Course: Downtown Dolphin
Distance: 27.4km (14 Laps)
I fancied a change tonight. I’ve been skipping my Tuesday commutes for a few weeks in favour of a Zwift Workout called Chain Breaker. Its been good. I’ve been getting fitter and sharper until last week when I couldn’t complete it. I’m confident I was just a bid jaded physically and mentally so I’ve had a break this weekend. Just a couple of days off to freshen up until tonight. Initially I was going to do Cthe workout again but I decided to do a race and stream it too.
I haven’t streamed anything for a long time because I couldn’t be arsed and I haven’t raced enough either. I found this race which gave me a chance to ride the Crit City course for the first time too, so I signed up and gave it a go.
Crits are just bloody hard at the best of times. It was a pretty big field in the pen and it was really quick, as expected, from the gun. The turns come unusually thick and fast if its your first time and it took a few laps to adjust. The cobbled kicker, a 200m long uphill is enough to sap your legs each lap and for me it did.
If you watch my stream, watch how much I’m in the red for the first half of the race. Its probably harder than doing the workout. Anyway, at halfway I was cooked. You have to ride this type of event regularly to be sharp enough to deal with the pace. I dropped off the front group and carried on as hard as I could. Lapping riders and trying to stay away from the leaders. I got caught on the last lap and finished 31st. A bit meh! but not unsurprising but I did get a 2 watt increase in my FTP!
Anyway. As hard as any race I’ve done and as hard as my workout could have been, done in half the time! Result!
Ride on!
