State TT Race Report

Hot windy day today, made for a tough State TT. Winds were 14mph with gusts up to 21, says the Internet anyway.


Got in a great warm up, took two bikes; the one below for the race and the cross bike for warm up. It was nice to hit the Katy Trail and other off road areas, plus I did not have the worry of a flat tire minutes before start time. (Thanks Jose for the use of your bike this weekend)




The start began with a tail wind, nice and fast. At the turn my average MPH was 28.4. I figured I would need to maintain 22mph to meet my 25mph average target for the event. I began to worry a bit as I watched riders on their return trip into the wind crawl at snails pace with a look of fatigue and pain in their faces.


Sure enough, I made the turn and felt the wall of wind. Took me a bit to get settled into a gear that felt comfortable. Here is an image of the change. You can see after the turnaround things started to go down hill.




At mile 16 to 20 is where I lost most of my time. I did struggle during this point in the race. Not sure what it was, just did not have the motivation to move faster. Fell to as low as 15 mph for a short time.

Then there was a "carrot". Not sure who it was but a rider behind my came around to pass me. One of my goals was not to get passed, so this sparked some needed motivation. After he was far enough ahead and out the draf zone I paced with him speed for speed. With a few miles to go I overtook him to only be passed again.

With the finish line in sight about a mile or less out I dug deep to catch and pass again holding it to the line. Spike in speed can be seen in the graph above plus I put my HR to it's max. That part felt good.

Here is the HR graph.







All that effort was good for 3rd in my age group (35-39) and I think 50th overall. Overall time 1:05:09, average MPH 22.9. Bit disappointed with not metting my targets for the day but pleased with the medal.

Link to motion based data