The C-Blog

Two weeks ago was the individual time trial championships at Lake Los Angeles. Yesterday, it was the team time trial championships. Instead of riding by themselves, cyclists enter as 2-man or 4-man teams. Categories were based on age.

Having had some fun in the ITT, in spite of dropping my chain 3 times, and wanting to redeem myself because of just that, I managed to convince a co-worker–and friend–to ride with me. He is a triathlete and new to the whole road-racing scene. We entered the 70+ category (outside of the “open” category, the youngest and fastest).

Prior to Saturday, we met on two separate occasions to go over the details and practice a bit. This would prove to be a big help.

I won’t bore you with the details of the ride but will cut to the chase. We came in fifth (out of 5 in our category LOL) with a time of 56:29. I was greatly encouraged by this for a couple reasons.

First, 56 minutes is about where I figure my solo time would have been if I had not dropped my chain. Getting the 56 in the Team event affirmed this.

Second, my partner, being new to the sport, had scored a 1:01 on his individual TT while I still beat him, even after dropping my chain. So our abilities weren’t exactly matched. I figure I probably could have gotten a 54-minute result (or close to it) with someone at my own level, putting us in 4th or 3rd spot. This was apparent during the ride. I would rest and recover on his wheel while he set the pace. Then, as I pulled through, I easily increased our speed 2-3mph (slowly so as not to gap and drop him). I would often look back to make sure he was still there. My pulls were substantially longer than his, as well. When I did finally motion for him to pull through so I could rest a bit, our speed would drop back down. I figure this slowing resulted in a 1- to 2-minute penalty.

Third, on the home-stretch of the course, we were passed by two 4-man teams who had just started (one was an Amgen Master’s team–big dogs in our little sport). They blew by with about 2-3 miles to go on the slightly uphill section. My partner began the last pull as we passed the 1-mile to go sign. As I drifted back behind him, I said, “When I pull through, get ready to go hard.” I anticipated this last mile would take a little over 2-minutes to complete. We both should be able to “go anaerobic” and exceed our thresholds for that duration. As my partner pulled off his pull, I came through. I got to the front, gave him a second to tuck into my draft, checked to make sure he was there, and started increasing the speed. I was pushing this section faster than when were on it the first time through. Soon, with about a quarter-mile to go, I began catching the two 4-man teams who had passed us. As we went up the last little rise, I noticed my partner was starting to gap, so I stood and slowed a bit, but we both were still passing these teams. We ended up getting to the finish line 5-10 seconds before they did (even though they were just starting out and not stopping here).

Even though we didn’t score better, I was greatly encouraged with my form. I was able to practice the skill of leading out a teammate and protecting him from the wind, all while not causing him to blow up: I helped him score 5-mintes faster than his individual time. And I had great fun. It would be nice if I had my own TT gear and could incorporate this type of riding regularly into my training.