2KX Documentaries: Like Hell On Lightning

Its weird how your brain works in the wee early hours of the morning while you're still in bed trying to get the motivation to get up. 5:00am. Time to get up. After a small wresting match with the down comforter (which never felt so comforting), I coaxed myself out from under its loving grasp. As soon as my feet hit the floor the adrenaline hit. Race day! And not just any race day, IMCCC Championships (Inter-Mountain Collegiate Cycling Conference).
The IMCCC Championship is a 3 stage race over 2 days. Criterium on Friday followed by a TTT (Team Time Trial) and Road Race on Saturday.
As I ran out the door I crammed a PB n' J down my throat. Hardly appetizing this early in the morn, but I had to get something in my system. That sandwich never really settled well.
Arriving at the start/finish line, it was like an ant hill. A whole mess of teams scrambling to get everything ready to go for the TTT. Luckily we had Joe (a team member who opted out of racing to be the race EMT, thus allowing everyone to race. A gentleman and a scholar- thanks). All we had to do was worry about our warm-up, Joe took care of the rest.
Since this post will be mainly about the TTT, allow me to explain the basics of our little race. A TTT is a sprint race over a relatively short distance, in our case a 14 mile course (7 out and 7 back). We had 4 man teams, but the time stopped when the back wheel of the third man came across the finish. The forth mans purpose (me) was to "burn out" with about 2 miles left, sling-shoting the remaining three ahead with maximum speed, like hell on lightning.
The four of us rolled up to the start line. The feeling right before a race is indescribable. I tried just to focus on my breathing while a million thoughts rushed through my head head. Joe stood next to us giving some last minute coaching, reminding us all of our duties at each mile marker. "Go hard, don't look back and give 'em hell!" Seems simple enough.
"Riders, 10 seconds", the official announced. Where a racers mind goes in those never ending seconds is beyond me, but I was there. There was complete silence as I starred at the open road ahead of us. It was about to be the longest 14 miles of my life. "5... 4... 3... 2... 1... GO!" The cheers of the crowds rushed back into my head. And so it began.
The cheers quickly faded as we made our way out of the park and onto the country roads. Nothing but the sound of wind rushing by us as we averaged almost 30mph. I still felt good at mile 7, the turn around point. "Don't fall over", was the advice shouted as we entered the hair pin turn to start back for the finish line. This was our only opportunity to get a look at the position of our competition. Teams whizzed by us. We gave shout outs to the other two UVU teams as we passed ways.
Then came my burn out point. 3 miles left, time to bring it home. I got to the front, put my head down, tucked my arms in and pushed myself as hard as I could go. I pedaled until it felt like my veins pumped battery acid and my heart was going to explode out of my chest... then I pedaled some more. Then came the black-out point, when after a scream of pain, I knew I was done. I dropped of the group as they sprinted the last 2 miles to the finish.
The sound of cheers came back as I coasted through the finish. Incoherent to most of the congratulatory words, I rolled over to the team and joined them in attempts to stand on shaking legs. Some were dry heaving. For the most part everyone was smiling, because we knew how fast we had just rode.
As the other teams sprinted to the finish, the results rolled in. We had taken 1st place in our category. Gold medal. Somehow, that made all the pain worth it.
Later that day we raced in a road race, where UVU had someone in the top 3 finishers of every category.