Looking forward to next year might seem like abit of a defeatist attitude to have at the end of July but its very far from the truth.ive come to the realisation that this year we make all the mistakes, get all the little niggles out the way and weed out the things that have been holding me back for the best part of the year and hit the ground running from day one next year. Don’t get me wrong there is a lot to still be achieved this year and I’ve got targets but these targets are around getting things right.
I didn’t realise how hard it would be to get going once I had the bike sorted in June , I think I’ve got a good position now to build on but the power difference between tt bike and road is huge ( circa 30w ), and no one can afford to give that away on race day.
I know it’s a good position and I need to adapt and make up the difference in power but that is where I would normally fall down and start fiddling with stuff to try and make the difference up instantly and as a result mess everything up , but one of the many things matt has taught me this year is to see the bigger picture and the longer term goal ( rode a lumpy 14 mile course yesterday and hit more power avg for those 14 miles than the 10 mile event i rode on the saturday so its building all the time ) , I’ve been working with matt for 8 months now and its taken that time to get my bad habits out and really get me training correctly , focusing on what needs to be done and understanding why we do the things ,and he was spot on when he said it will probably take a year of training before I got it all right.
So the year I’ve been waiting for turned into the year I needed big time, I could of probably stayed plugging away where I was getting not bad results and quietly ticked along making small improvements along the way, or stripped everything back and started from point zero and change everything I thought I knew . I had to put all my confidence into matt and I’m dam glad I did.
The next few months I’m feeling awesome about and its all positive, we try things out and I’m finally racing with abit of belief and enjoying my racing.
One thing I’ve missed this year is the chance to get on some of the fast courses and my diary for the rest of the years means I doubt il get the chance to get on any this year buts its not a great concern as a time on paper doesn’t really tell much of a story.
I rode Saturday in an event I’ve used as a sort of base event where I can race and it gives me a good idea of where I’m at, I rode it 3 times last year at did 3 times all within a few seconds of each other with the best being a 21:56, it’s a tough course but very honest and close to home so its ideal. I rode the first time this year the day I got the tte and did a pb of 21:46 still in the back of my head that last year I was sure I could do a 20 on this course, I rode again a few weeks later 21:37 these where before I changed to my new position, then I rode again on a wet night 21:28 then I got to the open event on Saturday and got super close to my 20 target with a 21:02,
I was beaten by the stronger man dean robson on the day but I had just gone from a pb last year of 21:56 to 21:02 and my power was 36w down on my best 20 min effort on the road bike this year so couldn’t be happier with that and a great ride to build on and added motivation to work harder to get the gap between tt and road bike down, I think it just needs adaption time which is even better as I should be getting stronger for the last part of the year.
The brains at nopinz have NOpinz have brought out the latest weapon against drag the aero calf guard, these type of things have been seen attached to the legs of the drag2zero boys for a while but they are team issue, so Blake with some input from xav ( I think ? ) designed the calf guard with built in trip strip as started by xav.
These things have divided people between “ they look silly so I don’t care if they work “ to “ I don’t care if they look silly if they work “ , I’m in the second camp, the fact that the original system designed by xav is seen on a load of riders at events, from the days that me and rob got a lot of funny looks wearing them at the 2up tt in wales , and xav is a man that knows his stuff and has tested them a lot both at wind tunnels and velodromes and real world ,
So it’s pretty much august and the time for the big national 10 and 25 and what would normally be the end of my season but we want to keep it rolling into October this year and try and make the most of any late season gains.
Everything is on a positive note now for the rest of the year, it’s been a tough one and man have I moaned so thanks to anyone still reading this blog, it goes to show if you keep working hard and work with the right people it comes good in the end, and in the words of les brown “ if there is no enemy within the enemy outside can do us no harm “;)
PS: I did part two of three on the podcast with mark last week if anyone interested
http://cyclingtimetrialpodcast.libsyn.com/
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