ESG - Stage One

The setting...

Pan flat...totally awesome. Kind of like the 38 time trial course... out and back, with a hot-dog turn-around at the 5 mile mark....except...

wind

wind

WIND

Grand Island, NY is a small island literally between Buffalo and Niagara Falls. Canada is just a spin-cast across the river, so is the westerly wind.

I warmed up on the course and the wind wasn't really bad at all so I figured I could go somewhat harder on the way out, hoping for an even split or a slight negative split. This turned out to be a mistake however, since the gods decided to hold the wind order until the exact moment when the TT started.

I felt awesome in the first two miles, looking at the meter often and making sure I kept it within reason. Speed looked great too. I felt a PR coming on!

until the turn-around

oops

I guess it was a tailwind after all!

so the headwind whacks me in the face like a wooden bat and I think to myself "not sure if I can keep this up into this kind of headwind"...

I try.

Actually I was able to keep the pace going with only one or two little moments where I faded, but the final mile went well and I pushed it hard to the line for a 23:40 28th place in a field of 51. That's not bad for me, and the average power was right in line with my better 10 milers. Schweet.

I rode around for quite a while after that, finding myself almost back near the turn-around again so I put the bike down and took up a standing post and gave some encouragement to the Central women's team. I hollered and ran and clapped, trying to give them the best boost I could

(lord knows I could have used it while out there!)

maybe, just maybe, it had an effect because...wait for it...

we got the GOLD in the women's field! Woohoo! Vanessa put in a heck of a TT.

Actually a lot of folks put in great rides today. Chuck Rhoades nailed it for silver in the 45+. Ed Burns got gold in the 65+. Todd Sherwood made gold in the 35+. Wow.

Our men's open team did reasonably well, with Dan Fitch getting into the top ten (I think). I was 4th best Central, and may hence end up on the a-squad for the team TT on Sunday.

Best time of the day: something around 21:30 by guess who? Jay Joslyn. I figure the wind was good enough to add a minute to his time, since I would have expected a 20something time.

Team Western went 123.

Road Race tomorrow. Hills. Lots.