Might as well jump

The sharing of training logs via blogging amuses me on several levels. Sure, it is useful to read about what your peers and others are doing for training, and how it works out for them. That's the reason we do this, right? Or is it because we're all so proud of what we did that we cannot wait to share it? Blah, blah, blah, killer workouts, woe is me now, I'm so tired... Or maybe it's just that misery loves company, because everyone who reads this crap does more or less the same stuff themselves, so at least you get some reassurance that you aren't crazy and alone (be patient, that will happen eventually). Then the best of it is just like sitting around after a stage with your virtual teammates, recalling the day's adventures and laughing about all that happened. That's the best part of living the racing life; suffering out on the road and then heading back to your week's headquarters to chuckle about it. Since most of us only get to do that once or twice a year, if at all, the blog scene at least provides a bit of a surrogate team hotel.

Yesterday's 1.5 hours at Wells Ave concluded 37 hours on the bike in 16 days for me. Maybe this isn't huge, but I'm pretty tired. Even spread over a "normal" three weeks, this volume of training constitutes a pretty big block for me at this stage of my cycling career. So this week will be a recovery/consolidation week, with massage tonight and reduced volume for a few days. Most of this recent block's hours were at low/medium intensity, sort of like March in May. With my actual early spring base being more running focused, I felt I needed this to build some endurance and capacity to train harder in the coming month. It wasn't all soft-pedaling, as I worked (one lap of) the Sunapee road race, along with three training races (one each of Loudon, Wompatuck, and Wells) into the mix. There was also quite a bit of climbing included in the three 5+ hour days I managed to pull off (huh-huh). These gave me a chance to work on the twenty-thirty minute efforts that have been lacking in my training prior to this block.

BTW, for the sports fans who occasionally ask "what the hell is a training race anyway," think of it as an exhibition game. The only difference is that unlike stick and ball sports, we do these throughout the year, sort of like a scrimmage. These are great ways to train and work out your tactics, and if you do well you can claim that your training is really working, and if you ride like shit you can say that you weren't really trying, because it wasn't a "real" race. Around here (the Boston area) there are legions of so called bike racers who make a career out of the weekly training races and hardly ever venture out to anywhere else.

Where was I going with this post? Oh yeah, well, there are many ways to get your money's worth out of a training race. You can treat it like a real race, and try to win. After all, you don't condition yourself to make smart decisions by riding like an idiot. But, many of us are practical and say hey, this is training, of course I'm not just going to sit in and do nothing. These races are a great place to do intervals because the challenge of staying a few seconds off the front of a chasing pack can be just the motivation you need to dig deep. Should someone counter and stretch out the field, well, that ensures you won't take it too easy on the recovery blip.

Yesterday at Wells, with the "real" race of the weekend being 2.5 hours away in Maine, there was a pretty decent field assembled for the "A" race, including Chain to the Right and some of his teammates, such as the infamous Craig, whom I got to chat it up with for a while. I haven't been to Newton much at all the past few years, so I did not realize how many primes they were going to have. Chris Ryan, who has been helping to run BRC since way back when I was on the board gave a bunch of instructions at the start, but I couldn't hear a word he said. Once the race got under way, it didn't take too long to recall why Wells has lost its charm for me, as every few laps a car would get on the course, and I can't help but feel that someday the packs luck will run out and a major disaster will occur there. I know they try with the cops and marshalls, but I'm being realistic here.

Anyhow, I'm as dumb and crazy as most of the rest, so I raced hard anyway. Attacks in the first half of the forty lap event are usually futile, but this is for training, and with the frequent primes, being off the front might snag you a couple of bucks, donuts, or energy drink, so lots of riders try. I found myself, as I have at Wompatuck all year, going into Indurain-style diesel mode when at the front and letting riders jump off, with me not reacting and instead just keeping the tempo high and coming back to them slowly. At Wompatuck every week, I see rider after rider making violent jumps to either initiate or get across to a breakaway, but many times this initial burst leaves them wasted and unable to do anything once they sit back down. For me personally, since I'm somewhat of a rolleur anyway, it's more efficient to avoid the energy sapping burst and just roll onto the wheel. However, my jump and sprint suck pretty bad as it is, and never working on them ain't helping the situation. When the going gets *really* tough, such as when the pace is around 50 kph, you *have* to jump on the wheel quickly or you will die trying to cross.

So what is the point? After five laps or so I decided that this day at Newton would be spent working on my jump. I'd patrol the front, and when attacks went, I'd get up and try to close it quickly, regardless of how that might make me feel twenty seconds later. This proved to be fun, and with Newton contested on a wide road with attacks going up both sides, finding people to chase was easy. I made about four or five of these efforts, some of which resulted in dangling moves for a few laps. With about ten to go, some BRC dude on an old school Bianchi with downtube shifters (this may have been Bob Campbell, not sure) made an attempt to bridge to a small group, and I got on him. The three breakaways were dangling only about 50 meters ahead of us. Chris rang the bell and said "power gel prime for the pack," which at the time I though was weird, because this break was clearly within reach of us. After reading kette-rechts account, I'm guessing now that Gavin and company had slipped off already without my knowledge and were out of site. Anyhow, I timed my pull on the backside to make sure Bianchi guy had the front coming onto the front straight, and as we came into the sprint the three guys who'd been ahead capitulated and they all sat up. The pack was really bearing down on us from behind, so I decided to make this one pay and opened it up early with all I had. Well, I got the power gels, but later review of the data showed me just how pathetic my "sprint" is: 52 kph, which was 104 rpm in the 52x13. I won't win any Wompatucks with that.

After that I felt really drained. During the closing laps I just sat in because I was getting the chills. Well, turned out that was because the temps really were dropping as some very light raindrops crept into the area. I had no idea a break was up the road, but at two to go Chis said "9 guys up the road" and I could see a small group. Turned out that was only six guys trying to bridge, but the other three ended up in sight at one to go as the chasing six were absorbed. By then I'd recovered and felt like one more effort might be good to finish up the day, so I took the front and just did some hard pacemaking over the course of the final kilometer. Nobody challenged me so when the line came into view on the front straight I swung off early to let the sprint open up. Not a bad day.

Oh yeah, Michelle, you're right, FSA bearings suck. After just one year and maybe 5000k my bottom bracket is toast. MMMM, toast, time to eat and head to work. Thanks for reading.