2011: A Look Ahead

Alright, well first off, I guess this isn't really a look ahead since apparently this is my first week of the 2011 season. Basically, I just wanted to post my goals for the upcoming season and talk about my A races.

Goals:

1:16.5 kilo - I raised this up from my 1:15 kilo from last year, because quite frankly I think that was a little too optimistic.

Top 5 opening week and states - Self explanatory, should be doable.

Top 10 cat 4 road race - only 3 cat 5 races left. I can do this...

As for the A races, same as last year: opening weekend at the track and states. I'm also tempted to try racing the tour of the battenkill this year, but that's a bit of the opposite end of the spectrum from the training for the track. time will tell.

2010.50 - Part II: Season in review

I figure I should do something like this, so lets see. I'll start with my goals that I set in my 2010 Annual Training Plan:

1- 1:15 kilo

2- Top 10 Opening Weekend

3- Top 10 Cat 4 road race

So, how did we do? My best kilo was a 1:17.94, so there goes that one.

I was 6th overall at opening weekend. That's 1 and 1

Finally, well...I'm still a cat 5 on the road, so the last goal isn't even close to being passed.

In this light, my season was honestly pretty terrible. however, I still think all in all, this season ended well.

Here's the highlights:

-Fastest kilo at opening weekend

-6th overall at opening weekend

-3rd overall in the twilight track series

-4 2nd places at state championships (kilo, points, team sprint, omnium)

So all in all, i'm pleased and hope to continue to grow next season.

2010.50 - Gettin' ready for next season

Holy crap. As you might have noticed, I haven't been paying any attention to my training plan anymore, so it comes as quite a suprise that we're on week 50 now. tomorrow is week 51! In two weeks my 2010 season will be over! wow!

I've been working on doing some power testing and getting my ATP set up for next season. I'll post when the ATP is done, but here's how the power testing has been going:

Sunday: Did a graded threshold test today. Here's the setup: starting at 100W, increase by 20W every minute until the power level cannot be maintained. Looking at the data real quick, it looks like my LTHR is still around 175, with a FTP between 240 and 260W. One interesting trend that I noticed is that the final test levels became harder much quicker than the last time I tested. I wonder if this means I did not warm up as thoroughly as last time. Alternately, the last test I did used speed in 1mph increases instead of power, so maybe a 1mph increase is less intensive than a 20W increase. Here's the gconnect linky: http://connect.garmin.com/activity/56784834

hopefully I can do some different testing soon to help me get some better numbers.

2010.40-41: 8/30-9/12 (i'm rollin' on, just rollin' on)

well, if you haven't guessed now that my season is over, this blog is going to get pretty quiet. i'll see you in december. as for riding and/or training, here we go:

Week of 9/6:

Thursday: rode to roadworx (shop of the gods, they say) to order some parts for my powertap wheel. i don't know if i've mentioned this before, but i'm building up a powertap wheel. in case that wasn't obvious from the previous sentence. as for the ride, it was windy, and i felt slow. same old, same old. one interesting anecdote to add though: i rode past a building with two flagpoles, maybe 20 feet apart. one flag was pointed straight out from the wind, and the other was hanging straight down, seemingly without any wind. weird.

http://connect.garmin.com/activity/48424412

Wednesday: rode before work. felt sluggish again. i've been feeling that way a lot lately.

http://connect.garmin.com/activity/48424423

week of 8/30:

Friday: Rode with Kurt through the hurricane. We were hoping to stop at roadworx (the crown jewel of bike shops) so he could get fit on his new cannondale, but things didn't work out. instead, we did some hills and whatnot.

Time: 02:37:27

Distance: 40.30mi

Speed: 15.4/35.5mph

Cadence: 84/120rpm

HR: 141/185bpm

wednesday: rode with danny. we both kind of felt like crap.

http://connect.garmin.com/activity/47596132

Time: 01:30:12

Distance: 25.55 mi

Speed: 17.0 / 35.1mph
Cadence: N/A

HR: N/A

2010.37-39 Peak and Race weeks

Alright, so my adoring readers might have noticed a lack of posts lately. I've been away. I like to fine tune my form by not riding and instead gorging myself while on a cruise to alaska. I did ride the exercise bike on the ship 3 times. it was painful, but not in any good way. See the race report post for, well, my race report of state championships.

Looking at my garmin calendar, I did ride the day before states. so here's some data:

http://connect.garmin.com/activity/46782976

Time: 00:49:52

Distance: 14.71 mi

Speed: 17.7/35.6 mph

Cadence: 93/141 rpm

HR: 169/194 bpm

RACE: New York Track Cycling State Championships

Alright. Weather: warm to hot. not very windy to slightly windy. sunny. definitely sunny. Saturday: Managed to do the same as at opening weekend, which was spend so much time on my warmup gear (49x16) that I didn't warm up in my race gear (49x15) at all for the kilo. That's always a fun suprise trying to turn that over for the first time in the day.

