I'd kind of forgotten about this a bit.
The plan has gone entirely out of the window. There's 2 reasons for this:
1- I am racing pretty much every weekend and a few midweek races as well, so i'm not doing any training at all other than race-recover-race-recover-etc
2- I'm finding that now I have a bit more experience and am a bit faster to stay in the bunch + attack out the front more, I'm doing a better job of analysing what's happening in the race and working out what i did wrong (or right) and knowing what i need to do to improve on it. So, on the rare occasions where i have some time for training, i have been doing a few ad-hoc sessions to work on the areas that i think i'm weaker at.
There's been quite a few DNFs since the last update, so some reports will be pretty short:
The first of those DNFs was at the Kilmacolm Kermesse.
I wasnt expecting much from this race, there were several Cat1 riders and a few Elites as well but i was disappointed not to stay with the bunch. I got dropped on a short climb and tried to chase back on for 5-6 miles. I thought I was at the back so I tried quite hard to get back on the bunch. Just as I was about to give up and head back to the car, another bunch of about 10-12 riders came up behind me so i tagged in with them. We were all riding quite hard but there was no chance we would ever catch up again. I lasted until around 55-60 miles then my legs gave up. The race was won by James McCallum (who has recently been selected for the Scotland commonwealth games team). There was a little bit of comfort in the fact that no other cat3 riders had managed to stay in the main bunch either.
Dundee stage race:
Stage races are good fun, there's a bit more tactical thinking involved than a one-day race. The format was a short hill-climb prologue followed by a flat 50 mile road stage on saturday, then a hilly 50 miles road stage on sunday. There was a big field of 70+ riders but we had a good team of 4 and were hoping for a good result.
The prologue was difficult to pace, there was about 2k flat run-in then 1.5k climb up Dundee Law. It starts off quite steep, maybe 8-9% for 400ish metres then levels out to nearer 5% for the rest of it. We had a recce around it the night before to have a look at the climb and also some of the corners. It had a fairly sharp turn into the bottom of the climb from a 30mph straight and we decided this would be the point where most of the time would be made or lost. We had a few practice runs through the corner and when we were all happy, we went off to stuff ourselves full of pasta
The prologue went well for us. I was 10th and had a teammate in 5th.
First stage was flat around narrow, mainly singletrack roads. I hovered around the front of the bunch helping to chase any breaks to preserve our 5th place overall and occasionally trying a few attacks myself. At one point I managed to get a small gap and my 5th placed teammate bridged across. He has recently won the junior national 10TT championship so he's certainly not slow
We made a good go of it but obviously, as 2 teammates who are both in the top10 overall, we got chased down hard! Lots of attacking all day but no big groups got away. 1 boy went off on his own and nobody wanted to chase until it was too late. He won the stage with around 30 secs on the bunch (he was high up overall anyway, so i didnt drop down the order). Back to the HQ to check the results and we find out that 2 of our team have been DQed for crossing the white lines (including the boy who was 5th).
Things have gone from looking like we were in a strong position, to looking pretty bad. I have moved up a position to 9th overall due to the DQed teammate in front.
Stage 2 is tough. The roads are rough and there's a lot of climbing. It's 4 laps with a bit of up-and-down then a large climb each lap. I start off fairly comfortably but soon realise than I dont have it today. Probably did too much attacking/chasing yesterday when i should have been hiding in the bunch more. The power stats from the large climb show how quickly It goes wrong:
Lap1 climb: 403watts in 4:38
Lap2 climb: 368watts in 5:03
Lap3 climb: 343watts in 5:23
Lap4 climb: 327watts in 5:34
Lap3 was where i got dropped on the climb. There was people all over the road so i got in with a chasing group quite quickly. We held the main bunch at 30-40 seconds for most of the lap then lost a bit of time towards the end. The finish was at the top of the climb on lap4 and by the time i got there i was around 3 mins down on the winner.
This put me 20th overall, which i was happy with considering the tough time I'd had on the final stage but could have played it much better and probably finished a bit higher up the order. Having said that, the overall winner was the boy who got away on the first stage, so it was worth a try attacking there.
