Testing Tales of the Time Trial

On July 2, 2010 I competed in my first time trial since my 7th place finish in the State Time Trial in 1997 (I placed 3rd in 1996). It was a 15 mile event at the Bud Harris Cycling Track in Pittsburgh, and I finished with a time of 36:34.  On August 20 of 2010 I did another 15 mile time trial and finished that one in 35:06, one minute twenty-eight seconds faster.  Good improvement.

Exactly one year later, on July 1, 2011, I once again raced in a 15 mile time trial, and finished with a time of 34:31 (26.07 MPH average speed), two minutes three seconds faster than the 7/2/10 race and one minute fifteen seconds faster than the 8/20/10 race.  Much, much better improvement.  I was very happy with that result and time.  It shows that I'm on the right track but there's still room for improvement.

With that said, it all fell apart last night, July 15, 2011, at the 20 mile time trial.  Going into the event I was feeling a little tired already from mowing a hilly lawn and then climbing up and down a ladder painting walls, but I was feeling up to the challenge.  However, just a few miles into the race I knew it was all over for me.  My legs felt like I was churning thick butter with them... slow and laboring.  I tried to fight through it thinking I'd come around, but it wasn't to be.  At the 15 mile mark I saw that I was considerably slower than my time at the 15 mile race just two weeks earlier.  People I passed at that race were now passing me.  I did what I could and gave it everything I had for the last 5 miles, and ended with a time of 48:09, good enough for 8th place in the Men's Open.  Blah... completely empty.

Today, the day after, I'm still feeling the effects... sore legs, sore shoulders, sore back, and all around tiredness.  Whew, time to regroup and put it back together.  In two weeks is another time trial, the big one, twenty five miles, which I did last year in a time of 57:09, a 26.2 MPH average speed.  My head believes I can beat that time, I just hope my legs do too.

And kudos to my great teammates for their awesome results in last night's race too!!!

Deflated at the Hilly Billy

In my last post I told of my training for an upcoming race, the 70 mile Hilly Billy Roubaix, and how I hurt my back bad in that particular training ride.  Well two weeks went by between that injury and the race, and with a lot of chiropractic therapy, ice, and stretching, I went into that race as close to 100% as I could get.  I was feeling very good.  My back wasn't hurting or bothering me at all and I felt pretty comfortable with my fitness.  I was also on a high from just being at the race.  I was really excited just to be there as I knew it was going to be a lot of fun.

So... short long story short, by the time the whistle blew for the start to around 16 miles into the 70 mile event, I had five flat rear tires!  I had two spare inner tubes and a patch kit, but that wasn't enough on these harsh, horrible roads, at least for me.  I can't even recall at what mile markers I had the first four flats, but on the fourth flat the "sag wagon" rolled up behind me (the sag wagon is a vehicle that tails the race and picks up people who can't finish).  I asked the driver, "I'm the last person on the course now, huh?"  He replied, "Yup."  My heart sank some and the last of my imputus was about gone.  I got that flat fixed and he followed me and as I was going up another dirt climb my rear tire was going mushy again.  Flat #5.  At that point the driver of the sag wagon, Jeff Gernert, and I fiddled around with the tire a bit and then decided it was a lost cause.  He then proceeded to put my bike in the back and handed me a beer and we drove off.

I was eventually handed off to Rick Plowman and his dad for a ride back to the start/finish line (Rick was also out of the race due to a nasty crash which required stitches in his knee).  I cleaned up, put on my happy face (a competitor never wants a DNF by his/her name!), and eventually made my way to the 100 pizzas and two kegs of beer waiting for all the participants.

I was sad that I didn't get to experience the full glory of the Hilly Billy but what I did get to taste made me hungry for the full plate next year (and the post race festivities were quite a treat too!).  I still had a blast despite my flat tires.  As this WAS my first attempt at a race on dirt let alone the craziness of the Hilly Billy, I had some lessons to learn, which I did.  I am truly looking forward to it next year!

(For a full gallery of photos, visit Fred Jordan Photography.)

A Bump In The Road

Last week, June 4th through the 11th, was quite frustrating for me.  There is a race coming up on June 25 call the Hilly Billy Roubaix.  This race is 70 miles on some of roughest, dirtiest, gnarliest, roads northern WV and southwest PA has to offer.  It's so rough that it's suggested that you leave your road racing bike at home and instead bring your cyclocross bike to the race instead (a cyclocross bike is a road bike set up and designed to be ridden on roads and terrain just like this).  And it just so happens that I just got a cyclocross bike, actually it's a "team hand-me-down" as I'm the third person on the team to be using it, but it is a nice bike nonetheless.

I was stoked to be able to do this race with this bike, so on June 4th I took it out for a 50 mile training ride on the harshest roads I could find around where I live.  And I sure did find some good ones too.  I was having a blast, out in the middle of who-knows-where on these beautiful dirt/gravel roads, with a little pavement here and there getting to other dirt roads.

