Racing: Sloten velodrome

Last Sunday I had the 3th and final race of this years indoor competition. After some thinking I decided to go with my own Fuego and not with the demo Gaucho 28. Yivalté is my favourite, slightly faster and would give me more confidence on the tight 200 metre track.

Getting there this time was different that the usual train ride. By car and with a female chauffeur. Someone to talk to and perfectly on time. Most Huneliggers tend to be behind schedule most of the time ;-) Now I had time to look around and to eat when I arrived at the velodrome.

I quickly got used to the track and did a little warm-up. The 200 metre flying went awfully slow. I'd forgotten how to corner at high speeds and averaged a miserable 50.7kph. In 2009, same track, I did more than 55!

The Keirin went a lot better. I managed to corner at 55kph, without going high up the banking, I felt comfortable. The Yivalté-Pjotr320 combination made it to the semi finale. In the end good for an 8th place, based on the average speed I reached.

Than it was time for the criterium over 45 minutes+ 1 lap. I started from the back, but leaped to the front of the field within a few laps. Good thing was that I was able to keep doing these short sprints throughout the whole race. My main competitor was new to me. I kept watching him, making sure he wouldn't get away. That was a smart thing to do. I thought I had one lap on him. It turned it was less than half a second. The video shows the rest of the story.

Most helpful thing was that some people shouted advises at me. To go faster, chase someone, or to take it easy. During the 'easy' parts of the race my heartbeat dropped to just below 170. Left hand and hips did the steering and the occasional braking, right hand offered the drinking hose (?)  and my head relaxed against the neck rest. Zen cycling on the track :-) (Thank you Hankie) I finished beside Thomas, the other Nazca rider on the track. He was riding his Gaucho 28, and finished in 5th position.

I got a ride home with the van Dijken family, again. There 2 sons (5 and 7) are amazingly smart. They also took part in the 200m flying. You can read those results, and all the others on ligfiets.net



I'll try to keep the fast legs. More fast riding over longer distances is needed. With the improving weather, that should be no problem. Today started with a fast 60km ride with Mango Jenease.