26 August 2005

26 August 2005 Friday Night racing

Weight:69 kg
Peak flow:500
Tried a bit different warmup with more hard jumps and less Z5 type efforts. Was able to more consistently sprint really hard during the races. Maybe add in one Z5 effort next time to the sprints.
Teammates: Paul Mircik, Steve McFarland, Vance Sprock in the 3's, Claire in the juniors. Rode my bike once this week so would see if lots of rest helped my performance. Results indicate training is better than not training. :)



12 lap scratch
Was going to try the rolling off front trick but someone (Dave Keefe?) beat me to it so I just got on his wheel ( I thought I went easy but it took a 13 watt/kg sprint ) so we were off the front for 2 laps or so.) Then the pack went slowly around until four laps to go where I don't remember what happened but I think I was gapped even after putting a 15 watt/kg jump into closing the gap but the pack was pretty spread out around the track and I finished at least a quarter lap behind the winners.
t: 6:02
P: 272
S: 26.0
C: 99

6 lap to win and out
I led out the start and attacked and saw everyone on my wheel so I gave up after a lap. At this point Peter almost took me out as he led after me for about 2 seconds then pulled up from the sprinters lane to the stayers line as he looked over his left shoulder and veered right as I kept looking back to make sure I had room to avoid hitting him without crashing the rest of the pack... Then Elliot attacked and I had to squeeze in at the rail and pass most of the pack and alert everyone else I was jumping but I managed to do another 15watt/kg jump and had a gap and was already thinking maybe I could get second or first out of this. Then I hear the announcer saying person X is bringing up the pack and the 10 meters between me and Elliot isn't worth closing so I pull up and let the pack pull him back. Not sure why this person's goal was doing that because with the time left in the race, he was not going to recover to contest for a win and he had no teammates he was working with either. Got gapped with two to go and wasn't sure if Elliot just ahead of me was trying to block for his teammates ahead or just blown but the rider behind me encouraged me to keep going so I put in a jumped that dropped everyone behind me but I blew pretty hard before I closed the gap and the other riders caught back on and I rolled across the line way back.
T: 4:08
P: 317
S: 26.6
C: 102

Miss and out
I started at the back of the line and worked my way through all the riders to the front. This was pretty easy because everyone else stayed high on the banking except for Dick in the sprinters' lane but there was plenty of room above him. In turn four several of us were ramping up the speed but I really wanted to lead out the first lap or two so I was not pulled first so I put in a big sprint (at least for me, 7w/kg for 60 seconds) and opened a slight gap. After a lap and a half someone passed me and somehow I managed to survive five more laps in the sprinters' lane behind three other riders.
M
T: 2:37
P: 350
S: 27.4
C: 105

20 laps points race
Was just following wheels when with after five laps a gap opened in front of the riders in front of me. I was boxed in so could not pass for half a lap. Put in what felt like a monster effort to catch back ( was only 9watts/kg for 15 seconds) on from half a lap back but the attacks kept coming and got dropped at the ten laps to go point. Held off the pack for the next nine laps and was only lapped by Paul on the last lap.

T: 10:01
P: 266
S: 24.2
C: 93

18 August 2005

18 August 2005 Friday Night Racing

70 kg
peak flow 525
teammates: Paul Mircik, Jun Aishima, Vance Sprock in the 3's/masters, Claire Sprock in the junior division

12 lap scratch 5/11
Took a few turns at the front to keep the pace high and with two to go was thinking of attacking when Jun took off. Then waited at the front for someone to attack and John went and I got on his wheel. He lasted a really long time but faded and Dick went with 3/4 of a lap and probably should have gone with him but did not want to risk bringing anybody with me so waited until mid turn three, looked between my legs and saw someone behind me and jumped around John to take fifth.

T: 6:31
P: 269
S: 24.9
C: 96
6 lap to win and out 6/12
Kim LaFleur put in a jump from the pole at the whistle and I just got on her wheel and followed for two laps, then I pulled for a lap when she pulled up. Paul and John and one went hard with two to go and strung the rest of us out, I got gapped and watched the sprint for 2nd from about 50 meters back and followed Kelly until turn three/four and jumped to try to catch fifth but ran out of room.
T: 4:00
P: 332
S: 26.7
C: 103
miss and out - first rider out, doh, need to move out of sprinters lane when in there behind someone ... Just feels so easy following someone sometimes and was blocked from my initial plan of attacking at the gun. I was called out first but did not hear my name as I was concentrating so hard on not crashing into the riders in front and next to me as I sprinted. This made the race one lap longer than it needed to be for the rest of the guys.

