Racing with the local cycling club

 One of my overall goals this year was to do the local bike club race series, mostly to learn something from the real bicyclists and also to challenge myself to something new. I wanted to do it last year, but I never put the races on the schedule so I alwasy forgot about them.

I have one flat TT and one hill climb done so far. I missed one flat TT and I'll miss next week's hill climb, both because of other comittements. 

I'm learning already! Lesson 1: I have found a new pain threshold. That's a very important learning point.

The first flat TT went ok, but there was the usual wind at the location out on the plains. OK, so the wind was just average, but it was still kicking pretty good at about 30mph. The first race (the one I missed) was the week before that with winds of probably 40mph, and that race was rescheduled because the week before that there was a wind advisory (50mph+?) that postponed the race. Anyway, I did ok on the race for me personally, but I got crushed by everyone else (of course). The race went as planned....slower on the way out against the wind, cruising on the way back with the wind, and I hit my target mph's. BUT, my math had been wrong, so I was slower than I wanted. My goal on this 10k course is 15 minutes; last week my time was 16:40ish (haven't seen the final results).  I made that goal without really knowing what I was doing other than saying I want to average 24mph, which if my math is right (and I'm bad at math!), puts me at 15 minutes.  I put everything I had into that 16:40 time, and I didn't make it. I think I I'd get close to it if I didn't do any workouts a few days prior, but that doesn't support my overall training goals, so missing those workouts ain't gonna happen. I'll just keep going in tired and challenge myself 110% with what I have.

The hill climb was tonight. I don't know the stats other than it's about 5.25 miles. Google earth says it starts at 5,080ft and ends at 6,535ft for 1,465ft gain.  It really kicked my butt. I was the only one on a TT bike....that's the only bike I have. The club folks are nice enough to let me join in. They really are a great bunch of folks. In any case, it was a BEAUTIFUL night to be out riding...very little wind, a bit of sun, and nice temps about 60deg.