June 20 - Race Report or: How I Learned to Love Getting Dropped

So, apparently the riding I've been doing since separating my shoulder hasn't been enough. I got dumped about 8 miles into the road race for the Tour of Washington County today, and I'm not really sure what happened. It was relatively hot and muggy, and pretty breezy as well, but didn't seem crazy out. Here's the story:

The race started out pretty easy, with a neutral roll out to a 6ish mile loop we (not I) would do 6 times before heading back in for the finish. Once the officials started the actual race, the pace stayed pretty slow for a stretch, with us working over some rollers, false flats, fun stuff like that. Eventually the pace began to pick up about halfway through the first lap, and I was out in the wind a bit, but did a decent job of staying hidden. Then, toward the end of the first lap, the field began to split a bit, and I was toward the back of the main group. We hit a hill, and I guess I picked the wrong wheel to follow, as we started to get gapped. I finally got around that guy, and began pushing to get back up with the group, and I just didn't feel like I had much. Then we started to hit the rollers again, and also a couple bigger hills, but still nothing huge, and I just felt my heart rate going through the roof. By this point I was hanging with some stragglers, and I saw a guy with Evolution Cycling turn around to head in. I didn't really want to pack it in, but I knew it would be a long freakin' day out in the wind, and I'd have no chance to catch back up to the pack, so I called it a day and rode the couple miles in with him.

I looked at my power files when I got home, and my heart rate was definitely redlined, but my power output wasn't out of the ordinary, so I don't know if I just wasn't rested, or if I'm just out of shape...

Since I DNF'd the road race, I was ineligible for the time trial and crit the next day, but I wasn't too upset about that given my performance. As I'm writing this on Monday the 22nd, I took two rest days and am just trying to regroup for two more races next weekend. Hopefully Saturday was a fluke, but we'll see...

Total time: 0:33
Total distance: 10.2
Normalized power: 254