The flying 200 meter time trials made the race night run a bit long so our much anticipated 30 lap points race got cancelled. :( If I had known that was going to happen I would have tried to get in the P12 50 lap points race!

13 August 2005

Track Districts - Masters 3K Individual Pursuit and Masters Points Race

Teammates: Jun Aishima - not racing but helping hold riders, do lap cards and starter duties on the backstretch. I encouraged him to try the 30-34 masters points race later in the day but he said he was not feeling very fast. If I let a little thing like that stop me, I would never race. :) And if he had raced, the minimum he would have gotten is a silver medal!

My preparation for today was skipping lunch yesterday, one margarita, one cosmopolitan( hello Sex and the City ), one glass of wine with dinner, and an after meal apertif of a *trainwreck*, vodka filtered through lychee and pineapples. Then I felt ready to race. Thank you, newly forty year old teammate Jeff and POSSLQ Diane!

Most of the women's fields consisted of zero to three riders. This meant they all medaled. I'm not complaining as I got a couple of medals last year when only one other rider showed up for the 35-39 match sprint and two other riders showed up for the 35-39 points race. This year we had four riders for the former and six for the latter. Attendance is spotty at track districts from year to year so sometimes the field may be competitive or sometimes no one bothers to show up, but ladies missed some golden opportunities to win medals or championships.

70kg
peak flow 520
very windy in the morning, calm by afternoon


H3 front and rear
LG Rocket aero helmet
50x15
170

3K individual pursuit 35-39.
I signed in at 9 AM and prepared myself for a lot of miles on the trainer to warmup. There were a lot of heats so I did not do my heat until 11:30 AM. I got to ride with Tom Fahey on the back side so it would be a contest to see how long I could hold him off. This turned out to be five laps. Started wheezing with three laps to go but just pedaled through it and coughed for about an hour afterward. Should have pushed harder into the headwind on the backstretch and in turn three and four and floated with the tailwind. This power output matches some of my efforts during mass start track races but should be able to do better for a one off event like this. Next year. My speed dropped to the average at the 1:20 mark and steadily dropped afterwards. I can do a faster start but not sure if it may be better to do a slower start and have more in reserve to bring up the later lap times. (edit: several people have recommended that I start much easier and the maximum speed one should reach should be the average speed one wishes to have for the entire distance.) The way the SRM measures data requires a complete pedal revolution so this means the first bit of power data is missing but the speed and cadence are recorded.

T: 4:24 - A new personal best (I did this once before and blew up even worse)
P: 325
S: 25.4
C: 97


I went out to get a burrito at a dive called Gabby's that Matt Martinez recommended on Senter near Hellyer, greasy but filling and less than six dollars for a burrito. I held riders for the Team Pursuits and got good advice from Harvey Nitz, Mike Hardaway and Leo Menostrina on improving my technique for holding for standing starts.


Masters Championship Points race, 60 laps,sprints every six
H3 front and rear clinchers
50x15
165 crankarms
This race started at about 3:30 PM. A slow speed crash in the 50 and over/combined women points race near the end preceding this race made for a short interruption in activities. Joseph Fineman and another rider went down but neither were hurt seriously and both walked away and I did not see any road rash. Six riders in the 35-39 group combined with all riders under 50 for a total of about twelve riders. I went with a few early moves and did not have the snap to move with the surges of the pack. So I ended up getting lapped three times eventually and just taking pace from other riders as a lapped rider is not able to pull for riders that are not on the same lap. Power output was pretty low, especially relative to 100 lap points races earlier this year, may have been fatigue or the heat but most of the other guys had also done the pursuit in the morning. Nobody showed up for the 45-49 age group race and only Elliot Logan showed up for the 30-34 group race.
60 lap points race
T: 29:55
P: 226
S: 24.4
C: 94

Track Districts - Master Kilo TT and Master Match Sprints

Teammates : Kevin Worley Rob Jensen and Chris Tanner in different age groups.
peak flow:550
70 kg
Very cool and overcast at 9:00 AM when I got to the track, 90's by the end of the day when I locked the gates at 4:00 PM. The racing started at 10:00 AM and there were already thirty cars in the parking lot as many riders decided to get a long warmup and prime parking spots. Windy at start of day, winds died down as day wore on. One thing I noticed right away is that almost no one that was here today was here racing twelve hours earlier on Friday night except me, Elliot Logan ( who had to leave early on Friday ) and Steve Pelaez. I suppose if this was a priority for me, I would have rested on Friday instead of racing but I'd rather race at the track than rest. Steve Pelaez showed up just in time to register and I loaned him my H3 backup wheel for his two Kilo TT's. He got second in the Elites and first in the 30-34 so I would like to take a little credit for that. :)
Thirty six miles on the fixed gear in six hours at the track.

