2025 Results and Race Lessons

Well. That went poorly! I came into this race hot off a week of recovering from COVID and oh did it show! I felt pretty good during the warm-up, but was nervous about how my body would feel, given that my test runs throughout the week were not promising. I did a 30-minute opener workout on Thursday, which consisted of zone 1, with 4, 45-second anaerobic efforts, and felt very tired afterwards. Not a good sign. 

I started the race hard, and figured we'd see what happened. My lungs lit up instantly and I felt horrible for lap 1 of 3. I contemplated dropping out but decided to reframe my mindset. A good finish was out of the question, so I focused on keeping the power output smooth, at whatever level I could muster. When I felt good, I would push, when it came crashing down quickly thereafter, I focused on recovery. Rinse and repeat.  

End of the day, just had to chalk this one up to factors out of my control. Weather was fantastic, I was on a mountain bike for 2 hours and I finished. Great day!

Lesson Learned: Sometimes you need to accept that it's not your day, but there is always something to be gained. In this case, I got some training in and enjoyed some great weather. 

I'm not gonna lie, my first last place finish was discouraging. We had four laps total for this race. On the first I was pushing, keeping the pace up. As I rounded into the second lap, I quite suddenly dropped the pace and tried to go as fast as possible with less effort. I just knew I couldn't hold the pace from lap one. Third lap, more of the same, fourth lap, total melt down, granny gear slugfest. 

Not the best day! I wanted to drop out sooo bad, but I just couldn't allow myself to. 

So why. Why has the performance dropped? I'm guessing it could be that I am not managing my volume, and I am going into these events with too much fatigue. Another theory is that the large VO2 max block I did in February did not serve me well, and I should have stuck with more sweet spot, and threshold training. Pre-race nutrition off? Crash the week prior sapped my energy? I'm aging poorly? So many factors!

Regardless, I push on!  

Lesson Learned: It's ok to be frustrated as long as you don't hang onto it too long.