Tradezone Criterium Race Feb 15, 2009

Well, here it goes. I ventured out to Upper Marlboro, MD this morning for my first ever cycling race. The course is approximately a 1.3 mile loop in an industrial park. I was entered in the C race (cat 4/5). It’s the only race I can enter since you have to complete 10 mass start races before you can upgrade to cat 4. Bottom line, you want to upgrade as quickly as possible. The cat 5 races are a real crapshoot. You have a mix of strong riders (getting into cycling), beginners and one time racers, all age ranges.

Course (click to enlarge):


As I was registering, I hear, “Hey, Pete”. What the heck? It’s Jenn Brown! She was managing the registration tent for the Bike Dr crew. It was great to catch up with her after the race

I really didn’t have any expectations. I just wanted to make sure I didn’t crash. Do some hard pushes, get some experience riding in the pack and build some fitness. My legs felt pretty good (good sign) even after doing a solid 1.75 hr threshold workout Saturday morning. I was able to get in a quick warm-up while doing 3 loops on the course before we started. With a NNW wind on the backstretch up a slight incline, I sort of figured that this may be the best place to start a break. It would be very, very difficult to get out of sight from the group (40-50 riders) on this course. There are only 3 turns on the loop. None of which are a big deal to carry speed through. After the third turn, you head down a slight downhill where it flattens at the finish. I think there were at least 3 or 4 times where guys attacked right before the downhill. I couldn’t quite figure that one out. A lot of work for nothing. You can’t outrun the group going downhill.

The cool thing about getting outside your comfort zone is that you get to put yourself in some innocent, unaware and occasionally ignorant positions. You see, I pinned my number on in the car and I knew it went on the back, slightly on the right so someone counting #’s at the finish line can read your number. Well, stupid me. I pinned the number upside down and right before the race started I hear, “hold on. I need to fix a number!” That would be the race official as he’s standing behind me fixing my number. Hey everyone, look at the NOOB! So, everyone had to wait about a minute until he re-pinned my number. I don’t know what is going on in my head today. I went to the grocery store today and realized as I was walking into the store that I had my slippers on!


Once the race started, I just decided I’d stay in the top 10-15 for the entire race. It really wasn’t all that difficult to hold my position. There were a few guys riding erratic. I made a mental note to steer clear of those. I definitely need to get used to surging for 5-20 seconds at a time, but that fitness will come.

After 3 laps, I thought I’d test the legs and take a flyer on the slightly uphill backstretch into the wind (Power: ~5 mins at 350avg/392np). Maybe someone would come with me? That didn’t happen. I opened up about a 75 yard gap to the group, but I knew I wasn’t going to go for 10+ laps solo, so I coasted the downhill section to the finish line and got back to my position in the top 10-15. It was fairly uneventful after that. The big teams (ncvc, dcvelo, etc.) with numbers, didn’t really seem to have any strategy. They were all spread out. I decided I would just buy my time, stay smooth and relaxed. It became evident that nobody was going to go for a real break. A few riders would attack and gain a couple of seconds, but nobody attacked with any conviction.

I did find myself in one awkward position. I was sitting maybe 15 when a guy came by on my left pulling up on the backstretch. I jumped on his wheel only to get out of the wind a bit more. I’m not really sure what he was thinking. He proceeded to try and ride away from the group without an initial attack. Hmm, pretty tough to ride the whole group off your wheel. When I looked back, the pack was only a few seconds behind. He started flicking his elbow to pull through, but I wasn’t going to rocket by him. He’d totally blown. I wasn’t about to go on a break with this guy.

Here it is; the final lap. I had already convinced myself I was going to punch it hard shortly after the first turn on the backstretch. What the hell!? I’d dropped back to about 15 or 20. The wind was coming slightly from the front left, so I planned to ride up the right side. I gradually built my speed and once I got close to the lead guy, I hit it hard. I gave a quick peek back after 20 seconds and I was all alone. Cool, I guess? I just tried to drill it as hard as I could until the finish (2.5 minutes @ 436w avg). I definitely wanted to test myself. Sadly, I was caught about 150 feet from the line by 4-6 riders, just nipping me at the line. I knew I needed some time going into the downhill stretch. I just didn’t have enough today. I think I sort of screwed up. Once they caught me, I grabbed a wheel, but they all sort of let up at the same time. I thought, holy crap! Do we have another lap to go? I remember Flanagan mentioning that he did that one time and I thought I’d just done it. Nope that was it. Dang! I think those guys were gassed trying to catch me. I should have sprinted as hard as I could right when they caught me.

