Track Nationals

The Victorian track squad arrived in Sydney on Sunday and after putting our bikes together, we headed to the Dunc Gray Velodrome. The track isn't as steeply banked as our Melbourne track so it felt different coming out of the corners. The endurance trackies did a group warm up and then we did a couple of flying 2km efforts to get the travel out of the legs.

The following day was my pre race day. It was raining so unfortunately that meant an hour on the rollers in the morning before heading over to the track in the afternoon. I did a track warm up then put my race gear on. I did a few efforts just slower than my race schedule. Both efforts felt good and I was happy that my legs felt good.

On the morning of my individual pursuit, I did a 40min spin on the rollers before breakfast to wake up my legs. I headed to the track and did 20mins on a light gear to get the feel of the bike and track. Then it was onto the rollers for my pursuit warm up which took about 40mins.

I was really nervous as this was only my second pursuit ever. Davo (coach) told me to relax and concentrate on sucking in air. I pre-empted the start gates and so I was already pulling forward before the gates released me. So I came out of the gates without momentum, got it going around the first corner but with jittery race nerves I sat down before I had really wound it up. So after this shocking start, I took a few deep breaths and tried to settle in. I was riding 18sec per lap so I concentrated on watching Davo indicate if I was on schedule or not. After 8 laps I caught my opponent but also started to slip behind schedule. I tried to lift my cadence but I was cooked. I finished in 3mins 47.9sec, completely wasted but 6 seconds faster than my first pursuit.

Now the waiting game started to see if I would make the finals. In the next heat, Tess Downing (VIC) rode a 3mins 46.9sec so I was now sitting in 2nd position. Josephine Tolmic was the last to start and rode a 3mins 42sec. I missed the gold/silver final but made the final to ride for the bronze medal against Vicki Whitelaw.

I rode back to our motel (600m from the track) and did some hot/cold ice bathing. Then I put the legs up for 30mins and rested. Back at the track, I did another pre race warm up on the rollers and found that my heartrate was still high from my heat. My legs felt a little heavy but I knew everyone would feel like this.

My plan in the final was to ride to my schedule in the first 6 laps and then Davo would tell me if I was up or down in comparison to my opponent for the final 6 laps. Whitelaw started out faster than I did and was ahead for the first 1km. I stuck to my 18sec laps and was even with her during the 2nd kilometre. She then faded a little and I was just in front with 4 to go. She then picked up again and we were even with 3 laps to go. Davo was screaming at me to dig deep and I knew it was close. The aero helmet I was wearing muffled all the noise and my legs were screaming in pain. I heard the bells ring simultaneously signaling 1 lap to go. Whitelaw found enough to secure the bronze medal as she crossed the line 0.2sec ahead of me.

I admit to feeling somewhat disappointed as the fairytale story of a medal in my first nationals did not become reality. I know I should be happy with my progress after 3 weeks of track training but coming 4th is always disappointing, especially when it was so close.

On Thursday, I raced the team 3km pursuit. Our heat went well but we hadn't trained together and rode too conservatively. The time was the same as what I'd done in my individual pursuit. We qualifed 3rd fastest and made the bronze ride off.

Our final was an amazing display of team work. We went out much harder, doing 17sec laps. Our opposition team, ACT had a slow start and after 3 laps we had them in sight. We caught them after 6 laps and didn't continue riding for an overall time but our coach said we would have done somewhere around 3mins 31sec. I thought that was really impressive with no training. So I collected a bronze medal at my first track nationals - yippee.

Now I am back to Melbourne to do some road miles and prepare for my season in the states.

Stay tuned