No worries man! you gotta take care of life too! As of now there are 19 in the 4/5 40+ field, would be nice to have more folks (the regular 4/5 field has 66 and might fill up!). I've been building this race up as one in which I might stand a decent chance of being highly competitive, so we'll see! One of the guys is a top 10 finisher at Mt. Washington, so definitely one to pay attention to and one other guy podiumed Hatfield but that was only 1sec and a bad sprint from me, so we'll see if I can be in the mix at least in the top 5. At least it's an early start before it gets to 97 degrees!

Tuesday: Fiesta TT bike. 3 x (12 minutes of 30”on/1’off). Very solid power (150%) on 3rd set. Maybe an all time record (total peak energy produced) for the last set for this workout.

Last night: Structured track workout at Carson Velodrome. Pursuit bike setup - 2x13 lap motor paced efforts Russian pursuit style and sprint bike setup - 2x5 team flying max laps with 3 laps recovery. 98 gear inches max cadence 124 max power 718.

All tapered for regional TT. Bike is ready. Only small complaint is couldn't find my rear wheel aero skewer. Found the front one.

Installed the pad foam, man that's more comfy. I had it bare carbon for testing so I could immediately access/change things while doing the Notio stuff.

It'll be warm so will warmup/wait for the 5 or 7min to go in the chiller vest.

Real goal of the day is a better time than last year.

GL BTS, let us know how it went

First Zwift ride in our new garage. 1.75 hrs total, cruising w B pace bot to warmup for 30 min, then a 35 km Innsnrucking race. Got detached on leg snapper climb 2 of 4. Finished 11th/71 overall 10/30ish As.

furiousferret are u racing GMR hill climb?

Of course, its a few weeks after my Spain trip so I don't know how I'll do. We have a Sprinter van now with seating and a fridge inside, so be sure to stop by!

I'm going to talk to the promoter about the absurd 15-year age groups, I'm sure they did it for a good reason, but they should have just had an open group with that wide a spread.

I have a 70+ age group at GMR so please do not eliminate that. At Fiesta,our 70 group was the largest with 7 racers.

Pretty sure I had an illness situation for that TT where I won but didn't PR and had crap power. I felt a tad off the day or so before and that day.

Yesterday did a 4mi run at lunch then did a mix in the evening of road and cyclocross laps. I mean, the power during that evening ride after a lunch run earlier in the day was not remotely the same as that day of the TT. Like, a lot better. Yes, the slacker stack cross bike vs TT bike. But still. Just felt strong AF in comparison, and the numbers corresponded. Like a great vo2 hill effort and a 30sec hit at 660w at the end of the ride. Power at what I would expect my 20min power is felt oddly almost comfortable.

So maybe it was illness.

Pulled the plug on VO2 interval 3 (of 5) this morning. Legs felt a bit heavy starting from stops on the way down to the island, and didn't come around.

Looking back, I had threshold/VO2 + intensity and solid TSS on four of the last five days. Not sure what I was thinking, maybe in younger years. I think a better play would have been to swap today's workout with tomorrow's planned easy day.

I'm getting old! Can't just go out and hammer all the time lol. Gotta plan these things better. At least it was a lovely morning out today so I did thoroughly enjoy the z1 spin home.

I probably had my best ride at Worlds. I couldn't keep up with the 3 Redlands Classic kids (whose combined age is close to mine) and was between them and about 10 riders. Solo'ed for 2 laps, and was caught by one guy at the end for 5th.

It's always a nice ego boost as I've been getting my teeth kicked in racing where everything is flat, or they combine the fields so much it negates my advantages. W/Kg doesn't do a lot in a crit when you're in the 130's.

There's a big gap between the crit racers on my team and the triathlon/time trial/gravel racers about what constitutes "elevation" in a ride. Even though none of us are as small as you are.

Anything with more elevation than weeknight worlds, which has maybe 900 feet in 30 miles, and they just balk at doing it as a group ride.