At twenty-five miles into my ride, I was going down a hill in the Bethany, WV area when I hit a bump in the road.  Not a pothole where you "fall" down into it, but a bump, where you "pop" up over it.  Well I hit that bump and it sent a painful jolt right up my spine that settled in my lower lumber area.  Ohhhh that crazy hurt.  And I had twenty-five miles to get back home.  Needless to say, my dirt road excursion was over.  I had to find the smoothest, shortest route to soft pedal home.

The following Monday I was in my chiropractor's office and could barely get on and off his table.  My midline was nice and straight until it got to by bellybutton where it took an angle to the left.  I was way out of alignment.  I was at his office three times to get this fixed and was stretching and laying on bags of ice in the evenings.  And to add insult to the injury, I didn't even look at my bike let alone ride it.  It was a loooong week.

But yesterday, the 13th, my last visit to the chiropractor, was all good news.  I was feeling great, he didn't find any mis-alignments, and he gave me the "all-clear" to get back on my bike and start training again.  He figured that I was starting to have alignment issues prior to that Saturday ride, and that bump was the straw that broke the... rider's back.

So now I'm back at it, had a great, hard ride today where my legs felt great but my lungs felt like they were two sizes too small, but they'll come around.  And now I'm looking forward to the party that is... the Hilly Billy.

Racing to Dizzying Heights - Tour of Tucker County

Every 4th of July weekend in the mid/late 90's, I used to go camping/cycling with my friends Mark Hess, Ron Lutz, Dan Chew, and Warren Delraso at the Horseshoe Campground in Tucker County, WV.  I've grown to love that area and have some great memories from those days.  So when I found out about a race on May 28, 2011 in that exact same area where I used to camp with my buds, I just had to do it.

The Tour of Tucker County is billed as "Voted as one of the Top 10 Hardest Race Courses in America by VeloNews Magazine".  Knowing the area, I can see how it was voted as such.  The course distance for my race group was 35 miles, and while the finish line was at the top of a mountain on Sugarlands Road, the start line was near the bottom.  That mountain road is so long and steep, that as we rolled down the mountain to the start line, several rider's tires went flat from their rims getting so hot from braking and heating the air in their tires.  The air expanded and didn't have anywhere to go and... pshhhhhhhhh, flat.  Pretty amazing.

Our race started around 12:30, and for the first six miles the course was gently rolling and we stayed together as a group.  At the six mile mark we rode into a small village called St. George and that's where the fireworks started.  St. George is at the base of a loooong climb, gradual in some spots, and steeper in others.  As we started the climb the attacks came fast and hard.  The tempo was strong but I was managing to somewhat stay with it.  In fact, surprisingly I was feeling pretty good as a "non-climber" going up this climb with the group.  But a few minutes into this climb I started getting into trouble.  I have a condition with my inner ears where they hold fluid, or something like that, and sometimes when I climb very hard and there's a lot of pressure, I get very dizzy (I constantly have ringing in my ears too).  So going up this climb this hard made me dizzier and dizzier.  I got to the point where a good bit of my effort was going towards just keeping upright and not falling over.  I caught myself riding off the road a few times and into the gravel berm of the road.  This went on for what seemed like forever, but really just a few minutes.  I eased up to try to alleviate the pressure.  My inner ears finally drained, or whatever they needed to do, and the dizziness went away and I was back to normal, though I lost a fair amount of time.  Fortunately, the top of this climb was coming soon, and then it was all downhill to the base of the final climb, and that's one thing I can do very well... go downhill fast.  I knew that once I hit the decent, it was a freefall at 40+ MPH and I would catch some riders.  Sure enough, a little into the decent, I caught one guy, but just as we were going into a corner he panicked and locked his brakes up... and he crashed hard, but luckily for him into the grass beside the road (See the guy in the green shorts beside me in the pic? It was him.).

As I got to the bottom of the mountain I caught up to a group of people, as I figured I would, and rode right through them and continued on, feeling pretty good.  And then came the last, grueling climb of the race.  Five miles straight up to the finish line.  It was sooo hard, but from somewhere I got a second wind of sorts and I actually caught a few more riders going up the climb and dropped them.  And then there was one last rider in my crosshairs but he wasn't going to let me take him.  He kicked it up and made it a race to the line.  I couldn't match his acceleration and started to cramp up, even down to my toes.  He got the better of me by thirty seconds in the end.

When the dust from this race settled, I wound up in 15th place.  I believe that with the way I was feeling physically, I could have done a little better if it wasn't for my dizzy spell, though as a non-climber I didn't have any grand illusions of a podium finish in this race.  Overall I had a good race and a great time!  (And a "very nice job" to my team mate Kirk Morrison for his 8th place finish in his group at the race!)

At the top of the mountain at the finish line

Thanks for the support!

My 2010 racing season finished up a few weeks ago with a win at the West Virginia State Time Trial Championships, and with it came the ups and downs that a season can bring, especially with it being my first year back to racing after a few years "off" from the sport. For a brief review of my season, one can go back through my posts. I hope I made it fun and worthwhile to read. I'll continue to document my training as I go into the off-season now, as I work towards a more successful 2011 season.

I'll be trying some new workouts/training programs, much different than what I've done in the past, in part to see if it'll make a difference, and also to keep me fresh as doing the same-old same-old can wear a person down mentally.