As we were coasting along afterward doing a warm down loop, it made me feel a little better when a few guys rolled by and said that it was a really good shot. An evo rider came up and we chatted for a bit. Nice, guy. I can’t remember his name. He said he tried to bridge solo but he couldn’t catch me and was swallowed up. I imagine he pulled that train close to me. I guess this is where cycling tactics can get a little tricky. It appears everyone was strung out. The group never did catch me. I think I finished 6 or 7? I couldn’t really tell where the line was since it was just a piece of tape across the road.


That’s a wrap. Good time. I learned some good things and gained some experience. I’ll be hitting it again next Sunday.

Power #’s:
Race:
Duration: 48:28
Work: 756 kJ
TSS: 70.4 (intensity factor 0.933)
Norm Power: 308
VI: 1.19
Distance: 18.98 mi
Min Max Avg
Power: 0 958 260 watts
Heart Rate: 12 192 156 bpm
Cadence: 36 141 92 rpm
Speed: 8.1 33.1 23.5 mph
Pace 1:49 7:26 2:33 min/mi
Hub Torque: 0 388 75 lb-in
Crank Torque: 0 1352 238 lb-in

What's happening

I have my blog set up so that I can now send updates via email. No more having to log in all of the time to update. You will just have to forgive spelling errors. So, I'm using this opportunity while waiting for the subway to take me home.



We survived inaguration. We didn't make it down to the Mall. I think we've become a bit desynthesized to washington politics. Quite honestly, it sort of depressing how politics work around here. I don't know. Maybe I need to pay more attention and be more active. Just don't have time. Oops at my exit. Sign off

Ouch!!! My Eye!!

Ok, I hate to admit this, but I did something really stupid Sunday night right before I went to bed. I decided to stretch a bit before going to bed. I grabbed my trusty stretch band and started to stretch my hamstrings.

Here's a sample photo of the stretch:


Unlike this photo, I like to do this on with my back flat on the floor and my legs extended up. Well, I got a little distracted and wasn't paying attention. The band slipped off my foot and shot back only to nail me perfectly in the right eye. I screamed like a little girl and held my eye. I seriously thought my eyeball was hanging out of its socket. It swelled up and my eye was all bloodshot. I awoke Monday morning and decided it may be a good idea to go the eye dr. Glad I did b/c I did a little more damage than I thought. I have what the dr called "Hyphema". Bascially, blood in the eye. Hopefully some rest and some prescription eye drops will do the trick and heal everything up. I've got to go back to the dr for one more test on Friday to make sure my retina is all in tack. My vision is ok, just blurry as well as it feels like I have sandpaper in my eye. Gee, what a stupid move!

My first ride on my new rollers- awesome

A little goofy, but figured I'd share my maiden voyage with my new e-motion rollers. These things are incredible. They really simulate riding on the open road. Since I spend so much time training indoors, I figured it would be great tool to have. Check out the short video clip Igda shot: HERE


Poor Leo. Igda loves to dress him up.

Here's a couple of comments I received from some friend's:

1) You look like some bad Euro cyclist from the 70s w/ that outfit.

2) Yea, where's your shirt?
It has to be possible to fall, not ride off, but lose control like a helicopter without a tail prop, start wobbling out of control, until the foot goes down.

3) Yes! That is awesome. I love the video. The music from the movie you are watching sounds so dramatic; it is quite fitting for your first attempt on rollers. I hope the dog learns to stay away. I have a feeling it could do some damage if it got in your way.