In other words, they don't want to get dropped due to inferior w/kg. They excel at their game in crits and train and have the body type for that. I do time trial and cyclocross and maybe and odd duathlon here or there and set myself up for that stuff. More raw mass and raw power doesn't help much in the cross/duathlon front. There's some more "bro build" triathletes that do well, but bulk or mass running is simply slower. Period. Time trial, a balance of mass/power is needed but not ignoring the detriment of more mass affecting aero negatively through less ideal bike fits. So, my build is heavier than an ideal climber/fondo rider but definitely lighter than probably an ideal crit racer.

Little 45min rain beater ride before work. Felt terrible. Looked at some uphill pieces with and against the wind and frankly this Stages left meter on the road bike needs to go in the garbage.

The new TCX pro 0 has a Quarq, the TT bike has a Quarq, and they agree. And both of those are within 1 to 3 watts of the Kickr.

The online calculators have the Stages at easily 20+ watts low when going slow enough up a steep enough little hill.

Just fed up forgetting this and then wondering why I'm such low power for a ride.

Tuesday track workout. Interesting Italian pursuit format with 3 other racers max flying one lap effort with an exchange.

Thursday, 30 on/30 off, Fiesta on time trial bike.

3 hrs total, an hour and change on Zwift with ~25' SST, then the "Chili's" group ride. A couple kinda good guys but no other hitters on the ride so I spent a large chunk of the ride attacking OTF and getting chased.

Tomorrow, 4.5 hrs of planned steady z2. Then resting on Memorial day.

my son got covid on sunday and diagnosed monday at the doctor (he had tested negative twice at home but had a not good sounding cough), and my wife tested positive wed. I'm either negative or asymptomatic, and I've been living in my basement lol Anyhow, I'm at 10hrs for the week, gonna do 3hrs z2 tomorrow to wrap up the week.

Rest day tomorrow, so says TP due to the "you may wanna chill" notification.

I think I will!

But I am LOVING the TCX. I mean, it is pretty much the nicest Giant branded cross bike I could own excepting it's Force versus Red, but still. Loving the miles on it so far. So much more compliant and behaved feel. On 35mm Gravelkings it's pretty freaking fast on-road also. I may not ride the true roadie except for group rides anymore. It's fast and comfy.

I put some ENVE aero gravel/cross handlebars on it, feels even better now. The ergonomics of that bar versus the cheap included alloy is nice. I cannot fathom why for such a nice bike they put such a **** alloy bar on it from the factory.

Next up are some XT pedals to replace my old ones. Open to other cross cleat formats though if buying into new ones. Old ones are really really really worn the eff out.

i tested positive for COVID about 10 days ago. I tried to quarantine you keep my wife from getting it but she did.

She has rebounded much better than me. I’m still very up and down. Mowing the lawn today nearly wore me out - and we have a self-propelled mower.

Good luck, and I hope you don’t get it.

so far, still negative, kid is at day 8 today and wife at day 5, so hopefully my basement living keeps working. just sucks because the holiday weekend is ruined, I did all 13hrs of riding in my basement. of course I do a lot of my stuff indoors, but I do look forward to the occasional epic weekend ride.

It's a weird one. I have Covid for the 2nd time now, and both times it's been like a moderately bad cold. Knock on wood, so far seemingly no lingering effects at all. I might get out for a steady ride today and hoping it'll be cleared up tomorrow (first symptoms Saturday, tomorrow is the following Wednesday).

We set the 10 mile scratch race record last night at the San Diego Velodrome! I think we rode the 50 laps in 19:30 ish. Previous record was around 20 minutes flat and had held since 2016. I was identified as one of the major contributors (gasp) and took a few full 1 lap pulls throughout the effort.

I got dropped myself with 3 to go... so close. Only three others riders finished with the front of the race. The rest of the field of ~25 had gone down a lap or two or just pulled out earlier. It started getting real hard with like 10 laps to go, getting cross eyed. I felt great at 15 to go and took a full lap pull again > 30 MPH at 16 or 17 to go, then it all caught up with me. Funny how that works.

Fun stuff!

I'm heading into the meat grinder of 'eating' events. I'm at 9% bodyfat right now and would like to be at 7% when we leave for Spain, because I'm going to eat whatever I want when I'm there :) (we'll also be walking 3-4 hours a day, so it won't be too bad).