I would also like to thank those who are behind me with their support in sponsorship:

• My team's sponsors:
  Agr International
  Butler Health System
  Pro Bikes
  TMR Roofing
  GNC (Moraine Pointe Plaza - Butler, PA)
  Bearing Consultants
• Others who have helped me along the way:
  Oxygen4Energy
  Pure Endurance
  Clean Bottle
  Magura Direct (Uvex products)
  John Gamble (supplements)

Much appreciated for the gracious support!

2010 West Virginia TT Championships - (Season ending on a good note)

Back in the mid to late 90's, I used to go camping/road riding with a group of friends in the Parsons/St. George area of West Virginia, an area I grew to love a lot. And getting there was one of my all-time favorite roads, Route 72. So about three months or so ago, when I learned about the 16 mile West Virginia State Time Trial Championships being held on Route 72, just north of St. George in Rowlesburg, I wanted to do the race very badly.

The race was this past Saturday, September 18, and for about two months leading up to the race, all I did was train for it. I didn't go out for "rides", but instead each time on the bike had a purpose, a reason, whether it was intervals, hill repeats, or a recovery ride. And each ride was done on the time trial bike as I put my bike away until after the race.

I arrived at the race with plenty of time to casually get registered, get changed, and get warmed up. There was no rushing or running around. The race started at noon and my start time was at 12:18. At 12:15 I got into the line to await my turn. At 12:17 I was at the start line being held and ready to go. At 12:18 I was off, all my training and trial-n-error over the past two months were now for this very moment.

I shifted into a slightly uncomfortable big gear and turned my legs as quickly as I could. I got into a nice tempo and was flying. I was feeling great. For the first eight miles of the race I was averaging 27.6 MPH. Not too bad. The turn around point in the race was on a little hill that put a good hurt in the legs, but it also meant that you weren't flying at speed into the turn which was nice, no hard breaking required. As I rounded the orange cone at the turn around for the eight miles back to the finish line, I was able to regain top speed quickly.

With about four or five miles to go, somewhere around there, I noticed myself starting to slow down, and with that I started to panic. See, I wanted a podium spot very bad. I mean I worked my butt off for the last two months for it, and when I started going slower, that began bad thoughts creeping into my head. I was starting to convince myself that I wasn't going to make it, "Your too slow, you went out too fast and now paying for it...", etc. And the funny thing is that the more I thought about it, the slower I was going. Funny how that works. AND... just as all that was going on, my helmet strap came unbuckled, or so I thought. I reached up to re-buckle it and found that it was still buckled, but the strap itself came out of the buckle, so there was nothing I could do about it during the race. So I was having melt-down mind games and was getting slapped in the face by my helmet strap. Things were starting to really suck. But then I had another thought, "You gotta get your mind right boy!" With that, I stopped pedaling for a brief moment, took a real deep breath, put my head down, and started bringing my cadence up and with that my tempo and speed. 23, 24, 25, 26, 26.5 MPH. I got it back to where it should be and then concentrated on my breathing. Short, deep, powerful breaths. I lost a lot of valuable time but wasn't thinking about that at that moment. With the finish line now in sight, I put everything I had into it. I crossed the line at 33 MPH. At that point I had no idea if I made the podium, and it wasn't until around one hour after my finish I learned that not only did I make the podium, but I won! First Place! I beat the 2nd place guy by twenty-four seconds. Wow, I was shocked. Even with my "panic attack" and my helmet strap beating on my cheek distracting me, I made it. That felt so very good. With such an up-n-down season I had this year, it was nice to finish out with this win.

8/20/10 15 mile Time Trial

Trying out my "aero" helmet, which has been in a closet for 13 years

Another Friday night, another time trial in the can. This event was 15 miles, the same distance as the very first time trial I competed in earlier this year. But the result was very different. In the last 15 mile event I finished in 19th place. This time, I finished in 4th place, shaving off a big chunk of time. But in that first one I was a different rider too. I was much more nervous, which I am sure contributed to a quickly tiring upper body and starting out waaay too fast and burning myself up. This time around I was more confident and relaxed, and felt a lot better. The only thing I wish I could have done differently in this race was to get to my chiropractor the day before. I am happy with my result but my back was hurtin' like the dickens... again. When I get an adjustment before an event, I am typically pain free, but when I don't, my back quickly flares up and the pain works its way down the back of my right leg, and I have to just ride with it to the finish line. I think if I had been able to get to the doc, I could have had a better time, but I'm not complaining.

Now I only have two races left for my season. The first one is the West Virginia State Time Trial Championships, which I'm not eligible to win the title, but I can still "win" the event on September 18, and the Pennsylvania State Team Time Trial Championships in Erie on September 25. I am very excited about the latter as I will be competing WITH my teammates as we pedal our hearts out for the state gold.

Team Cervelo as they crush a team time trial

We don't want anything less because, according to my teammate Brian Hopkins, "Silver is just stupid." So we're either going for the gold or "die trying". Between now and then all my training is geared towards these two events. Looking forward to it!