Here was my retort:

Did you not get the memo? Retro is in!!! Being too lazy to swap out your dress socks before you ride is totally allowed. Headbands are just totally cool, just not in public. About a month ago I started going sans top while riding indoors. Honestly, it’s the best move I ever made. When I crank the fan up, I feel like I’m able to stay much cooler. Try it. You’ll be topless from here on out. Now only if I can get Igda to ride topless, too.

I had a couple of close calls last night when I let my mind wander, but since it has the bumpers, I was quick enough to unclip before I went sailing in the air. I did practice hitting the bumpers a bit so I’d get a better feel for stabilizing my handling after that. But, really, I think they are awfully hard to fall off of.

Training Log

I recently added a link which can be found under “My Training Diary”- Trainingpeaks.  If you’re interested in seeing what I’m up to, feel free to check it out.  Once on the summary page you can click to see actual workouts for any given week.  It’s a nice tool to keep track of my training as well as being able to communicate with my coach.

 

American Zofingen Oct 12, 2008

Wow, what a way to end the year. My good friend and training partner, Ted Waugh, conned me into this race. It's a grueling Duathlon (5 mile trail run / 85 mile bike / 15 mile trail run) up in New Paltz, NY. I ended the year very pleased. I finished 8th Overall and 1st in my Age Group.

Here are the results: Overall

Age Group




Here's a quick write up I sent out:

Oh yeah, a lot of junk food for me on the way home. Taco Bell, Dunkin Donuts, Doritos, Pop Tarts, Mountain Dew, etc. It was a perfect weather day. With the leaves changing in the Catskill Mountains country, you couldn't have asked for a more scenic day.

Ted crushed me on the first run by like 3 minutes and kept up with the big boys. There were a bunch of fit looking dudes toeing the line. I was a little nervous, thinking “what the hell did I get myself into”. I took it fairly easy (like you really could on the climbs. They were brutal) on the first run just trying to get my bearings for what I’d be in for with the last 15 miles. Darn near even split each bike loop. My NP for each loop was 255 / 255 / 253. I didn’t run fast enough to get out with the fast bikers and once I passed 5-6 guys early on in the bike, I rode in no man’s land until midway through the 3rd loop when I ended up passing another 4-5 guys and caught Ted about 1 mile from the finish. It was pretty cool. We rode back down the packed gravel road to transition together chatting about how the hell we were going to run another 3 loops. Very weird that we ended up in T2 together, again. This is becoming a routine!

Ted held up a bit leaving transition to wait for me. We figured it would be a good plan to run together for motivation. I had to stop and pee before the first big climb and although Ted slowed, I couldn’t quite close the gap during the first loop. I think he was about 30 seconds up on me, but since it was a trail run, unless the runner was within 10 seconds of you, you pretty much didn’t know where any other competitors were.

After I passed through the Pavilion (a really unique aide station setup where they had a table filled with gels, Endurolytes, water, Heed, coke & Redbull. You just grabbed whatever you needed), the announcer said I was in 8th. I was like holy crap. I couldn’t believe it. I slowly caught back up to Ted on the 2nd loop and kept the motivation going. There wasn’t a lot of chatter since we both were on the verge of cracking, but it went along way having company out there to keep us both pushing forward. I was relegated to power walking the climbs. There was no way to actually run up the climbs. Every muscle from waist down was screaming mercy at any hard effort. I actually think the downhills hurt more than the climbs. The pounding was unrelenting.

I was right behind Ted when he clipped a root and went down on one of the climbs midway through the 2nd loop. Thankfully, he was uninjured. It’s at this point that Ted hit a bad spot for a few minutes and I gained a few minutes. I hit lap 3 in 7th place, what the hell? I just tried not to stop and kept power walking the steep, rocky climbs. I kept thinking Ted was going to catch up at any moment. With about 1.5 miles to go, I passed by 5 horseback riders on the trail and they said “runner back” as I approached so I wouldn’t startle the horses. Well, about 15 seconds after I pass them, I hear “runner back”. CRAP! Someone is closing on me. Maybe it’s Ted? I look back and it’s not Ted, but it is this young buck who passed me early in Lap 1, but bonked shortly after passing me and I re-passed.

