And you're too late, you give love a bad name. Stop the insanity! Just when you think it's bad having Bon Jovi stuck in your head on Valentine's Day...here's a sure fire way to get your ears to bleed on the trainer...Nelson's "Love and Affection" (You're forewarned, run and hide!). As bad as those songs might be, a hidden track on Nine Inch Nails' Broken EP better describes my performance at the third ABD Indoor TT--"Suck". Alright, I shouldn't be so hard on myself especially when I set an indoor PR by about 15 seconds. Then again, am I going for time or place?
The third TT of the ABD indoor series was another flat 10K course. Road conditions to the race were horrendous (my car hydroplaned several times), but they were downright balmy indoors (think 80s-90s). I got a decent warm-up in before my 10 AM race, but not as much as I hoped. I started the race with my wattage jumping between 100 watts and 1000 watts. Huh? The ABD guys caught it too and determined it was caused by a faulty Computrainer controller. They got a new one working right away, but my race was already over. There were several no-shows in the 10:30 AM heat due to the weather, so they were able to squeeze me into that race. This actually helped me, because I was able to get in some additional warm-up time.
My 10:30 AM heat turned out to be a good match-up. I was in the A heat, while the B heat was stacked with several Vitamin Water-Trek guys. The five of us guys in the A heat got out extremely fast, probably because we were afraid of Jessica Prinner beating us. Seriously, the first half of the race was very vigorous. My wattage was a good 40 watts above my second half. I was in second place, but my mind and body weren't ready to keep hammering at that pace so I backed off to sub-LT. I ended up having a solid second half and finishing in 15:19. I was happy with my time and I was sure I was going to place Top 5 in Cat 4.
Ummm, when I got the results later that night, that wasn't the case. I was 12th. Wow! My time would have been Top 5 the year before, but the Top 10 in the Cat 4 field this year had times more indicative of the Pro 1/2. While bummed, I was still happy with my time and realistic about my short course performance. I've always looked at the indoor TTs like a 1500 m. Plus, after last year, I've realized I'm stronger in 20K to 40K TTs. I also felt better when I saw the times of the B heat, which the announcer said "were tighter than a race for Hannah Montana tickets". I feel better gauging myself off guys I know and how they've trained thus far in the season. It's only February, and I think that killed me mentally going into the race in the first place. The points in these early races make up only part of a year long race series
One more indoor race and it will be time to head outsides. Ironically, the rainy, 40 degree weather of today could be normal for races through May. Yuck. Is it time for a little Milli Vanilli--"Blame It on the Rain"?
Again, thanks to ABD for great volunteers and running a top-notch race series. I was really impressed with how they got the Computrainer problem fixed so quickly for the next race.