Yesterday's RPM was pretty easy. We got about a foot of snow overnight the day before, so it was a little smaller group than usual. We didn't go that hard, with Todd, Glenn, and I rolling along at a moderate pace. Todd got a flat about an hour in and Glenn decided to try and drop me. He hit 27 mph on a 2% climb. I clawed my way back onto his wheel. He tried it again. I pulled him back again. I was not letting him get away.
We took it easy all the way to the finish line. I tried to make a move with 2 miles to go, but Glenn shot by me and beat me by about 20 seconds. Did I mention he's a Cat 2 rider? I'd fully expect him to smoke me :-)
Today was another story. We had a really strong group, with Tyler, Charlie, Mike, Ted, and I from QCW and a few new guys who I didn't get to meet.
Very quickly, Charlie, Tyler, and Mike were off the front. Ted and I, along with one new guy named Rob, formed the chase pack. About 30 minutes or so in, Mike dropped back from the lead group to our group. We had a pretty solid rotation. It felt like Ted and I were doing most of the work, but Rob and Mike were definitely contributing as well. We had a pretty good rhythm going and Ted and I worked really well together.
The last half mile of this course is a really brutal climb, reaching 7.9%. Just before it, Mike took off and quickly had 150 feet on us. I tried to bring him back had him down to 70 feet, but I just couldn't bring him back. When the course flattened out right before the finish, Ted came by me and I couldn't hold on to him. In the end, Mike beat me by 15 seconds and Ted beat me by 8 seconds. My finish time was 1:39:52.
The really great surprise was my average wattage: 252 watts. That was my best average wattage for any RPM class (ever, including when I was racing before I got fat). My previous best on this course was 242 watts in early January. I've never held that kind of wattage in my life. Based on that and some other analysis I've seen on the PowerTap lately, I'd guess my functional threshold is somewhere around 275 watts, something I never imagined I'd see when I started my quest to lose weight last May (hard to believe that was 8 1/2 months ago).
With just 8 weeks to go until the start of racing season, I'll be doing more threshold and VO2 max work now, so now I get to find out how my body handles the higher intensity. I'll be spending a lot of time working in the 330 watt range.... my legs are aching already...
