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Subject: Fiesta Island TT Racing Tips for 1st Timers & the travelling

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Posted:2/13/2008 4:24:00 PM

I've learned a few things when preparing for the Fiesta Island TT this past weekend, which I wasn't even registered to race; but!:

As a resident of Los Angeles county, near East LA in fact, prepare to progressively get used to sleeping earlier 2-3 days prior to that early 06:00-06:45 registration 100-150 miles away; I merely went to bed earlier and just wasn't able to sleep at all, but I did have everything pretty much loaded up in my car, so I just got outta bed at 03:15 for a nice quick breakfast and immediately drove off to destination San Diego in my pajamas...... oh yes, I'll filled up on gas here in LA county a couple of days before, which is from my past experience, MUCH cheaper than gas along I-5 especially nearing the San Diego area. I ate the other half of my breakfast about 45 minute into the trip which should prime me well for an hopefully-eventual race-slot at around 07:30-08:15

I arrived at the Fiesta Island TT registration at about 05:50, and while I was dismayed to find that my name on the waiting list is a distant 5-10 names back, the registration attendant told me that chances are "good" that I'll get an opening, which I won't know for sure until 06:45; in the meantime, I parked and set everything up for warm-up and other pre-race preps..... I finally managed to sleep for about 1/2-hour, knowing that if I do get a race slot, it should be a later start-time; so I'll catch some badly needed Zzz's, go get my eventual race-bib number, and have plenty of time for warm-up.

And that's what happened....... and it apparently wasn't anything unusual for about a dozen or more riders not showing up for that very early morning event.

Fast forward to the start: the two racers that were supposed to be in front of me weren't there, so if I was to catch anybody in the 4.1 mile loop, it would be at least the 1'30" racer on up. The wind conditions on the course that day was essentially some tailwind for almost the 1st half of the loop, and then a bit of side/head wind for the 2nd half; I was pretty much spinning an easier big-ring/14-15 cog most of the time at roughly 95-rpms; but my legs just weren't there for the bigger gears when I had the wind helping out a little. Course was a little dirty with moist sand, but the best lines from what I can tell were mostly there and available.

NOTE: IT WAS SCARY to speed toward a couple of easy 25-30mph turns on this course that looked as if the road in front of you ends with a cliff, and you'd be flying off in the the bay waters; BUT DON'T WORRY, IT'S AN VISUAL ILLUSION; you can take these turns at FULL SPEED VERY SAFELY, though it might help a little to go a little wide before the turn, and cut-in as you make the turn. In fact, there aren't any turns on this course where you'd need to slow down for, unless there's loose sand or mud. It would be nice if some of the loose-sand/mud areas be taken care of the day before.

In spite of the difficulties and personal challenges of the long distance journey to get to this TT event, I really glad I put myself through all this; and to come out with a decent result and points towards the SoCalTTSeries for whatever it's worth (I'd say it's worth is greater than the money/prizes at the crits/RR's). Fiesta Island really excellent and fast course; this terrain is about as pure a race-against-clock course as it gets, as opposed to race-against-clock+gravity in most other courses, in my don't-really-wanna-do-any-climbing opinion.

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