Tuesday March 29th Training RideThe Wheelsucker Report

The Wheelsucker has been trying to recover (and become stronger) from his nine days of riding in Spain. He has been doing easy rides, several this past weekend with his girlfriend, and his only hard efforts have been ten 25 second sprints, also done this past weekend. So he should have been feeling great and ready to rock for the Tuesday night "world championship" ride. But the Wheelsucker is never as ready as he would like to be and his sore back and allergies – his nose is a faucet and he is coughing all the time – were bothering him.

So it was an apprehensive Wheelsucker who rolled out at the very back of the large pack, determined to keep it as easy as possible. But Brian Whitesell and Patrick Hogan had other plans. They seemed to be on the surge-as-soon-as-you-have-recovered-from-the-last-time program. This was starting to annoy the Wheelsucker, but he compensated by not closing gaps, and simply following wheels when others did, so he never had to dig deep and go to his limit, and he was able to cover moves when others tried. The group never split, but there was steady attrition from the lead group. The new Tuesday/Thursday ride route has more short climbs and more places to drop riders or split the group.

A lead group of about ten were together for the last part of the route, from 214 to the finish. Ace was gone, probably sitting up for someone who had gone OTB. But Tim Shaffer, Brian Whitesell, Patrick Hogan, Tom Aga, Kyle Pitman, Ty Wu, Rick Paukstitus, Michel Wedel and others were there. A Bike Doctor rider was leading the train into the sprint, but Brian jumped just before the bottom of the last dip and hammered by the train with Patrick on his wheel. Suspecting the train would not accelerate enough to counter this move the wheelsucker jumped across and grabbed Patrick’s wheel. Brian pulled hard up the false flat and finally pulled off. Patrick launched, the Wheelsucker called down to the engine room for maximum speed and power, and Patrick simply rode away because the Wheelsucker's maximum effort was not enough to stay close. It was a long sprint for an aging wheelsucker who was having trouble breathing, and he sat up and coasted before the finish line. Patrick was gone, lengths ahead, winning easily. One or two riders passed the coasting and trying-hard-to-breath Wheelsucker before the finish, so Ty Wu was second, Tom Aga third.

Riding very easy for a couple of minutes, the Wheelsucker got his breathing under control and was able to make it back to the P&R.

Not great, but not bad for a day the Wheelsucker felt was not his best.

Wheelsucker data (approximated, as no intervals were set)

Average Power from start/finish line to finish line ~ 218 watts, ~ 267 normalized.
"race" time ~ 1:21:10, distance 31.25 miles, 23.06 mph