April 16, 2017

Getting the pacing wrong...

Sleaford Wheelers Charity 10 

The plan was a simple one - go over to a course I know well. Implement the three C's ! (Composed, Controlled & Consistent), win an Easter Egg in the raffle - come home.

Sounds like a good plan then - so....who shall we send ? How about a numpty !!!

All of the above went a little bit out of the window and I don't really know why. My finishing time of 22:58 was a course PB for me by 59 seconds and I should be over the moon - from the outside looking in you would say that time was a very good result on a day that had 18mph crosswind on the course - but it hides the ugly truth - my power control today was piss poor !

I had enjoyed a decent warm up and was aware that although there was a strong crosswind, it was going to still be a resonably quick day. At that point I estimated that I would do well to achieve a 23 with a quick ride to the turn and then a slog on the return. Once I had started though, I was almost immediately aware that the outleg would not be as greasy fast as I had figured it would be - this probably made me panic a little bit and as such my power reading was through the roof, then... when I tried to bring it down, I must have eased off too much as it swung wildly either side of the 300W I was aiming for.

This meant that I got to the turn quickly, but I was too much in front of where I should have been and boy did it hurt on the return. In comparison to other riders around me in the results, I was up at the turn, but lost more on the return leg which was 10W down overall on my outleg.

The last two miles were painful, but I kept a lid on it and in a way happy that my time began with a 22. It is progression, but I came away thinking how much better it could have been.

It's a 25 next week, and a first trip to the R25/3H course in South Wales

Wind 18mph WNW
Temp 15c
NP 296W

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