I really didn’t know what I had left, but figured I’d try to give him a fight to the line. I gradually picked up the pace and tried to put in a couple of surges through various parts of the trail. I came out of the woods to a little flat section and really picked up the pace, but David (which I now know his name) crept up alongside of me. I looked at him and said, “damn, I can’t believe you’re going to make me try to sprint this last little uphill section to the line!” He said, “we can cross the line together.” We chuckled and I told him “No, one of us has to go for it”, but he didn’t move so I put in a little surge. He dropped behind me, but with about 100 yards to go he came storming by me and nipped me by 6 seconds as I very nearly stumbled up the steps to the pavilion where the finish line was. Good kid. Turns out he was 20 years old and was in first place after the first run in a smoking time of 33 minutes. After the race, we chatted and he said this was his first try at a long distance event. Boy, that kid has some potential.

After a couple of minutes, I see Ted approaching the Pavilion. He made it! But, I have to give him a little grief because he had a few more scrapes and dirt on the uniform than when I last saw him! It turns out Ted was starting to gain back some time on me during the last loop after he was able to get things back on track during his low spot. I think races where you have to dust yourself off, pull your boot straps up and get back after it are some of the most rewarding experiences. Great race, Ted! It was awesome to challenge each other along the way and who knew we’d be seeing so much of each other?

Here's Power Profile (click to enlarge):




















Ted- quick bike comparison of Savageman to Amzof from powermeter

Amzof: TSS= 301 IF=.794 Normalized Power= 254 AVG= 226 VI=1.12 AVG speed=17.7mph Work=3,891kj

SM: TSS= 225 IF= .864 Normalized Power= 272 AVG: 244 VI=1.12 AVG speed= 18.6 Work= 2640kj

Interesting to look at Placid:

Placid: TSS=273 IF=.71 Normalized Power= 223 VI= 1.09 Avg speed=20.7mph Work 4,024kj

Although I think it’s hard to compare apples to apples since the distances are different (along with the 5 mile run beforehand) Amzof did produce a much higher TSS, it appears that it was only due to the extended duration. It is interesting to see the IF (intensity factor) was much higher at SM. For me, I never really felt like I went in the red zone during Amzof on any climb, very unlike SM. From a nutrition perspective, Amzof requires about the same nutrition plan as an IM based on the kj burned.

And if you doubt which is harder, here’s some interesting stats:
Peak 5 minutes
SM 361
AZ 313

Peak 10 minutes
SM 338
AZ 301

Peak 20 minutes
SM 308
AZ 284

Peak 30 minutes
SM 299
AZ 275

Peak 60 minutes
SM 287
AZ 265

Savageman -- Half Ironman Sept 21, 2008

Yee-hooo! I'm back and ready to rumble for Savageman #2. After a little layoff from Placid, I've had a pretty intense 6 week block of training leading up to Savageman (SM). I was feeling pretty good going into the day. Well rested and ready for battle.

Igda and I got up on Saturday and stayed at a home very near the race site. Thanks again Kyle for the hook up. The forecast was predicting a perfect day, low 70's and sunny! Deep Creek has to rank up there with one of the most perfect, beautiful venues for a race.

Dr. Evil himself (Kyle Yost- course architect, visionary & madman)



My plan going in was to cruise the swim, nothing hard. Let it all hang out on the bike and survive the run. Sean gave me the best advice as I was toying with the idea of going for it on the bike. He said earlier in the week, "There's no glory in racing in zone 3!" That's all I needed to hear to fully convince myself that I needed to go for it on the bike.

Swim:



We had a slight delay due to the fog, but before you knew it, we were on our way. I started fairly quick and then just got into a rhythm. After about 500 meters, I notice this guy to my right swimming about the same pace as me. We're right next to each other. As I'm breathing to my right, I notice he has on a Zoot wetsuit. Hmmm, interesting. Sean has a Zoot suit, too. After a couple more breaths, I notice his race number on his swim cap. It's one off from mine. Sweet, it is Sean. I figure, what the hell, we're swimming about the same pace so I drop back and get right behind him to take advantage of the draft. I can honestly say that I followed Sean's feet the rest of the way home. It was beautiful! I tried to avoid slapping his feet, but I will admit I tickled his toes on more than one occasion. Thanks for the tow, Sean! I kindly thanked him as we ran to T1.

