Surrey League, Seale circuit, Road Race, 6thPlace

Having just returned from Germany from a week long cycling in old home territory.  After this weeks quantitiy of riding, with 400TSS yesterday, not the most evident thing to consider racing the day after. Additionally, returning home from Germany past midnight, rebuilding the bike and getting to sleep only at 1:30 a.m. wasnt any good either.So here we go, all excuses upfront.

As expected my legs felt pretty rubbish from the start, with heartrate at 85% I was already breathing heavily and my legs were screaming to go back home and lie on the sofa...

3 laps before the end I was close to giving up, with 5-7 riders up the road no hope to win. I just couldnt do anything about the breakaways, hanging on for dear life instead. With an uphill sprint finish, usually my speciality, i was sure I would not be able to contest and went into the final bent 10th wheel, just to be safe from crashes. I did follow this until we hit the rise to the finish and just gave it a go. To my surprise i flew past the whole lot and won the bunch, for 6th overall, but honestly pretty empty.

Riding on old homesoil in Germany is increasingly becoming a rewarding experience

From 1981 to 1993 this was my "angst berg".  "Rund um den Elm" was one of the major classic road races in Germany and usually took on "Amplebener Hill" 7-10 times before returning to the finish in Braunschweig. Last year I took a delegation of what later became our LD Nat B team to the 100. edition of this race. We were the only clubteam entered amongst Elite teams.
This summer I returned to the Elm and rode the Amplebener quite a few times. It has never become easy, but the "angst" factor has vanished.
Maybe my recently imported Tuscan kit helped...

Hillingdon Crit; 6th Place

After a morning ride into the Hills I decided to do some early afternoon crit racing. Awfull hot day, but went to Hillingdon just to get some points. Could have won the race in bunch sprint if I wouldnt have allowed myself to get boxed. Ended 6th. But the heat and respiration made me feel pretty weak throughout the race, no way I could have sustained a solo attack.

1 YEAR ANNIVERSARY OF "THE BIG BANG"

It has been a challenging year. The accident has had longterm impact on my life. Still problems and pain with the shoulder, still pain radiating from the vertebrae, still getting tired early on and needing a lot more sleep than before. Life is not as it was before, but its the more beautiful. 
The rehab training and later the structured coaching by Rich came to a stop as it just wouldnt go with the job anymore, too much workstress, too many accidents on the bike this year, i basically had times when I crashed again with the wounds from the previous crash just not even completely healed yet. So I took a bit the pace out, reduced the riding, focussed more on work again. Probably through the intense rehab and the focus on the goal to get to previous levels of perfomance  made the vessel overboil a little bit and fatigue set in. Here a photo from a year ago, just noticed I never posted it.

London Prudential 100; 160km;

It has become like an annual ritual, getting up at 3 a.m., riding out to the Olympic Park, which is already 30km in darkest night, signing on at 5.00 and start at 6.00 am. all done and dusted just after 10.00 am, back home for lunch, heading back out to Richmond Park to glimpse the Pros wizzing past at 3 p.m.

Arriving fairly late I joined the rear of my startpen. From the off as expected hight speed, although not as mental as in previous years. By the time we got on the A4 I was amongst the front of the ride and stayed there for the entire race. Did quite a bit of work throughout, got into each climb at the front in order to be able to afford losing positions on the climb, hence never lost contact. The finale was thrilling. Got 4th over the line and 23rd best time in 4:01:26.
Not quite what I aimed for but given my current state a satisfactory result.

Average power just over 200w, NP 256w, best 5mins around 365w

Surrey League Crit@Cyclopark; 7th place

Feeling really shit on the bike, very hot and windy. Felt totally utterly useless, 5 got away, nobody responded and I wasnt able to do anything either. Still managed to pull myself together for a decent sprint at the end and got 7th.
Not sure why I mention this...