Next up was a crit around a go-kart track. I was terrified of this before we started. I'm bad at cornering and sprinting, so this really shouldnt be a race that i'm any good at. I sat on the back of the bunch from the start to see how it went. There were 20-22 riders in the race and 8 of them were from our club! The first 10 laps or so were fast and quite a few riders started to drop off the back. I wasnt doing as terrible as i expected and managed to stay on when others were falling back. The surface was great and the corners not as tight as i had expected. I was feeling pretty good and my confidence was growing each lap. Soon the bunch was whittled down to 9 riders. 6 of whom were from our club -this was not going to be a fun race for any 'outsiders'
I was pretty happy with myself by this point, there were points for the top10, so as long as i dont have a mechanical or crash, i should get a few more points from this. I'm also pretty comfortable going round the corners fast now and i start to move up the group a bit. Some of my teammates at the front are putting in some attacks but nothing has got away yet. A few more surges in speed as more attacks come but i'm comfortable sticking with it now and moving my way up the group. As we catch the latest attack (teammate) he comes back through the bunch and ends up beside me. Conversation goes something like:
Him: "How are you doing?"
Me: "Pretty good, actually!"
Him: "Well, get up the road then!"
So, round a couple more corners and into the back straight, I go for it. I quickly get a gap then settle into a time trial pace. There's still 20mins to go, so i'll get caught before the end but the longer i can stay away, the more rest my mates will be getting. Team mates wont be chasing me down, so some of the other boys will have to work. The track is very open and there is good visibility over maybe 70% of it. So I can look over to see the chasing group 3-4 times per lap. I can work out if I am gaining or loosing time each lap. At the moment, it's fairly steady. I'm still fresh and can hold the group at the same distance. we keep this up for maybe 5 laps then there's another attack from the bunch. One of the other riders who is obviously frustrated that none of my team are helping him chase has gone off the front. Nothing to panic about yet, one teammate was alert and stuck to his wheel as he went and this will disrupt the bunch chase as well. As I did, the 2 of them get a gap fairly quickly then settle into a pace. I estimate that they are roughly halfway between me and the bunch but not really taking any time out of me yet. This is working out quite well for me. My mate who has gone with the attack behind knows exactly what he is doing. He takes his turns on the front, balancing the pace perfectly to try and stay away from the bunch but not catch me. There's still around 10 mins to go but I'm now thinking about staying away. It's easier to take the corners riding on my own, I can take whichever line I want and there isnt the same excessive braking into the corner as other slow down in front then hard sprints out to catch up again. It feels more like a time trial than the hard sprint interval sessions that it was in the bunch. It still hurts, but it hurts in a different way. The headwind seems to be getting stronger down the straight. I didnt even notice the wind earlier but now it feels like i'm crawling along each time I get there. The time limit eventually comes and the lapboard is out for the final 5 laps. I'm still maintaining the same gap on the 2 chasers behind (who are now 3 as another team mate has bridged up) and also the bunch behind. I'm definitely slowing now but the laps are short and I dont have to keep this up for much longer. Around 3 laps to go and the other groups are now thinking about beating each other in the sprint rather than catching me, I need to keep going because if they start to wind up the sprint early they might catch me. By the time I get the bell for the final lap, I still have a good enough gap. I can ease up a little. Still low down in an aero tuck, but pedalling a little easier and freewheeling a little longer around the corners. These half-seconds of rest in the corners feel good.
Got it! That was massively unexpected. I was really dreading the corners beforehand but now i cant wait for the next race in the series (where i'll be wearing the series leader jersey
)
The power data from that race is funny. You can see exactly where i attacked and the difference between the big slow-downs and sprints in the bunch compared to the much steadier power when i'm on my own.
The day after that was back to normal road racing. It was tough, miserable weather and lots of climbing but a good turnout on a thursday evening considering, 50ish riders. Fairly uneventful for me, missed the 2man break that went very early and stayed away. Tried to help chase it back and see if i could set up anything for one of my teammates. gave up chasing when 1 mate got dropped and the other 3 all punctured leaving me as our only rider in the bunch. Just kept myself near the front as lots of people were dropped on the climbs and i didnt want to get stuck behind anyone and lose contact. I was 3rd or 4th wheel over the top of the final climb and moved to the front for the descent. It's quite fast and, as i said before, I'm not good at cornering so didnt want to take any risks further back. Tried a wee dig in the final mile before the line because I didnt fancy myself in a sprint. Didnt get anywhere though and finished on the back of that bunch, which was cut down to just 10 riders on the final climb so I was 12th.
This weekend I did a couple of TTs.
A 10 on saturday and a 25 on sunday.
Perfect days for both: bright, sunny and warm with not much wind. The 10 was terrible. I was a minute slower than the same race last year. I'm going to put that down to just a bad day because the 25 was much better! New PB and my first time breaking the hour (59:41). Average speed for the 25 miles was higher than the 10 miles
I'm still hurting from the first attack and i cant go with him. The others are not far behind but there is only 2 laps to go now, thats only 2-3 more mins of pain, I can hang on that long. Finished 2nd. 
