May 3rd, 2008

Let's focus on some good things: I have about a month and a half until the state road race championships, and about two months until Fitchburg. That's plenty of time for me to have a nice, long, steady build period up to a peak.

That's all just another way to say that Sugarloaf Mountain sucked. Thirteen hundred feet of climbing per lap, and about 3.7 laps. There were some pretty big rollers, and then one 'big' (for Florida) climb.

My main focus for a while now has got to be confidence in the pack. I started out in the top 20 or so (of about a 70-person pack), but quickly found myself moving straight backwards, as I was leaving gaps on the wheels in front of me that were quickly filled by more aggressive racers. My problem is that I don't trust anybody. I've got to get it to sink in that nobody out there is trying to crash, and they're not going to do anything intentionally stupid, so just hold a wheel and quit worrying. I mean, it's not like I haven't crashed before - I've gone down hard and broken bones, etc. - so what am I so afraid of?

Anyway, bringing up the rear of the pack, the accordion effect wasn't too bad, but after every hill, I was having to go around all the people who had blown up and close the gap back to the pack. Not fun. By the time we got to the long climb, I'd spent over half my time in the wind. Coming around people on this was a pain to say the least, and nearly dangerous on several occasions. I managed to chase back on just after the decent, but I was feeling pretty toasted. By the end of the first lap, my average heart rate was 188. I probably shouldn't have looked at my computer.

I stuck it out for one more lap, which consisted of much of the same. I had a few close calls with a bonehead who kept bumping me off wheels, then blowing up right in front of me (only to recover, chase back on, bump me off, and then blow up again). The second time up the climb, I started getting bad tunnelvision and was having some less-than-normal pains radiating out of my lower left abdomen from front to back.

I gave a half of an attempt to chase back on, on the descent, but quickly sat back up as they kept opening the gap on me.

I then got lost and couldn't find where we parked.

In short, it sucked hard. I've got a lot of work to do.