About 11:30 AM
Kilometer TT:
H3 front, Velocity Deep rear 50x15, 170mm crank arms, broke out the aero Louis Garneau helmet I got from Cupertino bike. Used dedicated pursuit bike for this with dedicated aerobars, first time I have done that on the track. Flatted the rear disk two minutes before start, had to change cogs and wheels (note to self, leave a racing cog on the training/backup wheel just in case) forgot to move SRM rear sensor when I changed wheels, so no SRM data! I was riding the trainer to warmup but was getting really bored, so I decided to take a few easy laps on the rough apron. I managed to get a cut in my tubular in the last 100 meters that made a 2mm cut in the center of the tread. I only use the wheel three or four times a year and I managed to get a flat and can't use this tomorrow as I don't want to ride a tire with glue only twelve hours dry. This is why I love tubulars... So I removed the disk, removed the 15 cog from the disk, removed the lockring and 16 cog from my training wheel, seated the 15 cog on my training wheel, then seated the lockring and tightened the rear wheel so no slippage there and rezeroed the SRM, but neglected to see if the wheel speed pickup was correctly adjusted. I have my SRM set to autostart if speed and cadence are nonzero so I had cadence but no speed. The main downside of using a rear speed pickup on a track bike - have to make sure the magnet is in the same place on each wheel and use the same gearing all the time or have to move the rear speed pickup.

Slowest kilo ever, but one official told me I had a very fast first lap (maybe it was the fast looking equipment) and really slow last lap. 1:24 and change. Started wheezing in turn three of lap two and lost my concentration, should have just forced myself to push hard.
Previously have done 1:23.something, 1:22.51, and 1:20( with a 38 500 start at ADT)

After watching the rest of the kilos and skipping lunch we went into the Masters Match Sprint Tournament with every rider doing a Flying 200 Meter Time Trial to seed the heats. No women signed up so it was all boys for the rest of the day. This started at around 12:30PM

Flying 200 Meter Time Trial
H3 front and rear clinchers
50x15
165 crank arms
It started getting really hot and Rob and Chris offered to share their shade with me. Thanks guys. Plus I got to hear their take on the different sprints and how to do the flying 200.
I got a personal best time, previous best was 13.80. I thought I started a bit late in turn two and Rob Jenson confirmed this and advised me to start sooner. So next time I have to step on the gas mid turn one or sooner and see what happens. It's encouraging to know that I have plenty of room to improve here just by changing the timing and technique a little bit - and several of my efforts in the match sprints were 33% higher than my effort in this flying 200. I watched Don Langley (masters world record holder and today's fastest rider) and he took the whole backstretch to dive from turn two at the rail to turn three in the lane en route to an 11.7.
200 Meter Time: 13.55
T: 26.0
P: 643
S: 30.1
C: 115

Four of us in the 35-39 match sprints. I was seeded third so I faced second seed Pritpal Singh. Heat one I had to lead out the first half lap. I forgot what happened for the next lap. At this point in lap two, Pritpal had jumped and I was on his wheel but it seemed he was going very slow. He was razoring me and I probably should have drafted longer but by the middle of turn three I jumped out from behind him and gave him about four feet as I wanted to be out of reach of Captain Hook. Unfortunately for me he turned it on at that point and we had a drag race to the end without any change in distance between me and him - my front wheel even with his rear wheel. Maxed out at 34.5, eased up at the end when I ran out of room to overtake him.
T: 22.5
P: 726
S: 30.8
C: 118

Heat 2 versus Pritpal. This time Pritpal lead out the whole way. This time I jumped early in turn four on lap one. He told me I had three bike lengths on him until turn four of lap two and I must have died or he really turned on the gas to pass me. If I had done this effort in the 200 I would have gotten a much better time... Only maxed out at 33.5 and slowed to 32.3 by the line.
T: 27.5
P: 788
S: 31.1
C: 119

