[Sportsandrec] My First "New Era" TT

[Thornbury, Kelly]

So, on Monday I took my completely stock, greenway tandem (as it is now affectionately called) on my first club TT. The greenway bike has flat bars, cushy "Lazyboy" saddles, and monster 26x2.7, 50 psi tires. 
The course was a 7.62 mile, slightly downhill road with about a 9 mph right rear quarter wind. 
The captain was a young lady from the club, who the week prior had run the course, with a slightly stronger wind, in just over 12 minutes. 
So, in the end we finished with the slowest time at 15:22, over a minute behind the winner, and never caught our "rabbit" who started thirty seconds ahead of us. Twice, on the down side of a roller, we ran out of gear, pedaling at almost 110 revolutions like there was no resistance at all...thank Look for my clipless pedals.  At the end we got off the bike, I was out of breath and could hardly speak while my captain was barely winded...poor commentary to my racing fitness. 
So, now that the first TT is done, and I have a baseline on personal and bike performance, I can start the modifications for more speed...the first being a 52 or 53 front sprocket to replace the 42 big ring...and more sprints in the trainer. Next year a new bike...one that doesn't weigh a ton and a half and doesn't have monster truck balloon tires. It might be time to really start putting that Bianchi together, now that I've been bitten by "the bug."