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| Kim & Erika approaching the railroad crossing on the outbound |
Another cloudy, cool morning greeted us at camp. On today’s agenda, the 20K time trial. My stoker and I took a few minutes at breakfast to discuss our “plan of attack” for the day. We loaded into the vans for our drive to the start line. The bikes were already loaded in the truck from the night before so minimal equipment juggling this morning.
We arrived at the start line in Fountain about 25 minutes from the OTC. The sun was starting to come through and wind, thankfully, seemed to be down from yesterday. The staging time before the race was used to prep our tandem, spend a bit of time with the amazing hands of our athletic trainer, Katie and a bit of warm-up on the bike including a couple practice 180 degree turns which would be part of the event at the turn around point.
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| Kim & Erika and Charles & Michael approaching the railroad crossing inbound |
As with most race days, race anxiety was a bit high among campers - our team included. The conversation with my stoker reminded her that we were going for a bike ride. We had done the course yesterday and that we just had to ride the course one more time. We moved up to the start line and were off.
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| Kim, Jill, Wendy, Annie & Alex at the finish Photo bomb by Susan |
We shifted our communication around a bit today which seemed to help keep us on track. Checking in periodically to determine RPE (rate of perceived exertion) and talking through positioning. We reached the turn-around, had a pretty successful 180 turn (only a slight rub on the cone) and headed back. 10K to go. We made it over the train tracks in both directions with no trains and pressed on to the finish. We managed a hard push to the finish and finished in a faster time than our preview yesterday! Success! 41:39:76
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| Touring the USOTC |
Once everyone finished, we gathered to talk through our races a bit, loaded the equipment and vans and headed back to the OTC. Upon arrival, we broke down our bikes - gathering pedals, etc that we had arrived with showered and headed to lunch. My stoker and I spent the afternoon being tourists on campus. We took the official tour and stopped at the Team USA Store.
Around 5:30 we gathered for dinner with everyone followed by our final meeting. The meeting was a great reward. A recap of the week, awards for the tandem teams and coaches and heartfelt recaps of the week that we spent together. I was loaded up and ready to head home after the meeting so once things wrapped up and everyone was settled back in the dorm, I said my goodbyes and headed out.
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| Stokers and Dogs of Camp in front of Team USA sign |
The goodbyes were hard. Many great connections and friendships made this week and I look forward to staying in touch and hopefully riding with some of the campers and coaches at future events. A great week, lots of learning and a truly amazing opportunity!
That’s a wrap!
We received some coverage from the local press: http://gazette.com/colorado-springs-cycling-camp-gives-blind-athletes-a-leg-up-in-competition/article/1625946
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| The USABA Tandem Cycling Camp 2018 crew at the Velodrome |
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