It's been a bit of a whirlwind since I raced in the Junior Track Champs at the end of June. Happy enough with my form and achieving my best results to date at that level on the track, with 3, 4th places in pursuit, scratch and points races, but sadly just off the podium. I soon turned my attention back on the road with my main focus on the Arctic Heroes of Tomorrow road race in Norway which I was invited to on the 13th August as part of the (North East) Scottish Cycling Road Team. With this being my next obvious target, my training centered around it. Upping the miles, and getting in a heavy, intense block of training in the weeks leading up to it and using other races to build towards it.
On the 29th of July, just two weeks before we were due to fly out to Norway, I raced in the local Forres TT's. The early morning 10 miler first, in a time of 24.59 just a little over 30 seconds off my PB. But the effort left me on the floor after as I had tried so hard to better my own best time and the strength of the headwind on the return leg really knocked me for six. However, I recovered well and was raring to go again for the 2nd event: The 23 mile Hilly. I set out with one aim - to get under 1 hour 10 minutes. Unfortunately, this wasn't quite a reachable target. My mind thought it was capable, but my body wasn't - It didn't stop me trying though! I set off and paced my effort perfectly, I was in total control, and posted several PB's over the biggest climbs on the course then rattled down the descents averaging well over 35 mph. I had just less than 5 miles left to go when I crested the summit of the final climb and I could see the timer on my Garmin flashing, I had already been racing exactly 1 hour. I had 10 mins to sail the descent and power along the finishing straight; it truly was a race against time. My heart pounding violently, blood rushing to my head, I felt physically broken, but as I came closer and closer to the line I had to push that bit more, it was going to be close. I stopped the clock in 1 hour 10 minutes and 26 seconds. Missing out on the time I hoped for but happy with my effort. You can't say I didn't try. I stopped, got my breath back and headed to race HQ. Throwing myself down in the nearest chair my head started spinning and everything kept going black. I remember Peter speaking to me, trying to get me to eat and get my sugar levels back up but I couldn't work out who he was, it took me several minutes before I realized it was him. Huge shout out to him and everyone else who helped me overcome this especially Anne Murray and Colin & Fiona Duncan, who were amazing and had me feeling better in no time!
The plan was to do a final hard week of training as preparation for my main race in Norway but I agreed with Peter that my body had undergone a lot of strain from the workload we had already put in and knew that it wouldn't handle another big week without risking pushing it too deep and getting ill or injured again. So we backed it off early, and a 7 day taper became 12. We got it spot on though. And I was as fresh as a daisy on the day it mattered.
Sunday 13th August. Tromso, Norway.
After flying from Aberdeen to Tromso on the Friday, and a good course recce for the race on Saturday our team was already to go. This year the boys race was first. We went to watch the start and finish and cheered on our teammates. They did really well considering luck was not on their side with several mechanicals and Joe being forced to do a lot of the chasing on his own when the break escaped. So it was a very special moment watching him come home in 4th, just off the podium. Then the pro race began. The crowds swelled massively as hundreds of people crammed in against the barriers to get a glimpse of them. Us girls were lucky this year as being the last race of the day meant the crowds were still high in numbers and lining the barriers for our race and the atmosphere was amazing. The cannon fired and the crowd erupted, we sprinted off from the start. And the jostle for position began. The first two laps were pretty nervous as everyone wanted to be in the front out of trouble. But as the race drew on, more and more riders grew and tired and the race quickly split up on the climb. The bunch hit the climb at such a high pace, and I was seriously in danger of being dropped, my breathing was heavy and my heart rate was teetering around my recorded maximum but one thing that saved me was my desperation to get a result at this level. I didn't get on 3 flights, and miss my first TTT champs with my awesome RT23 team mates for nothing and above all else the work that Peter and I put in to get my form up to scratch could not go to waste.
Deep breath and gritting my teeth, I powered on and fought hard to move up the group and sit in the wheels to recover. Over the climb and into a very technical descent that caught quite a few riders out. I was a little far back coming into the bends and missed the split nearly every lap as I was on my absolute limit. But luckily for me I'm good at paying attention to what is happening in the race and I knew each lap the race always eased up for the finishing straight into the headwind, so I had to fight the pain and make sure I was with that group so I recovered in time for when the race kicked off again. It payed off. Although my aim had always been to get a top 10 in this race, I knew how easily I could have placed very far down the field as I had been struggling to keep with the pace for most of the race, so the fact I finished inside the top half of the field with 23rd I can't complain too much especially as it's a huge improvement from the last time I raced at this kind of level back in March. So although a little disappointing as it's not exactly the big result I had hoped for, I have to keep my head up now and look to the next races coming up. There are always more events to work towards, and the end point isn't when you fail to achieve your aims, it's when you stop trying to achieve them. Roll on the next few weeks, still a couple more road races to do before I can even think about a bit of recovery time!
