Close…. Soooo close….

    21:05 (I think) – the fourth fastest….

   ….10 mile TT I’ve ever ridden!  A bit more racing in my legs and getting under 21 mins is inevitable. Excellent!

  Nice night for it actually - light winds, warm, high humidity and below average atmospheric pressure – all made the air less dense than normal without a doubt. Looking at the time gaps with some of the riders from last week, I think I went better relatively speaking.

  Strange though, I didn’t feel anywhere near as good warming up this time, in fact  I didn’t feel anywhere near as fired up for the event. Mad really – I think the lesson has to be just turn up and have a bash however you’re feeling, you might get a nice surprise!

  As for the post-ride debrief, well, goes a bit like this:

  WAAAAHHHHEEEEEYYYYY  WOOOOOOOOO WOOHOOOOOOO!!!

  Up to 27mph in just 12 seconds this time, so a big tick for that one.

  HR up between 172-174 for most of the ride, up there within a minute too. Felt like it might be a bit too hard initially and it was slightly unpleasant but I was able to sustain it. Probably a slight crack with 1 ½ miles to go but no real harm done I don’t think. A definite sharper edge to this ride, felt nice, sort of two-strokey rather than dieselly (if that makes sense). Big tick for that too then.

  The turn was a definite time loser though. I’ve marshaled on this turn a few times and it’s noticeable that the fast riders are really aggressive and attack out of the saddle for every yard between the roundabouts. I don’t / can’t sprint – I don’t know if years of TT’ing have made me very single-paced or it’s just in my genes (or both) but my turn was very casual. If I ride this course again this year, I’ll try to juggle my effort so I can hit the turn with a bit more enthusiasm. So the dreaded Red Pen and ‘room for improvement’ on that one.

  The build up to this event was equally laid back. No cycling since the last race apart from the 5 mins to and from work. Had 40 mins of hard rowing (Z3) on a Concept2 ergo thingy one day (which I seriously enjoyed – something for the winter methinks!) and a hard day moving slabs, ballast & cement etc on another but that was it!

  Before this ride, I had planned a big weekend of training, worried that I was bound to start detraining if I didn’t up things soon. Don’t think I’ll bother now though! At the minute I’m just looking at a hard 45 mins (threshold) on the turbo on Sunday, followed by another go on the C2 later on.  Couple of days riding to work, Friday spent wandering around Silverstone F1 practice then give the E2/25 a smash on Saturday.  A PB if it’s a decent day I reckon....