• Nieces birthday (Last weekend)
• Family staying at our house this weekend
• State Champs
• Spain for a week
• Camping with the nephew.
• FIL Birthday

I have an elastic stomach, so I can eat, and eat, and eat. Being the first season of real racing since the pandemic, I can't really anticipate my events. They just seem to be dropping stuff whenever, so I really just have to be ready for any climbing events to show up where I can do well.

We spent two weeks in Spain a few years ago, and it seemed like I was constantly eating but when I came home, I'd lost 3 lbs. Maybe it was all the walking. But man, I ate a lot of ham.

I was at home alone Thurs-today, so I went down to my parents' house (for the riding, and to spend time with the folks too lol). Thurs I did 3x30 sweet spot on the usual 13mile loop, was awesome. Friday did just 90min z2, stayed disciplined on a nice day! Saturday and Sunday I did 3.5hrs each, so 15hr total for the week 796tss and nearly 12k kj of work, almost pro! lol CTL is 85 and TSB is -25, I'd like to go for 16 this week but I think back to back 4hr rides with family home is going to be tough to pull off, unless I shift the long stuff to the middle of the week when I'm working at home and just do the shorter stuff on the weekend. The more of this I do, the more I see how hard it is to routinely do 15+hrs, you'd def need an understanding family willing to let you be out over 4hrs each weekend day

Anyhow, we're going to southern CA (LA area, out to some national parks in that area) for the first couple of weeks in July, so hoping all this endurance/sweet spot work stays with me during that almost 2 week break, might have to get some running shoes and try to use that as a proxy, and hopefully hiking will keep the aerobic system mostly topped off

Last 2 weeks I've been ramping up for State Champs, roughly 15 hours a week. The problem was my wife had family coming to visit, so in addition to that I probably put in about 20 hours of house chores in as well. Mowing, pulling weeds, mopping, etc. It's all added up, and really I'm just exhausted. Its hard to calculate the randomness of chores in reference to stress or calories burned. Last two days I could barely stay awake and have been tired. It also may be COVID since our work has an outbreak (and only half are masking).

At this point I'm not sure if I can do it, but on the bright side, I feel about 90% now, so hopefully I'm out of it.

Hopefully you continue to feel better! I will be racing the 35/40 combined, aiming for a good place in the 35 field between me and my teammate Kevin, who is super strong. Hopefully we can do something.

I was planning on doing the state TT this weekend but the temps and wind on the course look excessive - 102 degree (projected record heat and not on the course per se) and 25-35 mph winds. 3 hour drive up the night before, hotel, race the next day in the heat and wind and 3 hour ride home.

I will drive up to Carson on Sunday and do the Madison practice unless the weather changes and get a better workout with less driving and no additional cost. Although, I am in shape for the ITT and want to do it and support the promoter.

Bike racing- priceless.

Yeah I do not envy those racing the ITT this weekend. I'm not going simply because its too much logistical hassle right now with our schedule at home. I am planning on the TTT next weekend. Hopefully the temps are reasonable.

My wife and I are doing the two person, mixed, open TTT next weekend. The weather forecast looks better/more normal.

I'm on the fence about the TT, it all depends on what chance I feel I have to get a jersey. Really both are a long shot; there are some fast guys at the 50+ TT and if I do that I'm not going to be 100% for the RR. I'm realistic as I'm a long shot either way, but every time I line up I think I'm going to win, lol.

For the 50+ I need to find at least 20 watts, and at least 3 minutes to even be in the ballpark, but I've never had a good TT race, something always went wrong (last year I went off course and into the dirt at about 30 mph).

I'll be in Spain for the TT.

Thanks!

Have you ridden the course? I saw some videos (apparently it's a Wednesday night ride), and it looks marginally comparable to Rosena Ranch, so I'm not sure if I take my 1x aero crit bike or SuperSix. Any wind?

I'm not happy they're combining fields for a State Champs race, I'm not sure if that's a valid complaint or just a complaint. That doubles the field and means 1 to 2 teams are going to have armies to chase down breaks.