C-130 Hercules Time Trial

So starting out of the back of a C-130 was cool, but it would have been cooler to have a ramp that didn't make you wonder if you would either bust your wheels or just go face first into the tarmac coming down.

Actually, it wasn't quite that bad.  Maybe because I also kept wandering around thinking that I was #378 when I was actually #371 so I almost missed my start time like an idiot.

You can't really see it too well in there, but that is me rolling out of the back of the plane.  The start was interesting, semi-technical and VERY fast with a huge tailwind so it was easy to get well past 30mph and then find yourself going into a corner and, if you are terrible at driving your bike like me, it can give you a scare.

I also knew the guy in front of me was actually quite good so I was trying to chase him down and I know he made some serious distance on me coming out of the gate so I set about trying to run him down on the outbound leg.  I was happy that my HR came right up and so I felt like I was able to push pretty hard despite only going between 24-26 on the way out with the wind coming from the front and the side.  I think I got to within about 10 seconds (with some very rough calculations on my part) and passed a few other guys when we got to the turnaround...

And from there he was gone.  He was a bigger guy than me, so maybe he just had more power, but he really opened it up and even with the ten to fifteen seconds I lost when I had to slow up for a truck turning with a big trailer right in front of me, he would have killed me.  It was fun to roll past a bunch of guys but I was bummed because I knew he was in my category and I was losing the race even as I was spinning a 55x12 for a while and wishing I had an 11 on there.

I ended up finishing 3rd in the 4's, clearly a lot of work to do.  I am sure it would help if I rode my bike more than 2-3 times a week.  Hopefully I can at least go back this week and race the NJ crowd and do better than my previous run and just make all the right turns and see how I stack up.  Plus this one has at least one hill in it which I always think plays to my advantage, even when it doesn't.