fast. I high-tail it over to the start line with 30 seconds to go for my turn. Gees! Start in the wrong gear, of course - but it was neat having someone hold me up and give me a little push. Probably hurt himself. So now I'm off.


The graph tells the tale pretty well. You can pretty much see the "with the wind, against the wind" parts of the course. One of the scary things for me was how quickly I hit the red line. Man, before I knew it I looked down and had the HR in the high 170's. But, I wasn't going to let Excel Man beat me, so I thought that I'll just run it here until I puke. I didn't puke - I hate puking. But I did take the "safety tabs" off.

My official time was 23:15 - that aught to put me at 23.92 MPH - I really tried to hang on to 24mph on my Garmin - I just didn't have the juice left. Gives me something to shoot for though, and soon they are running a two lap TT for 30k - which I'll do. The winner of this thing came in really close to 20 minutes, or 27.8 mph.

Results are now posted - Official time was 23:17 for a speed of 23.88mph-

Oh, and how did Excel Man do, you ask? Lets just say that his time was a minute or so longer than mine (exactly a minute, to the second!). He did PR over his last effort here, so he's got that to feel good about. At least.

One last thing - a rant if you will. I go screaming past this guy who started at least 1:30 head of me - well, I was screaming, I didn't really go by him all that quickly, but I passed him, right. With about 3 miles to go. I go around a bend, and now the sun is right so I can see a shadow behind me - the DUDE is drafting me! Big time. I yell back, in between breaths, "NO DRAFTING!" and I notice he drops back about a foot. So what happens? You know what happend! In the last 200 yards, the shithead passes me (looking at the results, it had to be Racer #2). Comes right off my wheel and passes me at the finish line. As he goes by, I say to him, "You're not really gonna pass me after sucking my wheel at the finish, are you?" - no word from him - what.a.jerk.

Curt (Excel Man) and I hung around to see the final folks finish - the fastest one's in fact, and then for the RD's to announce the winners. Made for a late day, but it really was a good time and a great workout. My only lesson learned - push harder longer.