Benchmark Team TIme Trial

Today was the start of the Benchmark Homes cycling series. Six races in total between now and the 23rd of May. First up was a 40km Team Time Trial, which would set the order of the team cars for tomorrows 144km road race around Sefton, about 30km out of Christchurch. 

 

As the first couple of teams rolled away from the start into a head wind, Gordy, James, Mike Vink, Jason, Sam and myself were just rolling around slowly warming up. The temperature was up in the mid 30's so we didn't need to warm up too much, as the sweat and heart rate was up just trying to keep cool.

 

Started out at a nice even pace, everyone sharing the work out to the turn around without too many hickups along the way. Each time I pulled off the front and went to the back, I'd gulp down cold water, to try and relieve my parched mouth - it felt like a heater was going full blast on my face. Skin suit was un-zipped, which isn't the best for aerodynamics, but keeping the body temperature down was a priority! 

We went past the Benchmark team at the 15km point (think they had sat up). After the turn around (20k mark), Sam had a back wheel problem so we had to carry on with out him, leaving us with 5 riders (the minimum number of riders to finish) for the last 20km. 

 

From that point we turned on the gas, drilling it at over 57km/h in places. Quite fast when everyone is within a few millimeters of each others back wheels. 5km to go and Mike Vink (under 19) came to the front and lifted the tempo even more. I was going cross-eyed just trying to hang on with the increase in pace! 100 meters to go and James punctured, so we coasted into the finish from there. We won in a time of 51:13, with a gap of 4 minutes back to second.

 

Good result, as we now have the luxury of the team car at the front of the convoy for tomorrows stage.

Joe.

Mid week TT

Went for a spin with the Meo GP boys at lunchtime yesterday and the legs felt like they had started to recover a bit.

Kept an eye on the weather conditions in the afternoon, and it looked like the wind was dropping so I headed out to the mid-week TT that the vets hold on the Liverton Road Circuit.

Cracked the old record for the 23km distance with a time of 30:35. Will have a go at trying to get under 30 minutes over the next few weeks. The new Avanti TT rig is humming!

Full results here.

Tour of Wellington

Stage 1

This was a short and quick 7km teams time trial, in which you just have to ride flat out to stay with in reach of the other top teams.

The Subway Avanti Team plan was to go out of the blocks and hold nothing back to go for the win. Jason Allen was pulling some massive turns, like he would when riding the track. The rest of us were just doing our best to come over the top of him and keep the speed high. In the process 'no calves' Eric hurt himself like he's never hurt before and made himself sick at the finish! 

We were only one second off the pace, finishing 2nd on the stage. A good result as it meant we didn't have to ride on the front for the next stage (no jersey to defend), saving energy, and then try to take yellow in a bunch kick.

Stage 2

From the start it was full gas with attacks everywhere... left, right and even up the middle of the bunch. Nothing stuck and the bunch stayed together right up until the 90km mark. 

There we came to a 7km climb, which was my chance to get away. As I was about to attack to ride up to a small selection, a spoke went in the back wheel... that was my race done and dusted. 

By the time i got a wheel change and started to chase, the time gaps had blown out big time, so I ended up riding to the finish in the laughing bunch and losing 7 minutes. Gutted.

Stage 3

The queen stage of the tour. We had Eric sitting 4th on GC, so had to make sure he had a nice easy ride to the bottom of the last climb, and try have someone up in the break so we didn't have to do any chasing. 

As it worked out the stage was once again full gas with attacking for the first 30km. The bunch let a break go, and lucky for me, I made the break. Had spent most of my energy getting into the early moves on the stage, but I rolled around with the break, getting a maximum gap of 3 mins, before the peloton slowly pulled us back on the 2nd to last climb. 

Made it over the top with the GC leaders, and did some domestique duties, going back to the team car to get bottles for the lads. Got dropped on the last climb, Eric held on to his 4th place on GC.

Stage 4

This was the last road stage and my final chance to get into an early move and hope like hell it makes it to the finish. The break had gone and I was still sitting in the bunch, bugger. Launched myself across the gap, but this took some doing – I was in 'no mans land' for a few minutes and what seemed like a lot of kilometres. 

Eventually made it across and lead out my team mate James for the 3 KOM sprints (he won 2 out of the 3). The peloton didn't want this break to surive either and we were caught on the run into the finish about 10km out. Stage came down to a bunch kick.

Stage 5

Masterton Criterium. Nothing to report here, apart from the crazy heat hitting Masterton streets. Apparently race director, Jorge Sandoval is planning on axing this crit for next year. Thanks Jorge!

