This was a tough time trial with the altitude, climbing and false flats but I knew it was an opportunity to claw back a little time on some of the other riders, after all TTs are triathletes bread and butter.
One of the coolest things of the day was the fact that Lance and Levi were doing exactly the same stage as me. In fact their start times were less than 2 hours from mine. Lance was 10:45 and I was 12:39 and yes in a TT the slower riders normally go first. As the race leader Levi was only a few minutes after Lance and just like yesterday's stage there were very few spectators and the whole event was very low key despite the participation of the two the best cyclists in the world.
When it was my turn the people that had come to support Lance had gone but I still had a guy counting down to my start time and someone holding my bike steady which was a first for me. I came out of the gate charging and within about a mile I caught the guy who had started 30 seconds ahead of me. Before the turn around at just over 8 miles I had passed another 3 riders. On the way back I was really starting to feel the burn but I knew this was my event so I kept pushing and passed another 2 riders and if I had had another 200m I would have passed one more guy.
I really enjoyed the time trial and finished in 0:43:35 which was the 16th fastest time and it moved me 3 places up the General Classification (GC) to 36th, 0:14:18 off the leader. I also managed to finish within 10 minutes of Lance who finished in 0:34:22. Levi set an amazing course record at 0:32:29. Back to the hotel for the usual ice bath, to eat a whole bunch of calories and to try and get some rest.
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