Borrego Last Stand: Conquering the 6-Hour World Time Trial Championship

The First Attempt: A Hard-Earned Lesson in 2022

When I first competed in the 6 hr World Time Trial Championships in 2022, I was not nearly as experienced in long distance cycling as I am now. I didn’t really have a solid grasp of my body’s needs for nutrition and hydration nor the experience of pacing for such a long event.

Sure I had done long training rides and had completed an everesting that still holds up as the fastest time done in my home province of Saskatchewan, but nothing can compare to sitting on the TT bike in aero position for such a long time. I remember when I crossed the finish line in 4th position in 2022 with 140.3 miles I said to my wife Lisa that I was never doing that again.

After holding third position for the majority of the race I had completely faded near the end of the event, I got passed in the last hour and knew I had nothing left. In the months that followed the race reflecting back I felt there was something that I needed to prove to myself and every year that followed the desire to go back to Borrego to better my result grew. Fast forward to 2025 and the time had come to focus my training to coming back and giving the 6hr WTTC another shot.

 

Finding the Right Coach: A Partnership with Rollfast Coaching

After training and racing for two years under my own guidance that led me to many other achievements in the cycling world I felt like the time had come to find a coach to really dial in my training and focus on this event. My search led me to Cinch Cycling who connected me to one of their coaches who had competed in this same event two times prior, Matt Tanner.

After my first call with Matt, I knew this was the coach that would be the right fit for me. His enthusiasm for my goal matched my own and we carefully formulated a plan and race calendar for the upcoming season that would accommodate both my new found passion for running and duathlon balanced with the the goal to return to Borrego in November.

Mid way through the season changes came with Matt and Cinch and a decision had to be made, stay with Matt and his new start up of his own coaching business Rollfast Coaching or stay with Cinch but work with a different coach. As much as I appreciated the philosophies of Cinch; there wasn’t much of decision to be made. With how close and well Matt and I worked together towards my Borrego goal it was a no brainer to stick to the plan.

 

Preparing for Borrego: Adapting to the Unexpected

As the days grew shorter and the temperatures of fall began to set in the race was near. We adjusted training to the indoor turbo for the majority of the work but as fate had it I was still able to fit in 2 long ride workouts on the TT bike outside in unseasonably “warm” weather of 10-15 degree Celsius weather in the month of October. These were huge confidence builders heading into the final weeks before the race. I knew I would be ready to ride for 6 hours when race day came. But, what these training rides didn’t prepare me for was the heat on race day. Luckily having some hotter training sessions indoors and an outdoor sauna helped to build up some heat tolerance.

It turns out Saskatchewan wasn’t the only place with unseasonably high temperatures for fall… Borrego on race day was 30 degrees Celsius to start the race at 10am which reached a high of 35 degrees in full sun… not a cloud in the sky; compared to 2022 when I did the event the start temperature and highs were 10 degrees cooler. At least there was very little wind which as a taller rider I appreciated.

My wife Lisa has always been a grounding force for me and I am lucky to have her by my side for all my big goals in cycling and life. “Just go ride your bike like you do…” she said with a short pause followed by ”for 6 hours”. Just the way she said it had a way to lighten the task ahead of me and ironically mirrored what Coach Matt told me in the days leading up to the event. The work had been done all I had to do was just ride my bike… for 6 hours.

 

Race Day: Strategy, Support, and Sweltering Heat

The water bottles were all filled, the food all organized and packed in my jersey pockets and bike, and after a short ride to the pre race briefing I was ready. It was go time. With the amount of racers in the event we were released in 3 waves separated by a minute. I was in the first wave starting at 10am. As always the riders separated fairly quickly and we were off. I was out in front for the first stretch of the first lap then subsequently got passed by 3 other riders over the first half of the first lap. I quickly re-passed one of those riders on the north end of the course and over took the race favourite momentarily on the south end of the course on the climb before subsequently trading spots back to third position where I settled in. The biggest difference in this year’s edition of the race was that all riders were required to come to a complete stop at the lone stop sign on course vs being waved through by a flagger. Luckily training didn’t solely focus on endurance cycling but some short VO2 bursts as well to keep that part of the system alive.

