It won't be long, the racing season will be over and it will be time to reflect on what worked and what did not worked. One thing I learned that you just can't "swing it", are the high intensity intervals above your anaerobic threshold. In most criteriums and road races I did this year, I just didn't have the top end speed to instigate or bridge to winning breakaways. Looking back, that was to be expected as I really did not focus on that type of training.

Harder ..... Faster was an April Wine album from 1979. I can't find a better way to concisely describe what a team time-trial feels like.

Last Saturday, the Opus/A team (all four of us, David Albert, Michel Courval, Carl Dessurault, and myself) competed in the 4-man Quebec provincial team time-trial.

I apologize in advance, if you understand Canadian French, you may be offended by the title.

Last Sunday I was off to Magog in the eastern townships of Quebec,? for a 5km run / 40 km bike / 5km run duathlon. Many of us from the YMCA Parc Avenue Montreal triathlon club was participating in various distances.

Yesterday I had the option of driving 5 hours and doing a 2:45 hour road race (Ottawa Bicycle Club Grand Prix) or driving 30 minutes and doing a 1 hour sprint Duathlon (5km run/22km bike/2.5km run) in St-Lambert. After years of chasing races everyone weekend, and a few full weekends of racing in the last month, I decided to take the lazy option and went for the Duathlon.

I'm recovering this week from an intense weekend stage race, the Coupe des Ameriques, in Sutton, Quebec. For veteran cyclists that have a day job, a weekend stage is as close as we'll get to experiencing the thrill of multi-day stage racing.

This race is 4 stages in 3 days, with the first three stages, although short, are all within 24 hours.

I'm right now lying down in a Motel in St-Georges de Beauce, Quebec, with my legs ups recovering from the Master's A 114 kilometer road race and yesterdays individual time trial.

Yesterday at the annual 40km Gaston Langlois time trial. A generally flat, 2 x 20km loop course with one bump that is about 300 meters.

Again, like at the Granby TT, the Opus/Powerwatts team had a great showing. In the B Sqad, we had 3 racers in the top 4, with Stephane Lebeau first with an amazing time of 55:05, Eric Provost third, and Gordon Stovel fourth. From memory, the time from Stephane puts him fourth overall among the cat 1's! Quite impressive for someone in his upper 40's.

The Tuesday night Lachine criterium series is known to be a very fast weekly race near Montreal.

?Yesterday was the Pont-Rouge classic road race near Quebec City. The Opus-PowerWatts "A" squad had a complete lineup with Carl, David, Michel, and myself. The course was 5 loops of 19 kilometers for a total of 95. Mostly flat, a few little bumps that last about 1 minute, and moderate wind at about 20km/hour.

A quick warm-up, and Carl, aggressive as usual, suggests that the entire team starts from the gun, and we attempt a team trial. Not a bad idea, since we are all pretty good at time-trialing. So we tell ourselves why not? In my case, I just wanted to use this race as a hard workout.

Today is a recovery day. The ripped muscles in my legs are crying out in pain and telling I should have driven to work today, instead of commuting by bike. But with the price of gas and my green intentions, I think a light spin was the right choice.

Yesterday I raced an olympic distance duathlon in picturesque Mont-Tremblant.