Stage 6

The ITT around the bays. This was it, my last chance of a good result on the tour, so I didn't hold back anything here. I know this road very well, riding on it 3 times a week and knew deep down that I could pull out a special ride. 

Pre-rode the course before the start of the event and decided the strategy was to ride more conservatively to the turn at halfway and then red-line it all the way back to the finish. 

Put my game face on at the start line and launched into the ride. Set the benchmark time, which would only get beaten by the top two guys on GC in the tour (Vennell and McDonald). Was a long and nervous wait, but was super happy with 3rd place on the stage, 5 seconds behind winner Jeremy Vennell.

Stage 7

Lambton Quay criterium. Emptied myself on the opening part of the stage, riding on the front for a good 15 minutes to string out the peloton as much as possible and try to set up one of my Subway Avanti team mates to get away. Gordy went off the front by himself, got caught and then battled it out at the finish, taking second on the stage.

Dodging a real job

Article from Friday's Dominion Post here. 

Hawkes Bay Tour

Headed up to The Bay, along with Subway Avanti team mates, James and Pat in the Subway team wagon. Was going to be a hard task backing up last years result (where I took out the overall GC), but I was motivated to have a good crack at it. 

 

The Hub tour was held over 3 days and if nothing else, would be a good leg stretcher before the main goal of the summer, The Tour of Wellington. Starting with an ITT and finishing with a hill top summit finale on the last day. 

We decided to live it up while staying in The Bay - our hotel room had a spa, perfect after a hard days racing.

Carbo loaded on pasta most nights. 

Yep, life was good in The Bay.

Ok, to the racing...

ITT

Didn't quite have the speed needed to reach the top 5. Started well, but then just couldn't get into to a good rhythm. Still, it's early days - the speed will come from the racing over the next week. Finished 6th - stage was won by national TT champ, Jeremy Vennell.

 

Stage 1

Held on the Apley Road Circuit, where the road nationals was held a while back. First lap, James crashed about 10km in, leaving just me and Pat to fight it out. Nothing really special happened in the stage, a few breaks went, but were brought back. Finished 9th, 28 seconds behind stage winner, Jeremy Yates.

 

Stage 2

Criterium around the back streets of Napier. I decided to sit in and save my legs, but this strategy was not the best in hindsight! The rubber band was really stretching at times, with riders leaving gaps and sitting up. Ended up wasting more energy than I should of and losing 54 seconds to eventual stage winner, Yates.

 

Stage 3

A new stage for the tour with lots of climbing. Plan was to take out both KOM climbs, to try and win the KOM title. Easier said than done! The guys higher up on GC were still fighting it out for the podium and were laying into each other. Won the first KOM, with a solo attack 7km before the climb, just holding on over the top. Second lap, had to try something different, so took off up the road with a couple of others, rolling them at the top of the climb. Finished 6th on the stage, just behind Jeremy Vennell.

Stage 4 

Josh Page and Omer Kem took off at the beginning of the stage and built up a lead of about a minute. Heading into the 800 meter climb to the stage finish I attacked, but couldn't quite ride them down. Still, I was happy with 3rd on the stage (and 7th overall on final GC) heading into Tour of Wellington, which starts on Wednesday.

 

Nationals Road Race – Under the Radar

The team gathered around the lounge at Paul Holloways after a feed of pasta and a wide spread of salads and other good carbo loading fuels to discuss tactics for the following day – the nationals road race. 

We decided on going up the road in mass, take the field by surprise and get as many of us up the road as possible. Then the rest of team in the main bunch could take a free ride and follow any moves later in the race. The 7 of us knew the roles that we needed to take on, and we ended the meeting knowing we could pull something off after a disappointing previous day at the ITTs.

 

Woke up on race day to the sound of rain – never a welcome thing. Pretty much ran through my pre-race breakfast: 4 pieces of toast, jam and banana for topping and a couple of mugs of good coffee to get me fired up. Then load up the 4 cars and head off to the start of the race in Te Awamutu, just out of Hamilton to set up camp in the local Subway there.

 

We were all kitted up and just hanging in the Subway, team radios where handed out and tested, last of the race tactics for the day were finalised, we were sorted. Then it was picking out as much race food as you could carry. I grabbed 8 gels (popped a gel before the start) and 5 bars to eat during the race. Was pretty sure that would be enough food to get me through the 180km.

 

Heading down to the start as a team we looked really strong riding as a group. Must of been a bit intimidating to other riders lining up to start. Normal chit chat at the start in the bunch, then off down the road we go. 1km neutral zone and then racing is all go. Straight away 6 riders go up the road on the first little rise out of town, including two of my team mates. Massive Jason Allen and no calves Eric. They consolidate the break to just over two and a half minutes during the first lap.

