Race Report: Never take a knife to a gun fight

This past weekend was the Cyclovets Omnium. Three days of racing consisting of a Time Trial, a Road Race, and a Crit. An omnium is kind of like a mini stage race, but you aren't required to race all three days; instead you can, say race the TT and the Crit, but miss the Road Race... or you can race the Road Race and the Crit and skip the TT, or you can... you get the idea. Your placing in each race is worth a set amount of points. At the end of the three days the points are totaled and the winners given the spoils. In the world of Cat 5 racing the spoils consist of plastic medals.



The first race, Friday's, was the Time Trial, 2 laps around the World Famous Fiesta Island Loop - each lap 4.1 miles of nearly pancake flat Mission Bay property - your only obstacles a brisk early morning head wind and the occasional drunken fisherman - a time trialer's paradise.



I'd raced the Fiesta Island Time Trial Series a month before and was properly schooled by skin suited greyhounds riding full on professional cycling machines; the type of bikes that put Lance Armstrong's $10,000 time trial rig to shame. Where anyone that kind of money to throw at this sport blows my mind. So I came ready for battle this time with a set of clip on aero bars and my saddle thrust as far forward as I could stand.



I rode to the start from my house to warm out, bringing my total time riding with aero bars to a nice round 1 hour - surely enough time to master the more aggressive riding position and razor sharp handling my new bars gave my bike. I pulled into the queue for the start and waited for my countdown.



Within the first 4 miles I had already lost 1 minute to the leaders... Of course, at the time I did not know that; I thought I was doing pretty good - only occasionally hitting my elbows with my knees, not weaving to badly from one side of the road to the other. The Powertap was reading a fairly steady 300 watts and my heart rate was holding steady just under threshold @ 184 - right on track. 6 miles in I heard the tell tale whoosh, whoosh of a tri spoke wheel. The rider effortlessly passed me by, a Porsche to my snowplow - him: full TT bike with front tri spoke wheel, rear disc, and aero helmet - me: road bike, clip on aero bars, road helmet, and my 3.5 pound powertap rear wheel. I snuck a quick look at his number 412, I was 408. Doing, the math (30 sec starts, 412-408=4, etc...) I'd lost 2 minutes on this rider... it did not look to good. At the end of the day I finished in 21st place, in just under 21 minutes, 2:38 down to the leaders.

Actually, I felt pretty good. I rode within myself, concentrated on steady power, stayed within my limits. I was just pushing too much air.

Don't get me wrong, "a good workman never blames his tools", but... I probably should invest in a TT bike.