RojoRacing
Donut Powered Wise-guy
Team 1 Espresso Leauge Live Stream and race report
We had 7 riders this week and got a perfect launch with Kevin the first rider up at the front straight away. Kevin took 1 min pulls while everyone else did 30s on the front. Kevin was kind enough to do the callouts which was nice because when Kevin is in the mix I always end up unable to speak and gasping for air in the second half.
There isn't really much to say about most of the race because the rotation was so smooth it was rather uneventful. In the first half, I was proud to have jumped in to close a few gaps early in the making but in the second half, I was damaged goods. I wanted to make sure my pulls were over 6.0 but by lap 2 it meant I was really struggling to recover at all and I was failing at getting into the blob and was just lingering at the rear. I did make some honest efforts to surge past Craig and George who were just after me but the sticky draft getting passed George was impossible at times. It felt like I was attempting to take a pull and after 10 seconds I was still at the rear of the group and now even less recovered.
It was awesome have Craig after me because when my 30 seconds were up I'd glace at the bottom on the screen and he'd be 2-3 meters back surging passed. It's super nice to not be left dangling out front for even an extra 5 seconds when you're on the limit. With 2.5 mile to go several of us were about to crack, we more than a few of us trying to get to the rear to recover. When 4 riders all want to be last, gaps will quickly form in the group and that's exactly what happened 20 seconds later. 4 of us let a gap open, I quickly got in there and pulled one or two riders with me but one more was still lingering for an extra few seconds. After that effort to bridge the gap I almost fell off but just managed to hand on. With 1.5 miles to go we got into the final small climbs and I had to call out to skip my turn. There was a 10 seconds of silence and then Craig also said he needed to skip, thankfully Kevin was near the front and just filled in getting us to the top. I wondered if Craig was debating whether or not to skip over those 10 seconds or if he was so tired, that the realization that he was up next with 30s less rest because I skipped hadn't set in until that moment.
As we crested the climb Matt got caught out at the rear letting a small gap open which quickly grew to 20 meters before he could react on the DH, so he silently dropped off. Kevin and Peter got us into the final sprint which Kevin started earlier then I think most wanted. I surge through to grab his wheel and put myself in that gap that was about to open between Kevin and the group, it was the least I could do after skipping a turn. Everyone wicked it up a moment later and everyone else came surging past in the final 20 meters. It was probably one of the tightest group finishes I've seen in any of the TTT races so far.
https://www.twitch.tv/videos/681844711?t=00h04m06s
We had 7 riders this week and got a perfect launch with Kevin the first rider up at the front straight away. Kevin took 1 min pulls while everyone else did 30s on the front. Kevin was kind enough to do the callouts which was nice because when Kevin is in the mix I always end up unable to speak and gasping for air in the second half.
There isn't really much to say about most of the race because the rotation was so smooth it was rather uneventful. In the first half, I was proud to have jumped in to close a few gaps early in the making but in the second half, I was damaged goods. I wanted to make sure my pulls were over 6.0 but by lap 2 it meant I was really struggling to recover at all and I was failing at getting into the blob and was just lingering at the rear. I did make some honest efforts to surge past Craig and George who were just after me but the sticky draft getting passed George was impossible at times. It felt like I was attempting to take a pull and after 10 seconds I was still at the rear of the group and now even less recovered.
It was awesome have Craig after me because when my 30 seconds were up I'd glace at the bottom on the screen and he'd be 2-3 meters back surging passed. It's super nice to not be left dangling out front for even an extra 5 seconds when you're on the limit. With 2.5 mile to go several of us were about to crack, we more than a few of us trying to get to the rear to recover. When 4 riders all want to be last, gaps will quickly form in the group and that's exactly what happened 20 seconds later. 4 of us let a gap open, I quickly got in there and pulled one or two riders with me but one more was still lingering for an extra few seconds. After that effort to bridge the gap I almost fell off but just managed to hand on. With 1.5 miles to go we got into the final small climbs and I had to call out to skip my turn. There was a 10 seconds of silence and then Craig also said he needed to skip, thankfully Kevin was near the front and just filled in getting us to the top. I wondered if Craig was debating whether or not to skip over those 10 seconds or if he was so tired, that the realization that he was up next with 30s less rest because I skipped hadn't set in until that moment.
As we crested the climb Matt got caught out at the rear letting a small gap open which quickly grew to 20 meters before he could react on the DH, so he silently dropped off. Kevin and Peter got us into the final sprint which Kevin started earlier then I think most wanted. I surge through to grab his wheel and put myself in that gap that was about to open between Kevin and the group, it was the least I could do after skipping a turn. Everyone wicked it up a moment later and everyone else came surging past in the final 20 meters. It was probably one of the tightest group finishes I've seen in any of the TTT races so far.
https://www.twitch.tv/videos/681844711?t=00h04m06s
