American Track Foundation team

Harry Zaverdas photos of Kissena International Omnium

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6 28 2009 Kissena International omnium - analysis of placings in timed events

Below are my placings out of 43 riders in all categories for the various timed events:

-Flying 200 meter = 16 place (88" gear)

-1600 meter four lap pursuit - 12 place (90" gear)

-Standing 400 meter one lap - 6 place (90" gear)

Why is it I can place 6th in the 400 meter one lap and only place 16th in the flying 200 meter? The only difference is the gearing which was used - I used a smaller gear for the flying 200 meter.

Would I have placed higher if I had used a bigger gear? I always seem to ride a better flying 200 with an 88" rather than a 90" gear, but maybe I need to adjust my line and use a bigger gear.

The only reasonable explanation I can come up with is that my top end speed is not as good as my standing starts and jumps. Good standing starts require total body strength which can only come from heavy weight training. So maybe I made up time in my standing start, those 1,350 lb leg presses and plyometric jumps during the winter months really paid off in the standing 400 meter event. Placing 6th in front of many good Cat 1,2&3 riders certainly shows that one has to train and specialize in certain technical timed events on the track in order to get good times.

Chris Barbaria and myself proved this point by riding good 400 meter times - Chris won the 400 meter. We were practising this event in training with Andrew LaCorte during the Tempo Cycling training series -not bad for Cat 4 over 40 year old masters.

6 30 2009 training summary sheet

6 28 2009 Kissena Track 1600 meter profile

Time for this four lap effort was 2:15.51

The Garmin data above indicates a time of 2:17 but that was because I had to start the timer before I started my time trial and then stop the timer when I crossed the finished line. That added about 1.5 seconds to the time.

6 28 2009 Kissena Track flying 200 meter profile

Time for this effort was 13.62 seconds

Riding an atypical fying 200 Meter time trial at Kissena Track

All your preparations are done and you have warmed up, the sweat is pouring down your head. You are staged adjacent the start and finish line, your heart is beating at over 160 BPM and you haven’t even started your effort. You nervously look at the flags to note which way the wind is blowing and how strong. You hope the wind would die down when it is your turn to circle the track. Unfortunately the wind is messing with your head by reversing direction and velocity.

The whistle is blown, it is your turn - you are now cruising around on the banking of the track, trying to avoid swallowing any bees which hang out by turn one, and then swiftly you focus your attention to that overhanging tree branch at turn two which could smack you off your bicycle. On the back stretch you check that the coast is clear of any slithering snakes, yes snakes, there have been a couple of small snakes doing a 100 meter dash along the back stretch every now and then. Up comes turn three and you scour the area for any slow moving baby turtles, they have been known to cross your path. At turn four you are reminded that a sewer pipe is buried beneath as you gently roll over the bump. This bump requires some finesse to negotiate at high speed, hit it wrong and your bike will fish tail or worse.

Now you are approaching the start and finish line for the second time, you are going faster and you glance nervously over to the flags to check on the wind, not that it matters, you are already committed to your effort. You jump hard as you cross the start and finish line and you are now on your way at full speed at the bottom of the track, over the same path you just scoped out. Your time is yelled out as you finish - it is slooooow. Upon checking your gearing, you had forgotten to change your warm up gear to race gear.

Dam those bloody turtles!