One week to go

Finally its only one week to go, so its just all those little things to do like get the race bike in good order before I strip it down to go in the hardshell travel case and decide what clothes I'm not going to take with me. Past experience says that I always seem to take stuff I never use, so I'm going to try really hard to get it right this time. Of course if I was really sure what the weather was going to do it would be easier!

I've had three big weeks of training, by my standards anyway, pushed up the CTL (cumulative Training Load) pretty quickly so I'm really happy with all the power numbers although I know that racing adds more intensity so I expect to have to work in the first races but hopefully the base will come through. I had a weekend of racing last weekend, a handicap on the Saturday afternoon and a criterium on the Sunday morning. I got severely mauled in the handicap due to it being a super tough circuit and my mark in the handicap being just too rich for me, probably would have been just about OK on a flatter rolling circuit, not a circuit that starts up a nasty long hill and then gets worse, I really was just hanging on from the start. However a good hammering was just what I needed I think to harden up.

I was a bit nervous that my legs would be a bit shot still on Sunday morning, but no problem, a good fast hit out sitting at fifth or sixth wheel the whole race, just covering what I needed to and happy with that for a decent weekend of racing. A couple of observations from the race were that only 3 or 4 guys seemed to want to attack the field and there were NO counter attacks, there were 2/3 points that I almost went but stuck to my plan for a good fast training ride. In the sprint which was 500m out of the last corner, slightly uphill into stiff breeze, I had already said to the guys I would just sit on in the sprint, and although there was some sort of lead out going on which was not nearly fast enough, there was a big whoosh out of the corner from guys at the back of the race that had got gapped every time the pace picked up with a snowballs chance in... of winning a sprint, sprinting like crazy - of course they were all blown with 300m, going nowhere and wobbling all over the road just making it dangerous for those who did know what they were doing in a sprint! Just a rant really, obviously I respect everybodies right to try and win a bike race but do they realise how dangerous they can make it? I know they are always quick to complain if I come through hard making my own gaps!

Anyway I've paid for the big weeks of training a bit this week, I had to call off a planned interval session due to just not having it in the legs. I have been doing blocks of 3 weeks followed by a recovery week but had thought to go for one last big week of training before I travel, partially because of travelling etc I will miss a few days. However my (aging) body says that won't happen so I'll reschedule my week to a recovery week with a couple of strong sessions at the weekend, that will have to be enough.