1st Win Of The Year

This week was the kickoff for the Cherry Creek Time Trial Series and featured a new course for the first time in years. For anyone who does not follow it, it is a 7 week time trial series, in Cherry Creek State Park, held on Wednesdays starting in April. 35 Plus team members Matt Segur and LT traveled down to race, as did 45 Plus team member Gene Palumbo. For some weird reason there is no 35 Plus race at Cherry Creek. So Matt & LT rode with the big boys in the Pro/1/2 race and finished a very respectable 5th and 6th.

However the big news of the night was Gene taking the win in the 45 Plus race and in a time faster then his team mates. In fact Gene's time was the 3rd fastest of the night. Gene has put in a lot of training this winter, with a new coach, and has his eye on Masters Nationals and Masters Worlds. Congratulations Gene on getting things off to a good start.

Race report from Gene: Wow. What began as a bleak day for a TT bike race, turned into a near perfect day. You can count on the fact that it will not only be windy at Cherry Creek, but it will be down right gusty. Not tonight though. This couldn't have played out better considering there was a brand new course this year with a very different profile, especially the finish. Instead of some small rollers, typically into the wind, and a slight uphill finish, this years course had a significant hill to a false flat finish. Simple put very painful. You had to save some power in the engine on this one or you would blow up.

I had a good warm up with LT and Matt and after the start my legs felt pretty good. Since it was the first race I was finding it a bit difficult to find the right gears and to get into a rhythm, but after the first turnaround I felt like I had a nice cadence. To try and drive a good pace I kept thinking of a mantra my 7 yr old son suggested I use "ride like a rocket train Daddy". If anything, this helped to mask the pain in my legs and my chest. My strategy was to try and keep a steady, and strong pace, throughout the course, try to accelerate, and shift up through the uphill finish. While I admitted to myself that I was not achieving this goal while it was going on I kept pushing though to the finish and tried to accelerate through the line.