10/20 Bubba 3 @ Bella Fontaine, Masters, 1st.

 

Wasn't going to race as I am trying to get a few good weeks of training in, but changed my mind and got my cornerstone workout in on Sat and figured I'd take some licks on Sunday. My Hamburg workout is usually less than 150 TSS but I was feeling great and went deep on Sat and it was a 200. Felt pretty good on Saturday afternoon but warming up Sunday I was definitely tired with heavy legs. I only got a 30 min warm up in which should have been longer to loosen up.

There were only five of us and a few I didn't know but my general plan was to sit in a bit if possible and try to make a move with a few laps to go. We started and it was immediately apparent how hard this was going to be. I sat in the first few laps but found I was scrubbing momentum in every turn riding wheels so I went to the front. Lap cards went at 5 which seemed like it was going to be a short race. I opened a few gaps on lap three and was a little surprised when each one was closed down, but sometime shortly after that it stuck and I was able to open things up. I was definitely loosening up a bit and able to go harder. In retrospect, ever lap was faster and my last lap was considerably faster. 

I was dangling 10s behind the leader of the SS race who was aware I was coming and going hard. I continued to close in on him and by the last lap decided I wanted to try to close it down. I caught him with a full head of steam the jog before the tricky pine section but there wasn't room to pass and right when we got into the pines we came upon a lapped rider and there was a little Nascar rubbing as I scrubbed all my speed trying not to crash into them from behind. I came unclipped, dabbed, and wasn't able to clip back in right away and the gap opened up. I made the effort to get back up to him but my legs were torched and gave out and I called it a day. Good racing on the last lap. The first few laps were close to 40 seconds slower than the last lap, which was a scorcher and I'm pretty happy about the effort. 

Going to train through a Vlasis and then get some rest!

10/13 Bubba 2 @ Creve Couer, Masters, 1st.

 

Did a quick practice at Kenrick on Thursday. Probably the least amount of CX prep I've done, ever, before the first race of the season. Kenrick was bumpy AF and I was hurting and wondering how bad Sunday would be. 

Ultra nice weather and the course was pretty much fully laid out by 945, which was great. Got in a good warm up and was ready to roll. After a week of being back on the no booze train and a few good nights of sleep I was wicked fired up. 

Couple new faces on the line. We started 15 seconds behind a large group of  (8?) SS riders including Kukla. I got a good jump on the long uphill paved section only to be passed by Jamey at the top, who dropped into the first turn before me. He took a wide line on the next turn and I went around him. I was happy to pick the clear lines and trying to ride within my limits.

We hit the pavement and I wasn't going to lead out the group so I sat up a bit and Jamey caught me off guard with a massive attack. I was the only one to respond and bridged up to him just before the grass. It was full gas and there was going to be enough of that on a fairly non technical course that I started to worry a bit. Going around the tree after  the sweeping left hander that ended up being almost as fun as riding mtbs, Jamey went down and I went around him. I put a pretty decent gap into him and the chasers right away but he made another huge push on the pavement and probably got to within 5 seconds of me.  After that, I was able to extend my lead by 5 seconds or so every lap to take the lead with really no mistakes and feeling pretty good, aside from some tightness in the back and hips. 

Post race my brother told me I made it to within 23 seconds of Kukla before he extended it to 40 seconds or so for the rest of the race until he started to slow up on the last few laps of so. 

All in all I felt good about the race. Little worried about the lower than average NP but the speed was good and there was a fair amount of coasting so I'm hoping this was more due to efficiency than fitness. We'll see.