The first two laps were fast but I quickly realized this was far different than the race I did in 2022. I had already gone through two bottles and pulled into the pit to restock where Lisa was waiting and ready. We exchanged a single bottle on the fly that would rival any exchange in the pro peloton. Lisa’s job wouldn’t be as easy this time around; in 2022 we had done one exchange where I stopped for less than a minute and swapped all the bottles for fresh ones after lap 4; This race with the heat I would pull into the pit each 29 km lap after that first exchange but not to get just one bottle but getting two sometimes three bottles. Between what I was drinking and also squirting down my back I was going through water very quickly. After the race I learned Lisa even ran to the corner store to get fresh cold water between laps to restock our warmer supply for something colder.

The second save came from Lisa as well, I can’t remember what lap it was after but Lisa grabbed a bag of our nearly melted ice and asked if I wanted it dumped down my back which I quickly accepted. The watts stayed steady for the rest of the race and didn’t fade. Although my speed was slower than 2022 it was no fault of nutrition or hydration. Learning from 2022 where I had relied too much on electrolyte and liquid nutrition and not enough plain water we made the switch to water at the right point and kept fueling with solid nutrition throughout the race.

 

The Final Hour: Pushing for the Podium

Long Lap 6 came. This was were I had my biggest regret of my first attempt at the race. In 2022 I was starting to fade hard and the wind was starting to pick up, I was close to the cutoff to switch to the shorter more sheltered finish loop so I though if I scrubbed some speed I could recover a bit and also transition to the finish loop on my next lap through. This proved to be the biggest error I made in that race. Not only did I not get sent out on another long lap a but after settling into a lower power I had lost my rhythm and couldn’t get it back after that. This time was different I just kept telling myself keep going. As fate would have it this year we were transitioned to the finish lap with an hour and half to go. After the 6th lap I pulled into the pit for what would be the last time for a 2 bottle swap. My first finish loop lap was considerably faster than anything I did in 2022 and I felt confident that I could sustain the pace I was at for the remainder of the race. Averaging around 12 minutes a lap I quickly did some math based of my first couple of laps and figured I’d have time to get a total of 6 laps on the finish loop then I’d be done with about 10 mins left. But as the laps ticked off and I continued to push on I realized at the end of lap 5 if I just upped the pace a little more I might squeeze in a 7th lap… it started to sting a bit but I upped the power by about 10W and really started to dial things in around the corners. Rounding the corner to finish lap 6 I had a quick glance at the race clock and stood up giving one last big push to get the speed up coming out of the corner. It was all or nothing. Quickly I returned to the aero position and kept the power as high as I could which was another 40W higher than the last lap. It was going to be close. I came into the third corner with as much speed as I could taking it as close to the cones as possible then quickly avoiding a water cover that I had hit on a couple of the laps. I remember looking at my Garmin on the last few hundred metres… less than 30 seconds by my clock… the last turn in sight. As I crossed the line and and came to a stop in the pit I heard the announcement “Wave one is done” I had made the cutoff by just seconds (officially 4 seconds when I checked the results).

Podium Finish: The Sweet Reward

Hunched over my bike Lisa brought her chair over and helped me into it. I took a quick shower from two full water bottles that she had ready to cool me off. The race was done; I had not only bettered my distance from 2022 with an official total of 141.6 miles but I had got on the podium that I narrowly missed that year.

 

Gratitude

Matt put together the plan for that led me down the path of success. Many thanks go to his support, and the many one on one calls we had to dial things in from both on and off the bike to keep me true to my goal.

Where words fail me I can’t begin to express my gratitude to Lisa. For all her support from the long training rides to being my solo support in the pit. Without her this wouldn’t have been achievable. Thank you.