First 10TT of the year and Para Crit race at Hillingdon London

Q10/1

10 TT was a local race the Q10/1 heading out from Hamstreet, that is about 15 minute cycle from my house. I was aiming for my first sub 23 which with the form over the winter seemed very realistic, it was soon apparent though that it wasn't happening. The power looked good on the out bound leg but then I clocked the average speed and was well down on the target. My heart rate was to low also though so just tried to dig deeper but no matter how hard I seemed to push the heart rate was still fairly low but the speed did pick up massively on the second leg heading back as I then had a tail wind but not enough! I had people to chase that I was slowly gaining on so concentrated on pushing to catch them as soon as possible, I caught one of my old triathlon team mates on the home straight, who had started 2 minutes ahead but my finish time of 24:09 was very disappointing. I know it was only the first 10 and they do get quicker as the year goes on, I improved by over 2 minutes last year so am positive that even though I missed the target for this race they will improve. Conditions wont of helped as there wasn't allot of very quick times and I also have rib/intercostal injuries after a fall off the bike so am hoping when this clears up I will be able to at least get more out of the heart and lungs!

National Para-Series and cat 3/4 Crit Hillingdon 22/04/17

eeeesh another that I will just chalk up to experience in more ways than one, it was a fairly big field at 70 people on a tight course in places, twisting but no corners you couldn't cycle round. This in mind I started to far back in the pack, about 3/4 the way back in the middle so every time there was a kick at the front you ended to far off the front and the same if someone touched the breaks when they didn't need to. I loved the course but managed to lose a couple of meters on a down hill out of a corner and didn't react quick enough to it! Within a couple of seconds I was over 10 meters off the back of the pack with 3 other riders, I put in a big kick for about 10 seconds but the pack had done the same out of another corner and I found myself by myself. I tried for a couple of laps to get back on as I could see the main pack and was picking up other riders who had dropped off and was trying to get them to work with me and keep pushing. At this stage in my mind with 5 of us anything could happen up front and there is always a chance of catching if they slowed enough or there was a crash but it took to long till they decided to pick it up, it was just me working for the first long stint at the front. As soon as the pack lapped us I just treated it as a good opportunity to practice race craft and working with what turned out to be about 8 guys and kicking out of corners and the slight inclines into some of the corners. I wasn't in the best form probably physically with my ribs/intercostals being sore and looking back AHR was low again, so early season seem to be struggling to push into the big numbers like I have been all winter. I also put what I thought was 700x23 on my back wheel, that's what it said on the box but actually turned out to be 700x25 on the actual tyre. The wheel went on okay but noticed after the race it was rubbing on the frame. Needless to say the following day after lots of panicking that the frame was bent and 4 hour session replaced with the TT bike (which was actually good practice for endurance in TT position), it was just a relief it was just the tyres not the frame. It did hurt being lapped not just by most of the cat 3/4 guys but also the para lads, not my proudest moment, evaluate and move forward with positivity though!

No excuses though just evaluating in my own head, there was negatives to look at, to learn from and positives to take forward.

Work hard, work smart dream big!

Ade