I had high hopes for this time trial on the fast Brogborough course. Unfortunately, the weather featured a much stronger wind than I had expected - with some obvious (adverse) consequences! On the basis of the conditions when I left the house, and the forecast, I decided to ride with a deep section front wheel. We had 19 riders entered for the event, and I ended up not starting in my scheduled #7 spot, but as #20, having started the last dozen or so riders so that the timekeeper could get to the finish before the first riders. Accordingly, I was pretty cold by the time I started.
It was clearly going to be tough out to the turn. I'd not anticipated quite how strong the wind was, and my bike felt really quite unstable - dangerously so - coming down the start descent. And with that in the back of my mind I didn't really use the tribar extensions on the way ot to the turn. In fact, the headwind was considerably tougher than the graphic below - and with the gusts seemed to be wrenching my bike around.
Of course, once round the turn, it was a different matter! Unfortunately not enough to make up the losses incurred on the way out. One interesting consequence was that I was mashing out quite a high power - for me, at least. My normalised power was 259W
I finished with a rather disappointing 24:13, rueing my choice of front wheel.
