Mar 03, 2023

TIME TRIAL OF MY LIFE

TIME IS A CONSTRUCT WE ALL AGREE ON, and can be very real for us humans. For all other creatures there is day and night. Measured or not, seconds can mean the difference in another construct...

... winning and losing.

Aren't you glad you have me making mistakes so you don't?

This is a great one.

I thought I was being so smart and clever. Earlier in the week, I pasted all my start times into my calendar on Outlook. For some reason, I thought to share them with Surfergirl.

Good thing.

This morning, after a solid night of sleep in the van, we popped down to the Waffle House.

I love Waffle House.
She'd never been.

It's one of the reasons I come to this race.
I really look forward to it.
It's a time machine.
Backwards.

Fueled up, I doublechecked my start time: 11:40:30 AM

It was 830ish.

Plenty of time to get to the start, 30 minutes away, and relax before a 60 minute warm up.

Everything was according to plan.

9:40 AM

Why aren't you getting ready?

Still have 2 hours.

Are you sure?

Yep.

It says 10:40 start.

What?

Right here.

O. M. G!!! Arizona is on MST, Outlook updated all the times!!!!!

That's a pretty big mistake.
Rookie!

I hustled.
She pinned numbers.
No time for proper warm up.

On the line, I had another genius idea.

My new TICKR HR monitor from Wahoo, had finally connected yesterday and was working great. During the warm up it was working great. On the start line, I decided to stop the ride, which it deleted I later learned, and start a new Ride so I could look at the miles and exact time.

It read 128 as the official counted down. This is normal for me, my HR gets pretty high right before...

... ready for battle.

As I rode away, it started to drop.

120
112
104
98

Yep.

98 bmp, as I'm getting after it in a 10 minute time trial.

I don't use a power meter.
I raced on feel.

This isn't totally new for me. Short MTB XC races, I often put my Wahoo in my back pocket so I can concentrate on the racing and terrain and ignore what my body is telling me.

Who knows what the difference would have been with the HR data?

I'm 5th.

27 seconds off 1st... 5 seconds off 3rd, 1 second off 4th.

Want to know what else I did wrong?

Why not...

... I didn't crank my shoes down and had to do that within the first 100 yds.

3 mistakes.

How much time did it cost?
Who knows?
Who cares?

It's just racing.
Good times.
Fun.

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