I have some mileage in the saddle and I am entering the final week before my second time trial race at the Healthy Newton Omnium.
I didn't follow my own advise (living in ignorance) and I checked out the results from last year's race. I was in last place. SO, my goals for this year are pretty simple and I list these in order.
1. Improve my time (average speed) from last year.
2. Climb out of the cellar and not finish in last place
3. If I am having a good day average 21mph or better
If I have a decent race, I plan on entering a couple of more TT events. I have every inclination of entering some road races in the future but I am still not fast enough to be competitive with even the cat 5 guys. If you haven't seen or deduced from my pictures, I am not your average cyclist. I am 6'4" tall and currently tip the scale at a sleek 255 pounds. I think that I raced at last years event at 270 pounds. I have the watts to be competitive but not the physique....YET. I am on a mission to get down to 210 pounds, but it is going to take some time to get there all the while building my cycling base.
I am having a blast training and preparing for this race which means absolutely nothing to anyone but me. I am definitely trying to buy some speed in addition to losing weight and training. According to Strava I ride an average of 83 miles per week. If you are at all interested you can do an athlete search on Strava for Lee Hanson. I am the one in Temple, GA. Also, yesterday, I drove 1 1/2 hours to the race site and pre rode the course. I completely rode the course once then went back and did some specific work on hills and tried to determine proper wattage at specific places. Will this help? Probably not. I am sure once the race starts I will let adrenaline do the work and completely blow up half way through the race.
As far as the bike goes, I am still loving the Cannondale Slice. I have made a couple of changes to help me out. The first of which was to change my aero bars. The ones that came with the bike were basically straight and I found that felt funny and put a little strain on my wrists. I guess I pull when I ride. I switched to some bars that bend up and put my hands at a more natural angle. This made a HUGE difference to my comfort level in aero. Also, I had to move my cycle computer (Garmin edge 800) out in front of the handlebars. When the computer was mounted back on the stem there was no way for me to see the display when I was down on the bars. I purchased the K-Edge and it is awesome. In fact, it was so rock solid that I purchased another one for my road bike. A little pricey but you will not ever think about your computer mount after you install this. Garmin should include a mount like this for their higher end computers. Who wants to trust their expensive gps gadget to a couple of rubber straps that will eventually break.
After a little riding time the rear derailleur needed a small tweak which was probably due to cable stretch, but this was a minor thing. It seems that every time I ride this bike I get faster on it. I will say that it does not seem like a climbing bike. The bike is heavier than my Synapse, and I am still not great at changing the gears when not down on the bars. As a result, I find myself mashing up the hills in the wrong gear and wasting my legs in the process. I am still getting used to the neck fatigue and the Adamo seat but I am slowly improving and getting more comfortable.
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