OH HELL YEAH.

Anyone racing the Silvermine Time Trial this Saturday? 

So if I can't share a ride to the Silvermine Time Trial at Harriman on Saturday--anybody? anybody?--then the TT at the Green Mountain Stage Race next Friday will be my first ever. Check out the course here and here. I've got a skinsuit (still looking for an aero helmet; hit me up if you're willing to loan one) and I've been practicing my aerodynamic positioning and thinking aerodynamic thoughts. So I'm mostly there, right? Ha. Dear experience time trialists: what are the rookie time trial mistakes and how can I avoid them? 

MaX

I am away on vacation so can't help with silvermine but have a TT helmet you can borrow if we can arrange meeting up. 

As as for rookie errors the big one is pacing. Know what your typical watts, HR, or perceived effort is for the duration of the race and nail it. Even better, do a "negative split" 49% on first half of course and 51% on second half. The biggest error is to go out too hard and blow up somewhere on the course. People usually lose gobs of time that way. This can be especially tricky on hilly races. I can say more but have to run. Let me know if you have specific questions. 

So many tips.

Get to the parking lot early enough so you'll have time to have a stress free build to your start.

Get a good warmup in.  Several people have posted warmup protocols on the forum, though not necessarily in this thread.  

Beware of starting too hard.  You'll have an uphill start, so it's easy to overcook the first five minutes and be gassed for the reset.

Start in your big ring and the second-biggest cog in the back.  You want to be able to get your cadence up to speed quickly.  Only shift into bigger gears when you're spinning too much.  Remember you want to hold back at the start.

If you can watch your power and heart rate during the race, do so.  With power, shoot for a little below what your FTP is for the way out, so you can pick up the pace on the way back.  With heart rate, it's a bit harder.  you want to be below your threshold hr by a bit on the way out, and above on the way back.

I often set an alarm on my watch to go off at what I want to be the half-distance time.  I can tell if I'm on schedule or behind.  It also is something to make sure I'm paying attention.

There's a hill on the way back which is the hardest of the race.  It's between Kanawauke and Tiorati circles.  My feeling is don't spike power, don't mash if you can help it, get out of the bars when your speed is below 18mph.

After you pass Tiorati circle on the way back, the rest of the ride is downhill.  Since it's hard to really kill it on downhills, my goal is to be just about on fumes by the time I hit  that circle.

MaxThorn said:

 Dear experience time trialists: what are the rookie time trial mistakes and how can I avoid them? 

Three golden rules of Time Trialing

1. Don't go out too hard
2. Don't go out too hard
3. Don't go out too hard

@MaxThorn,

result?  Bro?

Couldn't get a ride up to Harriman so I wasn't able to race it. But come Friday, I'll be trying my best to follow all the good advice recently posted here, during the GMSR Time Trial. And then, broshious, I shall have a result to share. 

I am registered for the Merckx category at the NY State TT on July 15th.  Currently looking to iron out logistics after some plans changed.  Willing to rent a car!  It's a bit of a hike, so I would expect it to take most of Sunday.  Alternatively, I would be down to get out there Saturday to explore Tioga county and ensure legs are fresh for Sunday's 40K TT.

Please let me know if you are
a) going
b) interested in going
c) neither not going nor interested in going, but reading this and wishing me good luck

https://www.bikereg.com/ny-state-time-trial-championships

(847)393-3122

I love me some armchair time trialing. What’s your warmup plan? 

Good luck!

On July 1st I took part in the NJ TT championships in Chatsworth NJ. It was a mostly flat out and back 25 mile course. I lined up for the 50+ field and felt pretty good.. for the first half. It was in the high 80s that morning and I felt it intensely on the second half of the course. 

I found a partly shaded area and draped an ice pack meant for sore backs over my shoulders while I warmed up on the trainer. I drank more than usual and felt okay at the start. I am thankful that I kept a bottle on the bike as I needed it. 