Now I got to race against Keith Rabbin for 3rd and 4th. Our 200 meter times were pretty close. I led out Keith for half a lap then I forced him to pass me. I watched him as we were riding slowly and waited until he looked forward in the last lap and jumped in between turns one and tow but he managed to nip me at the line by a few inches. Maxed out at 34.5 again.
T: 19.5
P: 869
S: 30.1
C: 114

Heat two versus Keith, he led me out initially. This time we rode slowly until the last lap and he jumped first in about the same place and I got on his wheel. In between turns three and four I stood up to accelerate and for some reason he started moving out of the lane so I had to slow a bit but I wanted to pass him then he continued drifting all the way to the stayers line so I had to give up at that point because I wasn't sure where he was going to stop so Keith got relegated and we got to do a third match sprint. Looking at the data, I'm sad he drifted up track cause I have my fastest recorded data so far on the track at 35.4 mph before I had to slow down.
T: 18.5
P: 838
S: 31.7
C: 120

Keith led out, then at the halfway lap point I passed him and worked on pinning him to the wall. This time we went very slowly until turn two of the last lap and
we drag raced from 150 meters out, his initial jump was better than mine and I held back way too much. He was able to get to the lane before me and pulled out and I stayed in the lane and was able to pull even with his seat but ran out of room. What's really interesting is I got to 35.1 mph and we only sprinted for a very short time.
T: 16.5
P: 873
S: 31.6
C: 120

12 August 2005

12 August 2005 Friday night racing

Haven't ridden much this week so it's a taper! Teammates: Paul Mircik in the 3's, Jim Ryan in the P12's. Only one master and one woman showed up so they folded them in with the 3's, this meant a much shorter rest some times between races. I tried to be a bit conservative and follow moves this time and it was boring just responding to attacks. So next week back to Woo mode and attack, attack, and attack..

peak flow 550
70 kg
8 lap to win and out
Tried to roll off the front again at the start but no one was having any of that so I pulled up after a lap and half and George Meilahn attacked and I got on his wheel. He pulled up after about a lap when he saw the rest of us and after a short pause he attacked again, this time I let the pack catch him but left me in bad position for the rest of the race as the stronger riders rode up the track.
6th of 10?
T: 4:59
P: 300
S: 26.4
C: 101

They did the kids race after the win and out then we had to do this immediately after the kids finished.
This became a race of attrition and only six of us finished with the three strongest riders, Brian Peterson, Paul Mircik and Eric Balfus taking two laps! out of me. I rode solo for most of the race as did George and Emily ahead of me.
25 lap points race
6th of 10
T: 11:06
P: 249
S: 24.8
C: 95

Same as last week - Eric went hard in the pole and I used the banking to get ahead of him. I led it out for two laps and mistakenly thought Eric out of the pole was trying to crowd me out of the lane and I responded by going as far as I thought legal towards the sprinters line but he said I went out of the lane - doh, my bad. So I backed off after he said that and I unfortunately was too nice as this let two other riders ahead of me in the lane. Afterwards he said he was just trying to ride my hip to hold off the other riders. One second of lost concentration sure does hurt in this race. So only eliminated two riders before I was out.
Miss and out
7 of 9
T: 1:34
P: 392
S: 27.9
C: 107

15lap scratch
Five lead riders eventually gapped Emily and I. She was able to help a bit and we were able to catch them three times and get dropped by them three times. The fourth time we were catching them it was two to go, and I wanted to attack but I was so worn out I could barely manage a paltry jump at the 1 3/4 lap to go mark.
6 of 8
T: 7:29
P: 294
S: 25.4
C: 97

They held the Elite women's points championship race. Only one woman showed up so they started the race and she got on the start line and automatically won.

Elite points race champs for fun
Stayed safely off the back and could not keep up when the pack speed reached 31 mph so I just dropped out.

