Train on what you race

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Last weekend saw the second round of the British National Points Series take place in the grounds of Drumlanrig castle in Southern Scotland…  It was an ace location for a race and is the birthplace of the bicycle no less! There’s lots of reports over on www.xcracer.com, but suffice to say local bike shop owner Rik has built himself lots of sweet trails that are a great counterpoint to the 7 Stanes trail centres in southern Scotland.

After getting a kicking at round 1, I was hoping for a better result. On paper 13th was 50% better, but I know my legs are lacking zip and time is short with round 3 fast approaching. Which is why after a few years of resisting the temptation and believing in the mantra of ‘train on what you race’, I promptly placed an order for a road bike on Monday…
Until that arrives I have some Bontrager disc specific road wheels to get me rolling on the black stuff. A few days of lovely sunny evenings stuck on a train was enough to tempt me to fit them to the Superfly, so I shunned the train last night and rode the 70km commute home instead. The result? A new P.B. of 2hrs, 10mins with an average speed of 31kph. Boom! Probably not fast enough to keep up with SIS-Trek rider Dave Collins whose wheel I hung onto for a few k’s on a commute home back in January, but a good benchmark and makes me tempted to get some of these to improve my aero tuck! For now though I’ll be sticking with the Bontrager Big Sweep bars and hoping the road bike help me break the 2hr barrier! Or do I just need a more aero backpack? I’ll be finding out soon…