I set a decent split time (28:32) staying well within my threshold for the first half of the race. I was feeling pretty good. Unfortunately I fell apart on the second half. My heart rate was at threshold but my wattage was a good 40-50 watts below FTP. I was seriously thinking of quitting TTs and selling my rig during the race. I had done several hour efforts in the past several weeks and this was my worst performance. I can only figure it was the heat. 

I think I drank a gallon in the hour after the race. A lot of people experienced similar problems. I ended up in 6th place with a finishing time of 1:00:11. The winner in my category finished in 55:24. Damn. There are some real TT monsters in NJ. There are also guys with crazy aero TT rigs. I saw lots of superbikes like the Shiv with Di2. 

My original aim was to use the NJ TT to prepare for the NY TT champs this weekend, but family scheduling conflicts forced me to pull out of the TT. Too bad because I was starting to feel my form finally coming around and wanted to redeem myself. Maybe I'll do so next year (if I don't sell my rig first!)

Wanting to quit is pretty much the best sign you're going hard enough. After I did a 40k tt I didn't race that bike again for at least a year.

A lot of those TT monsters are spending dough in wind tunnels, not just on fancy rigs.

The redbeard sticker is the hotness.

@PatrickGrehan
That is a great time. I bet it was the humidity more than the heat itself that impacted performance. In high humidity your sweat doesn't evaporate quickly and the evaporation is essential for cooling. To try and keep you from overheating your body will then pump blood more quickly to the skin surface to aid with cooling. Hence you will have a high heart-rate but with less blood going to the muscles and  you won't be producing the power.

Sixth and 25m on the hour is no joke and a good performance.

Also that POC TT lid looks really good. Far, Far, Far better than their road helmets.

Nice job Patrick, 6th place is great, and you were so bloody close to breaking the hour! Ouch.

Take this with a pinch of salt, but could you get those forearms level? There's 30 seconds right there.

JohnMalcolmson said:

Take this with a pinch of salt, but could you get those forearms level? There's 30 seconds right there.

Is it though?

That look is so noughties Jules.

@JohnMalcolmson Last year I spent several days at Kissena Velodrome using the Chung Method to help dial in my position. This is the poor man's version of a wind tunnel. This site explains it better than I could: http://www.floataero.com/program-info/

I did it on my own rather than use the above service. Essentially I used used data from my power meter and speed sensor (not GPS!), as well as measures of air density, estimates of Crr (rolling resistance) and Eta (drivetrain efficiency) and plugged it into Golden Cheetah to get a measure of CdA. You can't really compare measure across different days, but you can do a series of ABAB tests where I would test 5 minutes in position A, followed by 5 minutes in position B and then repeating them.

This data suggested that having the arms up was slightly faster than having them straight out. Then again, the data was not wind tunnel quality. This may change in the next year as there are several devices coming onto the market that promise to provide realtime measure of CdA. Here is one example: https://www.bikeradar.com/road/news/article/notio-konect-specs-price-details-52590/

I doubt that I will have the desire to spend the $$$ these are likely to cost, but I would love to play with one and see how well they work. 

I hope people rent them. That would make the most sense.

AnthonyOtt said:

I am registered for the Merckx category at the NY State TT on July 15th.  Currently looking to iron out logistics after some plans changed.  Willing to rent a car!  It's a bit of a hike, so I would expect it to take most of Sunday.  Alternatively, I would be down to get out there Saturday to explore Tioga county and ensure legs are fresh for Sunday's 40K TT.

Please let me know if you are
a) going
b) interested in going
c) neither not going nor interested in going, but reading this and wishing me good luck

https://www.bikereg.com/ny-state-time-trial-championships

(847)393-3122

@AnthonyOtt

anyone joining you?  I hope so.  Canniballing a TT is the bomb.

Can't get the time to do it, otherwise, I'd go just for the fun--40k's are hard to come by these days.

@mugwump

I recruited an old teammate from my DePaul racing days (he now lives in Philly).  We will go up Saturday morning, ride the course, and stay overnight in Owego.  That should set us up for success on Sunday.

