Diary of a Rookie Veteran Racer: 7th January ’11

I’ve been a Shutt VR customer for about as long as I’ve been riding a bike, which is to say about 18 months. In that time I’ve gone from commuting to work to buying my first road bike and riding a few sportive events.

Last year Shutt launched the Team jersey. Purchasing this jersey grants membership of the Shutt Cycling Team which is registered with British Cycling, meaning you can apply for a club racing license. That started me thinking about new possibilities in cycling, so I posted to the Shutt forums asking what it was all about. In typical style, Pete Bragg saw a head raised above the parapet and “volunteered” me as Directeur Sportif. Talk about a steep learning curve…

I figured that I can’t be the only new MAMIL out there who’s thinking of racing, so here on the Shutt blog I’ll be posting a monthly account of my progress as a 43-year-old (therefore “veteran”) road racing rookie.

So, what have I done in January? First off, I joined the LVRC. I’m actually pretty nervous about that – there are some serious riders there. Former champions. They may have some grey hairs, but they also have serious miles in their legs and good cycling genes. Still, the first race that fits my diary and region is in May, so there’s time for training yet.

Speaking of training: As well as getting in some hard miles on the icy roads and on the turbo (courtesy of the excellent Sufferfest videos), I did my first sportive of the year – the Evans Ride-It! event at Chieveley. This was meant to be a nice training ride with some other Shutters, but on the day pretty much everyone else had to bail out, so I ended up slogging around the course for almost 5 hours with mostly just a howling gale for company. Good ride though – some lovely scenery, great organisation as always from the Evans guys, and I managed a decent time – I even got some KOM points for Court Hill. The bike was showing the miles though – believe it or not, the muck in this pic of was from riding on the road and not just me trying my hand at cyclocross:

Chieveley, of course, is nothing in the grand scheme of things. 110Km in a day? Pffft! Team Shutt VR is gearing up for its biggest sportive challenge yet: the 3-day Tour of Wessex at the end of May. 329 leg-breaking miles in 3 days. That’s going to need some well-planned nutrition and training – but like all multi-day stage races events, it’s going to be a team effort. We’ll be staying together as a group, taking turns on the front, and stronger riders will help the others make it through. The aim is to get the best time we possibly can for the entire team to cross the line together. If you feel like joining us, even for just one or two of the days (fresh legs will always be welcomed!), just post to the forum.

To finish the month off, I went to Goring-on-Thames where Pete had kindly invited me to the 2011 launch of Team Squadra Donne, no doubt so I could see what a proper race team and Directeur Sportif looked like.

Looks like I’ll have to upgrade the Skoda with some decals and a big roof rack.

Spurred on by seeing a proper team in action, I did my first FTP test of the year that evening and scored a new 20-minute PB, increasing my threshold power by 15 Watts (6%). That’s the good news. The bad news is that all my training sessions are now going to be 6% harder…

January summary:

Tags: RookieVeteranRacer