Keirins!

Well, that was a fun sort of a DISC session! Hard, but fun...

Warmup: 1/2lap powerjump, Entry + 1/4 lap: 57.3/140

Happy with the entry speed, 140RPM is good, only on 86" though. Do that on 99" and I'll be cranking!

The first of the 'work' exercises were a pair of 3/4 lap powerjumps, with the rider in front jumping first. This started around the F200 line, from ~10km/hr and hence down on the blue. I was a bit tentative accelerating on the first one, starting behind Dino, and I never closed on him after his initial jump. Got up to 52.1/128, so not too bad I guess though I don't have anything else to compare it to yet! The second effort, starting from in front, was similar - 51.3/126 from about 15m shorter.

Then we got a bit scarier! Well, not too too much scarier, but a bit at least. I borrowed a 14T from Carl since mine still hasn't arrived, which put me on about 92" for some gate starts - this time standing. I started off by not tightening the cog enough, so that when I stood on the left pedal to clip in, I actually unwound it! So back out of the gate, fix that, and try to slot back in to the lineup.

Eventually I got going, and the first effort actually felt pretty good - I'd been watching the others, working on the countdown in my head, and it went off without a hitch. I'm not sure on the numbers - garmin tells me I hit 53.8/106, but that doesn't quite seem likely. On the other hand, strava tells me ~45/~90, which doesn't seem quite right either.

The next two efforts were 1/4 laps, and while the first of those felt pretty good (probably could have gone a bit harder out of the gate though) and gave 41.7/92, the second was off - I lost confidence in the count (though it turned out I was right!) and so was quite tentative out of the gate. Not only did that affect power, but balance, and I was all over the shop heading through the bend, and only managed 39.5/90.

Then it was time for keirins! Other than watching a few youtube videos, I'd never done these before so I was excited and a bit nervous. I went back to 86" for these, since I couldn't get 82". The first one was with Carl and Emily, and I slotted straight in to third position so as to keep an eye on what was going on and not have to worry about people coming from behind. As we approached the point where the motorbike pulled off, Carl had been laying back off Emily and went wide through a bend so, taking advantage of what he'd told me in the warmup, I moved up behind Emily so as to keep him up the track, in the wind, riding the greater distance. As we passed one lap to go, Carl pulled forward around Emily and I waited back, not wanting to take the long line through the bend and wanting to hide in the slipstream that little bit longer. By the time I pulled out heading in to the back straight, Carl had a good 15 metres on me and I thought I'd left things too late, but I kept on pulling him back and was in his draft coming out on to the final straight. I pulled out, pushed pushed pushed and... no idea. Call it a dead-heat! I hit 55.7/138, which is right in a good sort of a range.

The second keirin was all six of us, and once again I pulled in to third spot behind the bike. This time though, Carl swung off to drop back, hoping to ride for Emily. That left me in second spot, behind Neil, which wasn't where I wanted to be! I didn't want to swing up and drop all the way back though, and I was hoping that as we came up to time for the motorbike to pull off, one or two of those behind would come over the top and I could slot in. Carl did do that, but couldn't pull all the way through and, as the bike pulled off, Neil jumped straight off, as I suspected he might. I wasn't going to try to stick with him for 2.5 laps, so I hoped that someone else would come around. But no. Or, rather, not for another lap, by which time Neil was well away. Eventually Dino and Nic came around and I grabbed a wheel, but with just under a lap to go it fell apart a bit - Nic swung up, thinking it was over, I went past Dino and heard him asking if it was over or if we were still going, Neil was 60-odd metres in front... I crossed in second, but by that point it was all a bit confusing and academic, and there was no real sprint, reflected in the top of 51.3/126.

I was pretty spent by the end of all that! I'm glad to have had the practice at the keirin, as Carl has lined me up to race on Friday with the BBN sprint night, featuring keirins at the end, so perhaps I'll have a chance to know what I'm doing! I'll also ride a F200, which will be a chance to see how my speed compares to the only other F200 I've done at DISC, 13.34s. We shall see!

Brief stats here.