 

In the bunch, we had slowed right down and no one was interested in putting up a chase at this stage, so Gordon and myself decided it was time to put our plan into action. We took off on a mission to cross the 2 minute, 30 second gap to the break.

At times we were riding at 65km/h and over, going flat out, making up ground on the break really quick. We dropped a fellow rider in the process of getting across by the end of the first lap, 30km in.   

 

Once we caught the break we drove it really hard, stretching the time gap out to 6 minutes, before slowly getting pulled back to 46 seconds at the finish. One by one riders slowly dropped off the break, usually after a Subway team mate had done a hard lap. 

On the last lap it was 4 Subway Avanti riders and a lonely Paul Odlin. Have to say it, but we worked him over good. First Jason attacked, Paul chased him down, then Eric and I attacked. The damage was done, we got up the road and waited until Jason and Gordy could bridge up to us. When we were all back together we team time trailed it to the finish (about 15km left to go). 

Team Avanti Subway, 1,2,3,4... what a day! Don't think anything like that has ever happened before and maybe it will never be repeated again. The icing on the cake was for James to come flying out of the main bunch to take the Under 23 title as well. Clean sweep for the Subway Avanti boys!

I'm resting up back in Welly for a few days, heading out on the Meo GP bunch rides (James has been out on the bike with us too). 

Next, I'm heading to the Hawkes Bay to knock it up at the Hub 2 day Tour, which I won last year. Then its back home for the Tour of Wellington, where the team is looking to carry on with its fine form and great start to the year.

Nationals Time Trial

New time trial bike arrived on the Monday, 4 days before the nationals ITT. Was always going to be a push to get it up and going, but the team at Capital Cycles were very helpful. They put everything down and devoted all morning to setting the new rig up and making sure it was running sweetly. Big thanks to Mark, and Paul for letting Mark put his other jobs on hold to look after me. Also thanks to Craig Loveridge for the super fast deep section front wheel – it pimped out my ride, and Backy for sourcing the wheel out. Also Steve Chapman for the use of his rear tri spoke.

 

Two rides on the rig and it was flying, was feeling pretty good riding it. I knew something special might be in the making, and then the worst thing that could happen, happened. Day of ITT I found out that the seat needed to be put back 1cm to be 5cm behind the bottom bracket. We quickly adjusted the seat and re-tightened the seat post bolts. Did the usual warm up, which consists of 30 minutes on the wind trainer with some efforts to get the heart rate up and blood flowing. Knocked back some caffeinated power gels, wiped off the sweat and rolled down to the start house. 

 

Get the call. 2 mins to go... starting to get really amped up for this one effort of 40km. Plan to ride around 85% (threshold pace) trying to reach 99% for maybe the last couple of kilometers. 10, 9, 8,7... heart is racing now... 6, 5, 4, reset the speedo, 3, 2, 1... launch myself down the start ramp and pick up speed around the slight up hill bend. Settle into TT position, drop down a few gears and pedal like crazy.

Feeling super strong, charging over the first couple of bumps on the road, and then... I lost my seat. Fu......ck!!! 

At this point I felt like throwing my bike into the bushes. What a let down, and I was up on time at that stage of the eventual silver medalist, Robin Reid. It took a long time to regain control, as I was yelling and cursing at my bike. That night I couldn't really face being around others with the huge disappointment of it all getting to me. Only 365 days until I can have another crack at getting it right.  

Vineyards Wrap Up

Heading into the last stage, I was only 47 seconds down on the leader and once team mate Yates, and only a hand-full of seconds back from 2nd and 3rd places on GC. That was after yesterdays stage which finished up Takaka hill, the longest climb raced in the country. Takaka hill sorts out the men from the boys for sure. 

Team plan was to go all out in hope that we could distance myself from the others, and work on getting time back. Attack after attack and then some more attacking riding was going to be the order of the day for the fast street circuit of approximately 50km. After trying more times than I can count, the race was over and came together for a bunch kick.  

Reflecting on the tour at the post race barbeque, I was happy with the outcome and couldn't say I would of done anything too much differently during the race. It was encouraging that all the good training from December was starting to show through and hopefully it will lead to some more top results in the weeks to come.

Tour de Vineyards

Currently down at the Tour De Vineyards here in Nelson. Day one was a 55km circuit race – won the 2nd sprint and pulled on the King of the Mountains jersey at the end of the stage.

On day 2 we rode from Richmond to Nelson Lakes District (90km), I won both KOM climbs and made the last break, finishing 5th, sitting 10th overall on GC.

Looking forward to putting it all on the line up Takaka Hill for a shot at yellow tomorrow.

Results are posted daily on cyclingnews.

Photo's courtesy of David Letsche.