Blogs
Tue, 10 May 2011
Getting back on the road
By Jo Rowsell - Horizon Fitness Racing Team
For me the month of April is all about the transition from track to road. Following a short holiday at the end of March in Lanzarote it was time to get out on the road and begin this transition. Luckily for me my team Horizon Fitness – Prendas Ciclismo had a training camp in Italy arranged! It is always easier to get in the long miles in nice weather, gorgeous surroundings, and with some great training partners!
This was my first trip to Italy and I was looking forward to training on some new roads. The day I arrived the weather was hot and sunny and this continued for the rest of week. We did about 4 hours of training each day with plenty of climbing, sprinting and some team time trial practice. It was great to get to know the other riders on the team and get in plenty of miles ahead of the racing season.
For the first part of the road season my focus is time trialling and the National 10 mile time trial championships which are at the end of May. After taking a few easy days following the camp it was time to ride my first 10 mile time trial of the season on the A31 near Bentley in Hampshire. It was a hot sunny day but with a slight breeze blowing that would mean it was a headwind out for the first 5 miles and a tailwind back. I completed the course in 22 minutes and 11 seconds. This was a personal best for me on this course but it was a bit of a shock to the system doing such a short intense effort after all the long miles and I was sure there was more to come over the coming weeks. Overall I was pleased with my time and I placed 2nd woman behind the multi National Champion and Commonwealth Games Bronze Medallist Julia Shaw.
I took a break from UK time trialling the following weekend and travelled to Luxembourg with the team for 3 races over the Bank Holiday weekend. Day 1 was a 5km team time trial over 3 laps of a town centre course. A bad traffic jam had meant we arrived with limited time to prepare so after a few quick practise laps we were lining up to start! This obviously did us no harm though as we placed 5th overall out of 25 teams, beating many pro teams along the way! The following 2 UCI road races over the weekend were tough for me but I improved a lot on the 2nd day and I stayed with the front of the race until 28km to go and eventually finished in the 3rd group. Overall a good weekend with a lot learnt and plenty of hard racing which will help improve my fitness!
It was back to the UK for me after this and back to the 10 miles time trials! At the weekend I had another 10 mile time trial on the same course as 2 weeks ago near Bentley. I woke up to cloudy skies and strong winds; however I was still determined to better my time from 2 weeks ago despite the slower conditions. My strategy was to start as hard as I could, not pace it at all, and just hang on! Luckily this paid off and I finished with a time of 21:51! 20s quicker than 2 weeks ago and also first woman!
For more information on the Horizon Fitness Racing Team, visit www.horizonfitnessrt.com.