and i'm totally green:blush2: any last min advice? its 7.3 miles out and back, i'm gonna try to hold a 23 mph pace which i feel i can do on a flat course. it will be hard w/ out my training partner to draft with!:D

Suffer

I've had great benefits from a heart rate monitor. It helps keep me honest, and I've learned what rate to hold depending on length of course. I think without it it would be hard to maintain a consistent max effort. Also, you never know what the conditions are going to be like, so unless you have practiced on this course saying you are going to hold 23mph may or may not be realistic. What if you can really do 25mph? If you know you can hold 185bpm for 7.3 miles and be totally spent at the end, do that and the pace takes care of itself. As your conditioning improves so does your pace.

That said, it's too late to get a heart rate monitor if you don't have one, so, on a course that short you basically just need to go all out, try for a fast turn around, and don't hold anything back after the turn. Make sure you are good and warm before you get to the line, sweating, but not out of breath, at least 40 minutes warm up.

Good luck!

thanks for the response, i def gotta get a hr monitor but tonight its just gonna be about how much pain i can tolerate. i'm gonna go all out and fight thru that stuff!

Don't go out too hard. You want to be going hard but not all out. Save your hardest efforts for uphill portions or headwinds. Agree on the HR monitor to help pace but if you don't have one yet, it won't help you too much on the first time. After you have done a few TT's or have a good baseline as to what you can sustain for 7.3 miles, then the HR monitor will help. Have fun and don't get discouraged with first time results. Just use it as a learning experience.

GF, how did you do? Where was this race at?

The Flash

yeah, how was it?!

http://buttar.com/events/2007/01.09.07.TTSeries/031307.htm

didnt finish quite aswell as i had hoped but its a start w/ lots of room to improve! 28 out of 37 got me 10 points in the series. Its behind Orlando airport every 2nd tuesday of the month really a cool setup. I was amazed at all the seasoned time trial riders there w/ their high end bikes and full suits and pointy helmets, got agood view of some as they wizzed by. Did manage to pass one rider that looked like he was gonna collapse but I was starting to cramp up and was hurting for certain! couldnt get out of the dang wind it seemed, oh well excuses excuses, it certainly has motivated me to train more! Flash you should come out next time April 10th.

//my names Jamie Jacobson btw and i live in cape canaveral not titusville (see results)

I may take you up on that race...we have one here in Tampa Bay on April 5th, but I may see if I can swing up there....

Congrats on the great effort! Keep track of this and think about what improvements you can make for next one....

All those crazy suits, helmets and wheels do make a difference. You'll see your times improve not only in TT's, but Tri's as well by working on this type of training.

Hopefully, I'll get up there next month....

The Flash--->