Analyzing the race

I've been going over the last race trying to identify problems and how to address them over the next season.

From the very start I never really felt that good this past weekend. I just cannot go too hard on the starts or I'm screwed for the rest of the race. Did it again this past race. On sport starts I can hang with a bulk of the pack, not the lead guys. But for experts it's even a stretch to hang at the back. To get the best performance I need to ramp up slower.

But from a training perspective this is something that needs work.

My pedaling never felt really on. And my skills haven't really been there since the bike switch. I took a hard look at the current position and was comparing measurements to my hardtail which has been feeling pretty good. I don't know how I did it, but my saddle height was higher on the new bike. For some reason I'd set it at my road bike height which is 5mm taller. Also I haven't been able to properly measure setback. The plumb bomb just isn't that easy to do because it catches on the frame or other parts and is tough to do with high repeatability.

If I had the same seatpost I could reference off some part of the clamp but this seatpost is different. After trying several times with the plumb bomb it seemed that the saddle position was too far forward. I moved it back which changed the measurement from the tip of the saddle to the bar. I'd used the 80mm stem off the Hollowpoint but just from calculations on Bike CAD I'd figured that I'd need a 75 or 70mm. So I should have known from the start that the saddle was set wrong when the 80mm looked like it fit.

I stole the 70mm off my hardtail and am testing it tomorrow. So far handling feels better. My pedaling feels a little better.

One glaring deficiency in my skills was downhilling on sidehills. Which most of Douthat is. Most people love that stuff, but honestly I don't like most of it. Not until it gets off the sidehill. Here at home I can't ride our sidehill trails well either.

I asked for some help at mtbr and this thread shows some of the discussion. I'm going to practice weighting the downhill side and leaning in more. Ironically, the more off camber it is the better I do. Because I do weight the downhill side more. It's the smooth fast stuff with sidehill that messes with my mind.