The Baptism of Frankenbike

So yesterday was the race of truth, the (time) trial by fire, the first time to turn the pedals in anger all year. But that’s probably enough clichés for one blog don’t yah think.

It was my first race in Cat 3, it was Frankenbike’s first race as a time trial machine – in retrospect probably not a good formula for success. It also probably wasn’t a good sign that I was still fiddling with my bike the day before the race. Whatever.

The race was the Jason Broom Time Trial by the Boise Stage Stop. It was a bit windy and a bit cold at the start. OK, a lot windy, and a lot cold. It didn’t help that the racing started late, and that the interval between riders was planned for 30 seconds, but ended up being 1 minute. Ultimately I thought I would start at 11 ish – my start time ended up being at 1:15 ~ish. Whatever.

Hadn’t planned on camping out at the race start half the day, so I didn’t bring any food. No worries the start was conveniently located next to the truck stop, so some teammates and I walked over to the con store and had some gut bomb truck stop sandwiches – great pre race food. Things just kept getting better.

At least I had like 3 hours to warm up right? Well I lost track of time bullshitting and ended up with about 5 minutes of warm up. Whatever, I never liked warming up anyway.

Finally, in line to start I have teammate Darrin Miller in front of me (won’t be seeing him again for about a half hour) and teammate Shane Litzenberger behind me (I’ll see him soon). A little Rob Zombie music playing in the background at the start – that was good.

I start out and quickly discover the wind is, well, windy. Windier than I thought it would be. Windy enough to blow me around the road. Windy enough that when I glanced at my computer that the slowest I went was 28 mph, but was consistently above 30 mph. Windy enough that Shane didn’t catch me before the turn around. Windy enough that I rode the first 5 miles in like 11 minutes – ish.

I looked at the riders on the way back as I was roaring out – they sure looked like they were suffering. What was wrong with them?

I hit the turn around and discovered it was still windy. Windy the wrong way. Uh Oh.
It was windy enough that when I turned I was instantly over geared despite shifting down before the turn. Windy enough that I was WAY over geared. Windy enough that I was going so slow that Frankenbike didn’t want to shift. Uh Oh. Windy enough that Shane caught me soon after the turn around (I don’t think he was even breathing hard). Yup it was windy. Windy enough that on the way back I think I topped out at 16 mph, but most of the time was below that. Windy enough that I was worried about running out of gears. Windy enough that it really sucked.

Did I mention that It was windy?

I had two main goals. First, to finish. Second, to not finish last. I accomplished both, barely. I think I beat like 3 people out of twenty.

As for Frankenbike it was a solid performance. It obviously wasn’t a Cervelo, but it was fun to ride – and that’s what counts.