Kilo: Started on the backstretch, which meant finishing on the homestretch. I felt like the start was good. I sat in turn 3 already, which i think might have been too early. Stood up again on the homestretch on the first lap to kick it up a little. had the usual trouble staying on the red line (what else is new?). I felt strong at the end, and ended up with second behind mike W, who i've been told has basically been training for that event and that event alone, so more power to him. he deserves it. http://connect.garmin.com/activity/46782968

Points: Don't really remember what happened anymore, maybe someone will post video. All i remember is Steve Marmo was really breaking my legs with the pace. He's a strong guy. He won it, I got second again. http://connect.garmin.com/activity/46782966

Win'n'out: not a state event, but still for the omnium. I tried to jump later than normal, and kept it up. first for me. http://connect.garmin.com/activity/46782961

Sunday: got to the track really early. rode in both gears, even put on the 50t chainring.

Flying 200's: wound up a little late, i think. took my own personal line, which is the opposite of everyone else's line. got 8th seed with a 13.454 or something. i didn't really care. http://connect.garmin.com/activity/46782958

1st sprint: 3-up against scott savory and andy da silva. andy tried to help me out, but i didn't even really try. scott just psyches me out way too much. he has more endurance, more sprint, and more experience/tactics, so how can i win? dumb luck. regardless, scott advanced. I also have to add in here that Karl showed up to race today. In his first sprint, he kilo'd to the win. and it was glorious.

1st sprint repechage: i think it was a 4 up with marmo being the main rival. i almost got it, but was half a bike behind marmo at the line. that ended my sprint.

Scratch: Karl and I couldn't figure out any tactics beforehand, so we decided to just wing it. it ended up being karl, steve and me rotating on the front (why did i feel the need to be there?) until i asked karl to push the pace at around 4 to go. at 2 to go i had the genius idea to try to jump off the front and try to suprise everyone. little did i know scott was right behind me. they all passed in turn 4 on the last lap, and i sat up to come in 6th out of 7. keep this in mind, as omnium points only go 5 deep. http://connect.garmin.com/activity/46782954

then there were more sprints.

then there was the team sprint. There was a small amount of drama regarding the teams, with harry and scott supposing to be on a team, then scott moving to a different team, siraaj not being sure if he'd race, me not being sure if i could make it friday, the whole race being moved to sunday, etc. eventually it was steve, mike mahesh, stephen smith on one team, siraaj, scott, anthony freeman on another, and karl, andy da silva and me on the third. scott's team went up against a cat 5 team, and we went up against steve. scott beat the cat 5's (suprise, suprise), and we beat steve, but we didn't know the times. in the end scott's team got first, we got second. the results just came out today, turns out we were only .05 off from them. i'm sorry, but that's bullshit, at least when they're timed with stopwatches. http://connect.garmin.com/activity/46782950

omnium: i was in the lead from the second race on, until the team sprint. scott savory ended up with the same number of points as me, and ended with the gold as he had more firsts. i got second again. that's 4 silvers for me, 4 golds for him. he certainly deserved it as he absolutely is the fastest cat 4, and i had more than ample chance to maintain my points. for the future, i'll try not to screw up so much.

RACE: Kissena Twilight Track Series 8/4

Well the forecast originally called for thunderstorms, but they cleared the radar in time to race. I took the train in this time, as karl was doing stuff that wasn't racing. I met a guy on the train going in that said his brother won the gold in rome in 1960 for the kilo. i assume he meant the olympics, but wikipedia does not agree. shrug. anyhow, got to jamaica, rode to the track in time. raced. here's a rundown:

Chapter 1: Unknown Tempo. Basically a tempo race at unknown distance. scott tried to break off the front at first, i bridged and tried to keep a two man break type deal. he gave up though, so i just kept off the front for the rest of the race. i just got lucky with the distance they decided on. another lap and i would have been toast. data:

http://connect.garmin.com/activity/43208901

Chapter 2: 4 lap scratch. somehow I managed to get myself at the front and then lead the entire scratch, until around turn 3 of the last lap. where i was promptly passed by just about everyone. siraaj was pretty firmly on my wheel, and despite my elbow flickingest, he stayed behind me. whatever. http://connect.garmin.com/activity/43208898

Chapter 3: Points race: almost took the first set of points, but siraaj pipped me at the line. nothing to write home about on the next two sprints. I think it was 5th and 5th for one point each. http://connect.garmin.com/activity/43208897

Thus ended the omnium. savory took lead, siraaj eked out 2nd, i sucked it up into 3rd.

Epilogue: A feature. Tailgunned until about 2 to go where I happened to have moved up the pack just as an attack went. I attacked, too. ended up passing attack the first, tried to hold it until the line, but prensky and savory passed me like i wasn't moving in turn 4 on the last lap. took 3rd though. at least i got that much. http://connect.garmin.com/activity/43208893

In conclusion: I raced. Didn't necessarily race tactically. word on the street is savory might do cat 4 track states. there goes my chances.