Springbank

Today started with very sketchy weather that was sure to include rain, wind and maybe a thundershower. Amazingly, the rain stopped right before my race began at 10am, and by the half way point the sun started to show.

I got to the race with an hour plus to get ready, but after getting distracted by the S4 and Cadet races, I was left with only a half hour to warm up. I brought my trainer along figuring that I would get a better warm up if I set it up under some shelter and keep dry while I got the engine fired up. That plan worked great and other than it being a tad short (25min) I felt ready to go. Using heart rate and cadence data provided my my new Garmin 705 (b-day present - thanks Mom and Dad) I was able to precisely control my warm up effort.

My race started rather slow. I felt great though and just sat in in the top 15ish. This lasted for the whole first half of the race. I was forced out front a couple of times, but only did a short pull and then pulled off. Attacks kept trying to go but nothing was a real threat, and I chased one down to test my legs.

It was just past half way through when Bayden Pritchard attacked. A St. Catharines club rider (Max I think) jumped out to try and bridge, so I chased him down and got a free ride to Bayden. I knew these two where strong so I chose to go all in and fully commit to this break. We got a 15 second gap quickly and shared the work evenly. By lap three away, Max was dropped, and it was just Bayden and myself working, with a dropped rider hanging on the back (not sure how he hung on so long if he was dropped...).

the pain started to set in with about 15km to go, but I was determined to make this move survive. Our gap started to grow in the last few laps, getting up to 25seconds with two laps to go. We really nailed the tight turns to gain time as two can take a turn much faster than a whole pack. It was working. I gave it everything in every pull I took right down to my last one. That wasn't the best way to beat Bayden, but I had no idea what our gap was, and know how a 10 second gap can get shut down in the final kilometers of a race.

I pulled through the last headwind section till about 400m to go, then Bayden sprinted away, and I could not close the gap he created. I was more concerned about us surviving than me winning in the end, and did not want to ruin all our work by playing cat mouse games in the final km.

So second it was, not the W but I am happy with how it went, and $100 richer. I enjoyed this race very much and am confident now that I can win S3 races. Can't wait till the Niagara classic!


Training last week had its ups and down's for me. I felt like shit on Monday following Mansfeild. Throat was sore from dust inhalation, knee hurt from crash and back was sore from the effort. That combined with no energy meant rest day for sure. Tuesday was the same deal, but my knee seemed to hurt even more on my commute to work.

Wednesday I took the day off work to get in a long mountain bike ride. Planned to do 4 hours, at endurance pace with one hour at race pace, but with my knee still sore I cut that down to three. Well I actually had to go home at after 3 because my free-hub body randomly sized turning my bike into a 18 speed fixie. Not cool.

Thursday was some intense interval training. I did 7 out of my planned 10 max effort 30sec. intervals. I wasn't feeling so hot and my knee was not healed yet. Ya no excuses...I know.

Friday I felt great. I did a 3 hour road ride to Port Colbourne and back averaging 32km/h. I had good energy and legs felt punchy for the first time in a while.

Saturday I did a slower 2.5hour road ride to Smithville and back. I arrived at the Timmy just as the St.CCC was leaving and jumped in on the group ride home. It was nice to be able to chat a little to pass the time.

Today's performance confirmed that I am now out of the rut and back in the groove.

I have some good interval training planned for this week to get ready for Albion. I realized after Mansfeild that the only way I will get faster is if I train with max efforts. Doing the same 2-3 hour mtb rides isn't going to yield the improvements that I need to get up there in elite level races. To bad my coach (me+Garmin) got distracted with how fun base miles are on the mtb and postponed intensity till now. Oh well, that may mean a peak closer to the championships....

All for know
Peace out