@Jules

Warm up plan (HR based because I don't measure power; neither did Merckx)

10-15 min: high Z2-low Z3
5 reps: 1 min on (threshold) and 1 min off (Z2)
10 min: high Z2-low Z3
Go to line 10 min to start

Really not looking to overdo it before the start

Patrick

i believe you mean ABBA testing protocol described here 

https://youtu.be/-crgQGdpZR0

@Patrick. Fascinating. What was your best CdA? Were you factoring power when you decided position, or purely CdA? 

Maybe the club buys one of those thingamajigs?

AnthonyOtt said:

I am registered for the Merckx category at the NY State TT on July 15th.

All I know is that Anthony's strava title is 1st Place Merckx NY State TT
https://www.strava.com/activities/1705418441

Please write a report!

Report and photos to come as I am on a train back to NYC now.  Snagged a victory out in Tioga county this morning!

Looking forward to hearing all about it!

Last week:
I worked too much (60+ hrs) last week and only rode Tuesday and Thursday.  I took it easy both rides.  My fear was setting up the Look in race mode and not having a chance to test it.  Of course, that's more or less what happened.  Oh well - no mechanicals.

Saturday:
I got up early and boarded a train to Trenton.  I met up with Ian, a college cycling teammate and close friend.  We made good time driving to Owego, getting to the hotel at 4PM or so.  After settling in, we rode to the start and the first 7K of the course.  I didn't want to ride too far (just 25 miles or so).

That area is hilly, but the race course was really flat.  Something like 300 ft of elevation gain over the 40K.  We got rained on riding back.  Made for a good excuse to clean and prep bikes before dinner.  My legs felt heavy on the bike after a day of travel.  

We washed up and went out for a hearty Mexican dinner.  I had one Corona with dinner, because I am 24 and it was a Saturday night.

I slept well.

Race Day:
We hit the hotel breakfast at around 8AM.  Oatmeal, veggie omelette, muffin, and coffee for me.  We relaxed, watched some TdF cobbles, and made good use of the hotel bathroom before driving to the race.  

I got in a good warm up on the rollers after triple checking equipment by riding around the area.  I followed the ~30 minute plan mentioned above.  I had a gel at 11AM and another at 11:20.  I started at 11:31.  The wind was negligible - truly a still day. 

For the first 10K, I found my "race pace" much easier to hold than on Saturday.  I caught my minute man at around 4K and my three minute man at around 15K.  I felt like a big fish in a little pond.  I hit the turn around at around 32 minutes.  Ian had challenged me to go sub 1:06, so I was happy at this point in time.  I drank some water from the half full bottle I started with.

I made no passes on the way back.  Just me and the road.  With 5K to go, I was pretty sure I had it in the bag.  It also started to rain lightly.  Having not been passed and having caught my one and three minute men, I was feeling optimistic.  And tired.  The drop position (shown below) became tough to hold after 45 minutes.  It's hard to describe why - sort of a full body thing.  I found a bit more speed on the hoods, so I alternated between the two for the rest of the race.

At 1K to go, I had legs to wind it up to 45KpH.  I am glad I did.  I believe the effort won me the race!

Result:
So I snagged a 1st place.....barely, just two and half seconds over the second place finisher.  1:04:30 is roughly 37.2 KpH or 23.1 MpH.  I feel I executed well, but I know I can go faster.  Speed has not been the focus of my 2018 riding.....yet #crossiscoming.  I feel I won more so because the pond was little and less so because I am that big of a fish.

The 6 in the Merckx was the largest field of the day....

It'll take me some time to break it all down.  Overall, I am happy with the result.  After focusing on distance running from December to April and base building on the bike from May until now, I have had minimal miles at threshold.  Breaking the hour is more top of mind now that I have a 40K under the belt.  It had been a couple years since my last TT effort.  The sub-hour 40K seems doable.  

Some photos: sorry they are lousy quality


Not sure why my hometown was shown here.  It said NYC elsewhere in registration.  I will have to be mindful of that should I go for a state title in the future.

That's awesome Anthony, congratulations! Get yourself an aero bike and sub 60:00 is definitely doable!

hotness/