Practice runs

Friday was practice run day on the TT bike. This was the first real road test since I modified my position. I modified it even more after seeing the pictures by lowering my bars about 6mm (two spacers worth).

I went and did my usual TT practice route; North Dog Leg, East Old Springfield, North Peters, East Evanston. There wasn't wind to speak of but the effort felt pretty easy. I didn't want to push too hard, just hard enough to make it count. Ended up with a 13 minute effort at 272 watts. But the cool thing was that my average was 26.8 mph. I went and checked the weather to make sure there wasn't some sort of wind coming from the south and west. Weather.com showed a slight wind out of the south at less than 5 mph. Well, my west to east average was at the same speed as the south to north. Note: I wore no aero gear. Std Bell Sweep helmet, std jersey over top of my skinsuit and no shoe covers. I did use my race wheels.

What does that all prove? Nothing for now since there are no time trials until next March! Really it means that I felt comfortable (more comfortable than my old FIST position) in a more aerodynamic position, and could push enough watts in the new position. I have a few more weeks of decent weather to dial in as best as possible this new setup before shutting down the time trial work for the year. Then it's off to North Carolina and the wind tunnel early in 2009.

If I can start next year in the high 26's to low 27's for average, that should be enough to win several age group tt's around here. Hopefully, I can work that up to high 27's to low 28's by June. Not sure what speeds will come out of the wind tunnel...? To be continued...