June 2008 totals, Friday night track racing

Friday night, 6/27/2008
The previous Wednesday I had discovered my saddle had slipped backward about 6 mm. The trouble is, I have no idea when it happened. It could have been a month ago, and I will never know! Those who know me know that I am OCD about my bike position, so I was freaked, to say the least. I slid it back to the marks on the rails, but, of course, everything felt "wrong" now that I was hypersensitized to every sensation. After my warm up and the first race on Friday, a scratch race, where I managed 7th in the final sprint (out of 27 riders), I became convinced my right cleat must have moved too. Luckily, my teammate Jerry had a screwdriver in his car, and he was kindly willing to go grab it for me.

The next race was my first attempt at the Keirin, which is an odd race that is quite the gambling rage in Japan. A motorcycle paces the group for 4.5 laps, pulls off the track, and then the sprint is on. We draw straws for position, and I drew the spot behind the motorbike. Bree had warned me that this bike tended to stink, since she had practiced Keirin racing the night before at women's training night (that's right, Bree has a shiny new track bike, and is planning to give racing a shot). All I knew was that I was supposed to draft it for the 4.5 laps, and then I didn't really have a clue what happened next (or what the rules are). After the bike pulled off, I pulled up track, thinking "I am not going to pull them for the next 600 m", and another rider (Cooper Lang - very strong) attacked. I sat on the chaser, but was passed for the finish and came in 4th in my heat. Only the top two advanced to the final, so now I had a lot of sitting around to do while the other races went on.

I messed with my cleat, and discovered it had not, in fact, slipped. So, I just had to assume my bike was back in my preferred position, even though everything felt weird.

The final race was a 5x5 points race. I attempted a solo attack with 500 m to go, but got nipped in the last turn by a group of ~6. I barely caught back on, and was pretty winded from doing 500 meters at about 34 mph. Two sprints later, there was a break fo two off the front, and I attacked solo from turn 2 and got the 2 points remaining in that sprint. I just barely hung in the pack for the rest of the race. My two teammates in the race, Niels and Mark, both managed to get some points too, so overall it was a good race for Team Cucina Fresca! We also had a great crew of teammates hanging out, giving us some love from the sidelines. It sure is nice to be on such a friendly and supportive bike team.

I took it pretty easy on training since Friday, so hopefully I will be good and fresh for Wednesday night racing with the Masters group. Bree should be there too! My mother is in town and can sit with Emy and watch while Bree and I compete. It will be the first time Bree and I have both been in a racing event since May 2000. Wow.

June 2008 totals

bike
Distance: 543.9 miles
Time: 30:34:00
Longest Ride: 38.7 miles (2:05)
Rest days: 5

run
Distance: 7 miles
Time: 0:51:00
Longest run: 4 miles
(took two weeks off of running, just to see how it would go)

I'm planning on the 40 km TT test this coming weekend. I expect it will be roughly the same as last time, since I have not been doing much threshold training. In fact. most of my "training" is racing on the track these days. With two nights of racing, I do only one other structured training ride a week (intervals, hills or sprints, usually) - the rest of my rides are easy spinning (17-18 mph, 1-2 hours, <130 bpm HR max) with one rest day a week. I'm definitely not in shape for road races, but I should be fine in the summer crits. I'll need to switch over to some more threshold intervals of 10-20 minutes before cross season (in less than two month now!).