Time trails are a mental mind game, how hard one can push them self to limit and stay there. Ones ability to be able to perfectly execute their planned pace, 90% first half 110% second, etc. either way it also boils how well you can deal with racing against yourself.
I do a lot of solo riding, mainly because of the areas I like to ride, where I live and times I can get out and ride. I truly enjoy riding in groups as well, but I have also learned to be able to burry myself just as bad if not more going solo. I have been commuting to work by bike for the last 2 plus years, havent driven at all. In the mornings around 4am its nice and quiet, not many on the road, generally 15 - 20 cars will pass me on my 12 mile commute, the perfect time for training. And this is probably where I get some of my ability to do it decently at it. I am not the best, good, but just mediocre in the grand scheme of racing, I try to do well in my category but in the end I also measure myself for the categories I want do to well in.
The hardest thing about psyching ones self in a TT is believing in your ability to do well, ability to punish yourself, but unfortunately anything on your mind can also be a huge distraction as well.
Last Church Creek I was not in the best of shape, I did it mainly to support the team in a TTT effort, but figured what the hell. I signed up at the last minute after breaking two ribs at the Battle of Run the week prior with a crash on the gravel road. I did well considering my injuries, wished my power was higher, but hey dont well, the heat was definitely there and that could have hurt too. Either way I finished second, two seconds behind Kyle Pitman.
Now shortly after that I realized that Chruch Creek #2 and Stoney Creek were back to back on the same weekend, a double dose of suffering? Sure why the hell not. From the begining of June on I started training for my body to be able to put up with two all out efforts day after day and still preform well on the second day. I learned a lot about nutrition, hydration, recovery and all the other good stuff.
In this process on weekends I wasnt racing I would bury myself on Saturday on a hard course or loop, and repeat it again on Sunday. With some unfortunate or fortunate circumstances in road races I either found my self off the front or the back which was helpful in the mental game preparedness as well. I planned for this past weekend to be my second peak of the season, tapered and did everything right, but unfortunately not everything goes to plan.
The days leading up to the race, I submitted my upgrade to Cat 3, in hopes of receiving it I put off registration until the last minute, in fact almost forgot completely about Wednesday night., but I got in just in time, I assume third or forth last Cat 4. The legs were feeling great, power was there, and it was all coming together.
But alas on Friday I had some very upsetting news, personal, huge, and enough to throw you out of the game completely. Some teammates knew that I have been having some issues but they never thought it was going to hit me the day before my big peak but it did. At this point I didn't want to race at all, I wanted to be done with it, just throw in the towel. I am still debating if I should share the news or not, probably not, it is very personal.
Not being much of a religious person this weekend was very eye opening in many reasons, first when you find out news that is life changing, for the worse it is definitely going to affect your ability to focus. I had no idea how I was going to ride home, it was gut wrenching. But as I spent the afternoon with my son, I decided I needed to race this weekend, it will help me and hell who knows maybe everyone else will also have a bad day.
I continued to get the car ready Friday night so all I had to do was wake up walk the dog eat breakfast and go. All of that went according to plan. Got to the school with plenty of time, met up with teammates and had a good time. It helped take my mind off things a bit. Then I started warming up, on the road, out there looking at numbers my mind eventually started to wonder off think about the future, etc.
Came back to the car, got my things and headed down to the start. This time I incorporated the 5 or 6 miles down there into my warm up, also brought a small bag to leave at the park and ride for afterward with a gel, water bottle, and other things so I can start my recovery ASAP.
I head to the start get there wait for my turn and go off. I went out to hard, first 20 - 25 minutes my power was way to high, but oh well I was feeling good. I passed all of the Cat 4s, there was a break in riders then caught the Cat 5s. Not sure how many i passed it was a lot.
This time i was prepared for the bumpiness, there wasnt much wind, not sure if there was any at all but certain spots in the first half did feel like a little nagging headwind with a cross wind at the end.
A 10 mile, 12 miler, or 20k TT is just short enough for your to really just focus on putting yourself in pain. But in a 40k for me at least from minutes 25 - 45 my mind can wonder, especially like Chruch creek when there is no turn around. So I got very distracted and my my focus start falling off completely. Until the final right turn. I new this was on fresh pavement and could just really hammer away. I tried to refocus, head down staring at my garmin 705 map and looking at the white line. every few minutes i would peer up to see if i was getting close to another rider, and when i did moved over but other than that i just kept my head down looking at the computer. I think I saw the 5k sign, and thats it some math went on in my head, and it was looking good. Either I was am horrible at trying to calculate things or my mind was completely out of it but it did end up beating my previous time, but was it good enough.
I bested my last time by 23 seconds. I got my water and talked to many other riders who stopped to get some water too. After regaining my vision I head out for the long ride back to the car. I met up with an NCVC rider and was explaining the benefits of running the map function on the Garmin and he did seem interested, so I really enjoy passing that tidbit on to others, its not just an expensive power meter head unit, it can do maps too.
I get back to car, chat with teammates about how evidently my garmin is off and i get the wrong distance every time i do Church Creek. After waiting for the results to be posted I was astonished I was won the Cat 4s, with a time of 56:08. I was completely stoked and I had to hand it to God for helping me go out there and help me get through this tough time, even though it was an individual time trial I know he was there helping keep my eyes on the end.
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