Madtown

Early season off road TT's are a nice mean way to wake your body up from the winter slumber.

This past weekend Jen, Tego, and I packed up and headed to Madison. We hadn't been there in way to long and missed the city and our friends there....oh, and there was a off road TT nearby at UW Platteville on Saturday=)

The TT course was 1000 feet of climbing each lap, lots of twists and turns, a log bridge over a big gap jump, and a starting ramp to get you going (pic above). The race was 2 laps and I went really hard on the first one...Ben started 30 seconds behind me so I had to get on it right away. I started to gap him. Then 1/2 way through the lap, I dropped my chain and slid my front tire out in a matter of a couple minutes..i lost 30 seconds to a minute from these two hiccups. Going into the second lap, I had put 30 seconds on Ben, but didn't know it. I kept pushing until the end and dealt with some calf cramping because of the effort (Ben also had calf cramping, and all we can figure is 80 degree temps and first hard mtbking of the year caused this).

One great thing about TT's is that given similar conditions and the same course, you can compare your results from previous attempts. In the end I won the TT and was 25 seconds off Jeff Hall's course record from last year. Minus the dropped chain and foolish crash, who knows. Either way I was 2.5 minutes faster than last year. Ben came in 2nd and trimmed over 4 minutes off his time from last year! Watch out for him...

Results should be posted here at some point: http://www.uwplatt.edu/org/uwpcycling/

After the race we were treated to some sweet jumps...this one courtesy of Richzilla.

After getting back to Madison and showering up, we got a babysitter for Tego and headed out on the town. Between some Great Dane beer and a boot of Spaten Optimator, we were all fat and happy=)

Top secret training you ask? Yes, this is Ben and his girlfriend Polka'ing the night away at the Essen Haus (German beer house).

Our biking tolerant hostess Mackenzie and my lovely wife=)

Until next time.