Wednesday, August 22, 2012

2012 Bogus Basin Hill Climb

Quick Stats
Time:  1:14:44
Distance:  14.96 Miles
Climbing:  3,358’
Can I get a Do-Over?

The 40th annual Bogus Basin Hill Climb took place on Sunday, Aug 18th and I decided to experience this race first-hand and get a “benchmark” for climbing to the top non-stop.

I wish I could say that I had an incredible race and defied gravity like a tiny Columbian climber.  The truth is that I rode somewhat uninspired.  Racing while uninspired leads to uninspiring results.  I had a hard time mentally getting into the race but I rallied for a strong finish, and then botched the finale by attacking on the final corner…only it wasn’t really the final corner…it was two corners before the final corner.  Doh!

I think it is very ironic that I came home from the hill climb and saw this article titled “The Transcendent Pain” on Bicycling.com.  This would have been a good read over coffee BEFORE the race.

Tran-scend-ent
-          Beyond or above the range of normal or merely physical human experience: "a transcendent level of knowledge".
-          Surpassing the ordinary; exceptional.

Being a mass-start hill climb with 200+ people, it would have been a big advantage to line up near the front and try to stay with the stronger riders.  I had no idea that you need to get to the start line 15-20’ early to secure a good starting position for this race.  I finished my pre-race warm-up at 9:20am and the lineup was already 100 yards deep.  Lesson learned.

I thought that “pacing by power” would be the smart thing to do in this race but now I am not so sure.  I think that next year I will turn the power display off and just “race”. (Of course I will capture the power data so I can look at it later because I am a numbers geek)

At least I have a lot of room for improvement.  

3 comments:

Adam Meyer said...

Dave- I've regressed with data this year.

On my SS, I am completely unplugged so there are no distractions or data points to be concerned with.

On the road, I have power, but generally only use it for intervals/time in specific workouts, and NOT to pace myself during a race or tuesday night worlds.

I leave pacing to my roughly tuned racing gut.

ericb said...

pacing with power for any race that is a time trial (hill climbs included) makes lots of sense as long as your levels are pretty well dialed, but as you know they are ranges and some days you are capable of the high-end and others only of the low-end. sounds like you were uninspired and maybe still at your threshold...but maybe that was one of those 90% days.

just as when you have those 103% days it doesn't necessarily mean you are much stronger, 90% on any given day doesn't mean you are weaker.

being willing to throw a power-based plan out the window in order to have fast wheels to chase, though, can make a difference.

just guessing for something like this it would be pretty key to stay with the leaders for the first 15-20', and then it appears you settle into a steady climb.

"all you can do is all you can do." sounds trivial, but it is critical.

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