Race Report: Midvaal Vets Tour Prologue

Well, I woke up this morning with a severe sore throat. Last night I could feel I was not right, I had a fever and headache and the throat was scratchy.

I have been looking forward to this race for a long time. Having missed out on quite a few races lately I was keen to get back into racing. So, sore throat was not an option.

Went to the doc first thing. He checked it out and diagnosed a sinusitis. Prescribed some antibiotics.

The Prologue was 8km long, starting at the entrace of the Suikerbosrand Nature Reserve and heading back towards Daleside. I was seeded 11th so my start time was 16:30.

This was the first time I was going to ride a Trek TTX so I was really looking forward to it. I had seen Andrew Mclean after his ride and he said the judges had told him he had ridden 8:11 for an 8km TT!! Holy Crap!! That is just under 60km/h.

The team rode out to the start together. The finish of the TT was close to the Boswell Wilkie Circus, so it was a nice warmup ride to the start. The Trek felt really good, best I have ever felt on a TT bike.

The ride went better than expected. I got to the start and started my powertap interval timer, then made the mistake of riding a slow loop waiting for my start. So, the CPU timer had started! Anyway, my target wattage for the ride was 370w. I felt this was a good target because I had averaged 368w for 20 minutes a few weeks back when I was doing my 20min threshold test. In the past I have not been able to match my road bike numbers on the TT bike, so I thought that if I could get 370 I'd be very happy.

I started out well. keeping the powermeter between 360 and 380. But by the halfway point I was really starting to feel it!! I found it very hard to keep the power levels up and started fading a bit. When I went over the line I was really hurting. I switched the CPU to time and say 10:14 - geesh, 2 minutes slower than Andrew over 8km, as Craig said, maybe we should take up golf!!

Anyway, at prize giving the results were given out and Andrew had done 9:11, not 8:11. The line judge must have made a small mistake. So, not as bad as I first thought, but I still thought I was about 1 minute slower, and I couldn't even blame the wind!

Times were pretty quick, Werner Moolman did 9:05 and Craig Harvey somewhere around 9:20.

Later when I got home and checked my powermeter data, I realised that my timer had started early and my time was 9:38 - okay, not so bad then!! Average speed was just a fraction over 50km/h.

Average power for the ride was disappointing - 344w. I really need to spend more time on a TT bike.