First Kilo ever...ouch...

I used to have a real nice track bike, even took it down to Hellyer a couple 'o times and messed around on saturday mornings. Great fun, but i didn't think i'd get into racing down there so i sold it so i could buy a big lens for the Nikon. As this years masters championships got closer i kinda got swept up in the excitement of niki preparing to win herself a few jerseys, and at the last minute decided i'd bring my cheap-ass Bianchi Pista to the track on sunday and try to do the kilo. I rode it around Paradise saturday morning, then brought it to work and stuck a hodge-podge of aero bars on it. Changed the gear from what i ride on the road. And i threw the Zipp 303 from my road race wheel set on there for good measure. We drove down and made multiple trips to and from the car to get all the stuff set up. Canopy, chairs, trainers, coolers, camera bag, kit bag. Since this was only the second track race i'd ever been to, i just kinda wandered around took a bunch of photos, and asked some people what i should try to do in my race. Funny, they all just said "oh, the kilo? just start fast and go fast" Sounded pretty easy, just insert myself into the pain cave for a little over a minute. Having not much of a clue about warm-up, i just jumped on the trainer for a while, then as my start got close i went and rode around the warm up circle. I got called on deck and sat down on the podium to wait. Ruggy came over and sat w/ me and we joked a bit about bike racing stuff. He held me up for the start, and i took off. From what i heard later, i had a very un-track like start. I guess i did the exact opposite of what you're supposed to do, but i stood for the first half-lap, then sat down and got into the aero bars. The first lap was no prob, and most of the second felt ok. I could hear a few people yelling encouragement from the apron (thanks donna, niki and lorraine!). Then...the dreaded last lap. The back straight seemed at least twice as long as the previous laps...i wobbled around the final turn and heard donna screaming something about going faster, finishing hard. Yeah...right. I put my head down (not very aero!) and hit the line. I didn't really have any goals for the race as i had nothing to base anything on, but i guess i wanted to be on the fast side of 1'20". I just made it, clocking a 1'19.2", which initially put me in 4th, but i guess someone else in my age group clocked a slightly faster time at the very end of the session and i ended up 5th of 9. I was the only first-timer out there, so i'm happy w/ the result. I figure if i keep training, learn how to start better, and get some cool black wheels, i can do a bit better next year. I think i'm gonna have fun racing on the track...