This is what tells me my chronological age is>65:
- my eyes which have been short sighted since I was 14 years old and which have been very, very slowly getting more long sighted, over the past year (since my 65th birthday in fact) make a sudden dramatic leap into long sight. This might appear to be a plus until you realise I had to shell out $900 for new lenses to my glasses and also new contacts.
- my teeth which have served me well for many decades suddenly decide to lose important parts of themselves meaning that expensive replacements (actually only 1 so far) will now have to take up residence in my mouth.
- when deciding which travel insurance to buy, I realise that my choices have shrunk..
- when studying up for my next Italian class in the train, a young chick in the opposite seat marvels that you are still able to learn "at your age"
- I can no longer do early morning training..it's too cold and I'm too stiff
- every time I take a break from heaving weights around I have to go back to the beginning as I can no longer squat deep enough due to stiff hips.
- and FINALLY and MOST irritating, I know for sure that in any UCI event I will be racing against younger chicks (well ok women in their 50's!!) since there have to be 6 competitors in a class and there aren't that amount of women in the 65-69 age group still competing.
With more time to think I'm starting to rationalise the gear in my Aladdin's cave of bike bits and pieces.
- About to be put on are:
- a Miche disc (Shimano)+tyre, about 3-4 years old
- a Xentis front 4 spoke wheel +tyre about 3-4 years old
- a Corima 4 spoke wheel set (Shimano)+tyres, about 9 years old.
- a complete FSA compact crank set .34/50, Shimano/170 cranks..
- these are heroic cranks with a history...they helped me limp up the Passa Pordoi
and the Stelvio..
and there's more to come..ebay stuff that is.
Sunday's TT race
this was at Benalla over a 21.7kim course I've raced quite a bit..best time of ~36mins.
I was so over rain and mud I opted to travel (quite unnecessarily ) to Benalla on Saturday. It was a good choice weather wise 'cos although it was very very cold, it was dry and that was such a great change it made it worth the effort. The cabin was warm , but for some reason there was no hot water.....
Today was not going to be a PB as I've been a bit crook during the week some viral thing upsetting my sinuses. But you do what you can on the day. When I got to registration I discovered there were only 10 entries and (natch) I was first off. Hume vets normally put on a TT followed by a road race, but this time it was a TT only and also this time the winner was not to be the fastest around the course, but the rider who bettered their international age grade standard by the greatest margin.
Stupidly I'd not changed my cranks over to SRM and even more stupidly hadn't done anything about the read out on the Garmin being in MPH. So once again I was racing on perceived effort, a skill in which I lack experience.
Actually I wasn't doing too badly until about 3 /4 way through when all of a sudden I realised I'd been too thrifty with the chamois cream. The course is really flat and with no places where its legit to stand up to relieve the pressure, any issues with position are going to be unforgiving.... Its hard to say how much time I lost by having to sit up out of the aero possie but I'd put it at least 40 seconds, maybe more.
My result was the very worst I'd done on that course and while not actively sulking I was somewhat annoyed with myself until I discovered that I'd won the handicap ie I was the rider who exceeded the age standard by the most.....8 minutes. I'm not sure where these figures came from, but they must have used some fairly sluggish old ladies as their data base..guess I should be grateful for that!
Thanks Hume vets for a well run race and I'll be back during June for the 3 day event.
Next week the Boulie, then a crit and then another TT followed by the 3 days.
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