Nerves 2 Weeks Out

I'm sitting here in my living room, with just over 1 week before my first race of the year, thinking about the training I've put in over the past 3 months. The questions of " Have I put in enough work?" "Have I put in the correct type of work?" "What will everyone else look like at the races?" will all be answered soon enough.

These questions, and the nerves that come along with them, started up last week. I had some issues the previous week with some knee tightness during my trainer workouts, so I decided to take the week off the bike. This gave me way too much time to think. Looking back at Strava I've logged 100hr over the past 3 months. This is not a great amount of time, but is fairly good for the winter. In fact it is by far my best winter ever on the bike.

But even with this proof I find myself questioning if I've really gotten that much faster? I'm about 6 lb over my goal weight, but I know that my weight will sort itself out as soon as the race season gets under way. Only racing will sort out my questions.

This week I took it mostly easy, I've done a little weight lifting and worked on my bikes. And I've been eating whatever I've been having a craving for, just trying to let the body recover and be preped for the race season.

On to the first race of the year! It's shaping up to be a warm (60F) and very wet race. Not only do you have the snow/ice and rain that is already fallen on Iron Mt, but now they are calling for rain the night before the race. Now I've never ridden at Iron Mt, but if its anything like the Nox or Sequoyah its bound to be a very slow sloppy race that drive nightmares for months to come.

So what about that review I've been saying I would put out about my new Epic? It's still coming, but I wanted to get in an Endurance race before I did a review. But  I'll give you a short overview of my feeling on the bike. Paraphrasing my favorite Epic review I've ever read:

No matter how you look at it, it's still a Specialized product. You can talk about how it climbs, descends, corners, and how it rides. But it's still a Specialized bike, you either love it or hate it. Somehow they have made this bike able to be race day fast, but all day comfortable. You can climb steep up hills, then bomb down a downhill course without changing a thing.        

As always I just need to Ride More, Ride Harder, and Get Faster.