Bike:
Start of the bike:


From the get go, I started out hard. I was either going to have a great bike split or I was going to go down in flames. It was a gamble. I blew through the first part of course and entered Westernport feeling good. Now, the real pain was about to commence. I shed my vest just before The Wall and followed Brady up the climb. I saw Brady take a stumble at The Wall, but I had no time to doubt my ability to get up the steep ascent. I charged up with everything I had. I made it! Brick #2 complete. Now, 7 more miles of climbing to go before a reprieve.

"THE WALL"



Here are some good youtube videos Igda got (click on to launch link):
1. Me
2. Funny one
3. Leaders
4. Bad Fall
5. My buddy Ted

For the rest of the ride, I just tried to keep drilling it and hit the power #'s I knew I could hold. I just tried to stay in the here and now and not worry about how I was going to hold up on the run. When I came to the Killer Miller climb, it was brutal. I slugged my way up the climb and got a few cheers from Kyle and Laura as I reached the top. I asked how far Brady was up the road and they said about a minute or so. Brady had re-passed me on the Big Savage climb, but I was now going to use him as my carrot to chase down.

Just after "Killer Miller Climb"




I really pushed the last 10 miles. Finally, I caught a glimpse of Brady up the road. It was what I needed. About two miles from the finish, I finally caught him. I rolled into transition and was so focused on wrapping up the bike strong that I forgot to get my feet out of my shoes before transition. Well, so much for a flying dismount. I stopped, unclipped and hobbled over to my rack with my shoes on. Michael and Ken came over to offer some encouragement as I was putting my running shoes on. Here comes the run. A huge question mark in my mind was about to be answered! Would I have the legs to put together a decent run??
Power Profile (click to enlarge):


Run:
Yikes...my hip flexors were cursing me as I worked my way out on the run. Oh, boy. This is going to be rough. My only mantra was "Don't Walk!!!" I knew my bike split was around 3 hrs, so I was hoping that bought me enough time to just run steady. I had no idea how far back anyone was in my AG but I felt if I could keep the legs moving, someone was going to have to run really fast to catch me.

Brady was off like a bolt of lightning. There was another fellow heading out in the 30-34 AG right in front of me. I figured I'd just use him to pace off of and stick with him. I managed to keep up with him for the first loop, just barely staying in contact up that painful fire road climb. I was a little nervous, I saw Ted and figured he was about 5-6 minutes behind. Although he started 7 minutes behind me, I desperately wanted to make sure he didn't catch me. I thought if I could hold him off, I'd be in good shape. Loop 1 over, thank god!

I knew I was going to have to go deep into the pain cave on lap 2. My rabbit was still in front of me as we hit the climb up through the camp ground. He ended up slowing to walk and I passed him. I hollered at him to "keep it going", but he was gassed. I just kept repeating, "Don't stop!" I saw Sean as I exited the campground and he was entering. Ok, he seems to be gaining on me. He looked pretty good. I put in a pretty good effort to get to the fire road climb. Once there, I just knew I had to get to the top as quick as possible, but it wasn't easy. I had to alternate between power walking and jogging. I still wasn't sure how far back my chasers were, but I knew I needed to finish strong. I saw Ted midway down the fire road and Sean at the base as I exited. Ok, time to bring it home! Man, was I happy to wrap this sucker up. I finished in 5:27:11. 11th overall male and 1st in 35-39 AG. Wow! What a day. It was a big 30 minute PR for me from last year's race. After the race, I came to find out the that the 2nd place AGper and Sean (3rd) were closing the gap throughout the run. Damn glad they ran out of real estate!

That's a wrap. An absolutely amazing, challenging and fun race!
Sharing War Stories with the crew post race:


Igda & I:

**It was also rewarding to be able to raise some money for the Joanna Nicolay Melanoma Foundation. Thank you to all who donated in my fundraising effort! A great cause to support.