T: 2:13
P: 275
S: 26.4
C: 99

07 August 2005

Timpani Crit 35+ 4/5

39/73
70 kg
Peak flow 450
Windy and very hot
Worked beforehand as course marshal and had to skip lunch and get straight on the bike to warm up.
Teammates: Thomas Oelsner, Chris Pearson, Rob Jensen, Jeff Vadasz, Gene Regan, Chris Tanner
Friendly rivals: Raymund Alvarez, Eric Peterson (not the promoter/official!), Juan Ortiz


Followed an attack at the start of the race, stayed out there for five minutes or two and half laps with six other guys. The McGuire guy was really strong but not very good at pacelining, when my turn came up he insisted on riding so hard that I could not pass him. The next time, he cut me off in one of the corners and then someone had to nerve to ask why I was not pulling... Up to this point the race was like a mini track race for me: T:5:25 P:255, C:95. Eased up and latched on the back of the group, we caught them shortly afterwards. Struggled to hang onto the back of the pack. Eventually saw Dean Haraguchi and Keith Rabbin from the track and then Juan Ortiz passed me. I thought about quitting but then I did not want to have my winning streak against Juan broken. With two or three to go I was planning on passing a particularly slow cornering guy who had a broken spoke on his rear wheel on turn two when he braked even more than the previous time and I missed his rear wheel by about two inches - this brought an exclamation from someone behind me - sorry! I saw Eric Peterson jump off the front with about two to go but he got caught but still finished in the top twenty. On the last lap I was about forty riders back from the front. There was one point between turns 2 and 3 there was an opening on the outside to move up but after I stuck my nose in the wind I hesitated. Probably should have just gone for it then just for the heck of it. In the final sprint was doing well but could still see about twenty riders ahead of me and a rider was drifting into my line so I gave up about thirty yards short of the line. At least Juan motivated me to go hard in the last lap, but I thought he was ahead of me and it turned out to be his teammate.

Looking at the chart, the speed when we were off the front versus the speed in the pack afterwards isn't much different.

NP 211
TSS 54
IF .90
Pavg 183
Pmax 921
VMax 35.5
PAvg 26.3
C Avg 80

05 August 2005

5 August 2005 Friday Night breaking away

50x15
H3 clincher
450 peak flow
70 kg
Changed warm up a bit to put in a hard effort, also recorded it. Felt good the first race but such a short rest after the second felt bad during the start of the second. Teammates - Jim Ryan in the P12, Kevin Worley in the Match Sprint and Olympic Sprint, and Paul Mircik and Steve McFarland in the 3's.


12 Lap Scratch
T: 5:47
P: 297
S: 26.4
C: 101
Set the pace early, no one seemed interested in working when I pulled up after two laps so I attacked from the front and after being chased down again I kept the pace up and finally Elliot attacked and when I saw none of my teammates going, I went after him, but the initial jump was not hard enough to shake anybody but it cut his lead down in half. Now I just rotated to the back of the group and could not keep up with the last surge.

8 Lap to Win and out
T: 5:14
P: 290
S: 25.9
C: 99
Started off slowly and the speed ramped up for four laps. I felt we had eased up a tiny bit and was about to attack when the X-men rider attacked. I jumped anyways but did not make a dent in his lead so pulled up after a lap. I got back into fifth position where I potentially could place. Paul was able to put in a nice attack to nab second. Steve McFarland was duking it out with Pritpal for third then pulled up and looked like he was giving up so I yelled at him to get on my wheel. I think we finished fourth and fifth.

20 Lap points race, sprint every five
T: 9:51
P: 276
S: 25.8
C: 99
Got gapped after four, Marc Franklin took a monster pull and almost brought us back. At this point I felt bad about attacking and closing the gap solo but after pulling the chase group for a lap, one rider attacked me and got up there barely. I gave up after that but Marc and a group of five others caught me and we worked together just to stay even on laps with the lead group.

Miss and out, 13 riders
T: 2:31
P: 344
S: 27.6
C: 105
Decided just to attack at the gun, see what happened. The X-Men rider had the same plan but he was in the sprinters' lane and I was up track so I was able to use the banking to aid me in passing him. After two laps the X-Men rider came into the lane above me and while I was trying to figure out what the heck he was doing Pritpal managed to hook me and drive me into the blue band, next time I am just going to hold my ground. ( I have a new nickname for him, Captain Hook.:) ) This made me lose my concentration and I said a bad word but Paul was behind me and counseled me to keep on going and I didn't want to make Paul get gapped so I pushed on and we dropped two more riders and I heard the sound of rubber on concrete as someone was accelerating past and it was Paul. I think I was the seventh rider eliminated as I could not motivate myself to get up sprint.

Got to help judge the championship scratch race. Pack of about thirty riders, a few breakaways, one almost lapped the field but the teammate of one of the breakaways brought them back! Don Langley made a late bid with less than fifteen laps to go. With three to go Giovanni Rey attacked out of the group and won with room to spare with James Hibbard and Larry Nolan coming in for the other medals.