Well that was an interesting session! I got to DISC earlier than usual (though still not as early as most of the other sprinters) so as to do a proper sort of warmup without being too rushed. That started off fine, spinning on the trainer, before going out on to the track to do a couple of efforts. First powerjump and CRACK! Pull the wheel forward in the dropouts, but manage to roll back to the infield without drama. This after I specifically checked the tightness of the nuts or lugs or whatever the hell they're called.
So that was a little frustrating, but no great drama although I rubbed a bit of rubber off the tyre and paint off the frame. I headed out for the 1/4 lap powerjumps from ~10km/hr paired up with Nic again. First effort I was behind, too close and too wide so that when I jumped, he saw me easily and held me off without any problems. Second round, Nic behind, he sat much further back than I had, more directly behind and accelerated in the saddle to start with. He got the jump and went around me with ease.
Rolling around afterwards, he let me know how stupid I was - always something to appreciate in a training partner! He let me know exactly what he'd been doing in the second round, and why, and how he'd been able to hold me off in the first round, and why. Useful stuff!
So this should be the bit where I tell you I beat him next time? No. Not quite. I stayed further back, closer to his 6 o'clock, accelerated in the saddle, threw a feint, and finally went later than usual, but he still held me off. Was closer though. One thing I noticed was that he stayed down really low, and moved up the track a bit as I jumped, which forced me to go around, rather than in a straight line, and to think for a second - probably just about enough.
Last round I lead out again, staying down low and focussing more on keeping an eye on him than maintaining my line. Which meant that I was down on the blue a bit, and we got yelled at by Carl to get up on the track. So I did, still keeping an eye on Nic, and jumped at a point which was a combination of a) looking like Nic was accelerating (in the saddle) and b) getting too close to the turn to feel I'd be able to accelerate fast enough to stay on the track through the banking! I managed to take the win on that one, although I was unsure if I'd reacted to Nic jumping, or just jumped. I tend to have a sneaking suspicion in such cases that I've ended up jumping first rather than reacting. Given that I normally react too slowly, it could just be that I need to recalibrate my senses.
After that we were switching to 250m MACs. What are they? Well, they're kinda like windouts, except they're shorter and you roll around on the blue line before diving in to the lane behind the motorbike for a lap, accelerating at each corner so as to go really fast. Fun! But before I could get out there, first was the traditional mechanical problem - Nic loaned me a 51T chainring so that I could get ~92" (spares have been ordered and should hopefully get here for next week) rather than 86" or 99" which is all I've got otherwise. So I hurriedly got that on (as hurriedly as I could, having never done it before) just in time, only to realise - my chain was too short! I could just barely get it on, but it pulled my wheel too far forward so that it was rubbing on the frame. So bugger, had to take it all off again, swap back to the 48T, and rush out on to the track to do my first effort after everyone else had already come back for a rest! So I nipped out there, straight up to 40km/hr, dived behind the bike and went all-out for a lap. And was well rewarded - 62.9km/hr at 155RPM. Noice! As I said to Carl afterwards, stealing a phrase from Douglas Adams "Like an orgasm without the foreplay!" Probably describes all of track sprint, really.
After a short break, it was back up to the fence (last in line, thank you! Needed a bit of recovery time) to do it all again. This time I swapped to 99" to see what would happen. I felt good behind the bike, perhaps a bit slow in matching the acceleration on 99" (though again, lots of rear-wheel slip. Doesn't bother me now, but surely it's detracting from acceleration) but caught the bike fine and stayed with it. Looking at the max speed afterwards, I thought that the first effort was the fastest, but it turns out that I actually hit 62.2 and then 62.9 again in the other efforts, so I held on through the session well even though I felt like bursting. In my last effort in the last corner I actually backed off slightly (mentally at least, and maybe softpedalled a bit, it's hard to remember!) because I was going to hit the bike. I hear tell that perhaps you lose less momentum (unless you hit really hard) hitting the roller than you do soft pedalling, so perhaps next time I'll have to try that instead.
And now, video:
Brief stats here.
No comments:
Post a Comment