New Jersey

Not the state (I drove through there for the first time last June; a story for another time) but what I picked up this past Friday at track cycling nationals in Carson, California.

Last week from Thursday through Sunday, USA Cycling hosted the 2012 elite and paralympic track nationals at the Velo Sports Center at the Home Depot Center.  I raced a pair of individual endurance events from the elite program, and then piloted tandem for Chester Triplett, a visually impaired cyclist based in North Carolina.

In order, my schedule was as follows:
Scratch race qualifier and final on Thursday
Paralympic 4km pursuit on Friday
Points race qualifier and final on Saturday
Paralympic 1km time trial on Sunday

I rode small gears for the scratch races on Thursday, did just enough work in the qualifier to make the final, and then treated the final as a hard opener to make my legs primed and ready for the pursuit on Friday.  The scratch race final wound up being rather fast, with the field splintering inside the last 20 laps (of of 60 laps total for the 15km race).  I finished 12th place out of 24 starters, with the dubious designation of being the last-placed rider who was on even laps with the eventual winner, Ian Moir.

On Friday, Chester and I put a big gear on the tandem, affectionately nicknamed The Battle Tank and warmed up for a 4km pursuit.  We opened up the first kilometer of the ride a little faster than optimal, but were able to throttle back our intensity and settle into a pace we could sustain for the duration of the race.

Mid-way through the race, we caught Kevin (and pilot Robert) which clinched the win.

We ended up posting a 4:37.7 in the pursuit.  We were both quite satisfied with that time for our first pursuit together.

On Saturday, I was back on the single bike for a points race qualifier in the morning and final in the evening.  The qualifier went smoothly.  Like the scratch race, I rode patiently and did just enough work to make sure to qualify for the final.  The final was 160 laps of high intensity suffer-fest.  I thoroughly enjoyed it.  Also like the scratch race, I intended for the points race to leave my legs primed and ready for the 1km time trial on Sunday.

The kilo was early in the afternoon on Sunday, immediately following the team sprint event for the women.  A picture of our kilo start is shown below.

Kilo starts are hard on tandems.  Chester and his former pilot broke a bike once doing a standing start like this.

Our final time in the kilo was a 1:11.0; not what we had hoped for.  However, there were quite a few easily-identified areas where we could have done better, so there is plenty of low-hanging fruit to pick for next time.

On Monday I hit the road from LA and drove across southern California, through Las Vegas, cut the corner of Arizona, across Utah, and back into Colorado.  There was a closure on I-70 in Glenwood Springs, so I was forced off the road and took a little down time before completing the drive to the front range.  Now I'm back in Boulder for a short window before taking off to my next adventure with the new job in North Dakota.

Back on June 25th, I drove from Washington DC to Boston in a day, and in doing so traversed New Jersey on the New Jersey Turnpike.  I think I like this new jersey better...

To quote Hannibal from the A Team: I love it when a plan comes together!