Charm City C2 race analysis and recovery plan: Sunday, October 4
- Athlete: Sidney McGill
- Prepared: 2026-10-05 by Coach Luca
- Status: the recovery plan was approved and applied on 2026-10-06 to the calendar and TrainingPeaks (see the publish report). Sunday's top-up was skipped because of the 6-hour drive.
- Race: Charm City Cross C2, Druid Hill Park, Baltimore. 2nd place, behind Manon Bakker. Sidney lost contact with Manon near the end of lap 1, battled another rider for most of the race, then pulled clear on the last lap.
- Conditions: about 17°C, damp with light showers.
- Evidence:
- Sunday's files: a morning ride, the warm-up and the race.
- Saturday's C1.
- Last year's C2 on the same course (September 28, 2025), matched by venue.
- This week's training files and the fitness trend.
Bottom line
- Two second places at Charm City behind a World Cup-level rider. Strong UCI points, and on Sunday a race won tactically on the last lap after a bad patch.
- Sunday's "dead legs" came from lap 1, and the data shows exactly when.
- She started cold: heart rate 94 at the gun, after a 10-minute gap between the end of the warm-up and the start.
- She then went with Manon: 236 W for the first two minutes and 241 W NP for lap 1.
- On the climb about 1.3 km into lap 1 she rode 428 W for 30 seconds, her hardest effort of the weekend.
- For the next four minutes her heart rate sat at only 161-168 while her power fell. Her legs, not her heart and lungs, were the limit.
- Manon was gone by the end of the lap.
- She recovered into a solid race. From minute 8 her heart rate settled at 176-186, her lap times held at 8:35-8:50, and she finished strongest when it mattered. That's resilience and racecraft.
- The same thing happened both days. On Saturday she matched a surge on the climb (362 W) on lap 3 and lost Manon over the top; on Sunday it was 428 W on lap 1. Right now she can match Manon's attack for about 30 seconds but can't recover at race pace afterwards. That's the main thing to train and race around before Kings.
- Fatigue is real and Sidney is right to ask for rest.
- This is her fourth straight race weekend with travel.
- Her heart rate was suppressed on Tuesday and Wednesday, her top end was capped on Saturday, and her legs died on Sunday's first lap.
- TrainingPeaks shows CTL 66.7 and TSB -5.5, which looks manageable on paper. As before, the load numbers understate what racing and travel cost her.
- Her requested week costs almost nothing in fitness: rest Monday to Wednesday, a small pick-up Thursday, normal training from Friday. That's 1-2 CTL points at Kings and about 1 point at Nationals, PanAm and Ostrava. The World Cup timeline holds.
Sunday in numbers
Power exists only for the first 24 minutes. Power and cadence both stop partway through lap 3, almost certainly a pit-bike change onto a bike whose power meter isn't paired to her recording device. Laps 3-6 have heart rate, speed and GPS only. TrainingPeaks' whole-race NP of 210 W includes the missing section, so it understates her effort.
Minute by minute, laps 1-2
Opinion: what went right, what went wrong
Right:
- Two podiums and C1/C2 points that count toward her European start row.
- She didn't panic after losing Manon. She settled, raced the rider beside her, and won that battle with the best last lap of the group.
- Her top end was there on Sunday. The 428 W for 30 seconds and 329 W for a minute beat Saturday (364 and 290 W). Her maximum heart rate (192) was higher too. A day of racing opened her up again, as it did at Roanoke and Rochester.
Wrong:
- She spent it all at once. The race plan said to cap lap 1 at 225-235 W and not to match surges on the climbs above about 360 W for more than 30 seconds. On lap 1 she rode 428 W for 30 seconds and 241 W for the lap. Following Manon is the right instinct for a racer, but on Sunday it cost her four minutes of dead legs and any chance of staying in contact.
- Another cold start. Heart rate 94 at the gun: the fourth race in a row with a long gap between warm-up and start (98 and 95 at Roanoke, 114 on Saturday). A cold start makes a hard first lap cost far more.
- No power data for half the race, because the pit bike's power meter isn't paired.
- Hard efforts in both morning pre-rides (653-704 W for 5 seconds). They're small in themselves, but they're unnecessary on race day.
- Sunday's morning ride was automatically paired with the planned "Endurance top-up after the race" in TrainingPeaks, so it looks as if she did the top-up. It needs unpairing and relabelling.
Why: fatigue plus a specific limiter
- Fatigue. Canmore, Rochester, Roanoke and Charm City, with travel every week. Tuesday's suppressed heart rate, Saturday's capped top end and Sunday's dead lap 1 are the same story. She is not over-trained: her heart rate responded normally again by Friday, and Sunday's top end was good. But she is carrying fatigue that racing every weekend won't clear.
- The limiter. She can produce a World Cup-level surge, but can't recover at threshold right after it. That's repeatability. The threshold-with-surges, 30/30 and starts-with-follow-through sessions in the plan target exactly this. Until it improves, racing Manon means not answering her biggest surges in full.
Recovery and training plan to Kings (October 17-18)
Sidney's request, built in. Her training rules still hold: two runs a week, at least one hard session between race weekends, Friday pre-ride, Monday travel.
Over-unders drop out this cycle; Friday's threshold session covers threshold work.
Recovery rules for Monday to Wednesday:
- Eat normally on easy days. Keep carbohydrate at about 5-6 g/kg and protein at 1.6-2.0 g/kg, all GF/DF. Under-eating on rest days slows recovery, and with Hashimoto's it's a real risk.
- Sleep is the main recovery tool: an early night every night.
- Short walks and mobility are fine. No intensity.
Thursday readiness check:
- Resting heart rate back to normal, good sleep, legs no longer heavy, and heart rate on Thursday's ride back to about 145-155 at 165-195 W (her Friday pre-ride norm): Friday's session goes ahead.
- If heart rate is still suppressed (under about 135 at that power) or her legs are still dead: shift Friday to Saturday and Saturday to Sunday, and drop Sunday's long ride to 2:30.
What it costs:
These are projections in TrainingPeaks values. She would be fresh by Thursday (TSB about +8), and the deepest fatigue dip before Kings would be -19 instead of -21. The December build in Europe is still the main step up in fitness, and nothing here changes it.
Kings next weekend: racing Manon again
- New venue. None of her files from 2022-2025 are at the Kings course, so Friday's pre-ride matters more than usual. Learn where the climbs are, because that's where Manon will attack.
- Start warm. End the warm-up within 5 minutes of call-up, then stay on the rollers, with 2 x 20 sec hard at about 10 and 5 minutes before the start. Aim for a heart rate of 120-130 at the gun, not 94-114.
- Don't go all in on Manon's first big surge. Follow her if it's 20-30 seconds at up to about 360 W. If it's longer or harder, let a gap of a few seconds open and ride her own threshold over the top. On both Charm City days she lost far more by matching a surge and then fading than she would have by letting a small gap open.
- Race the second half. She was strongest late on both days: Saturday's lap 4 was her fastest, and on Sunday she won the battle for second on the last lap.
- Easy morning pre-ride: lines only.
Fixes to make
- Pair the pit bike's power meter to the recording device (or use one device that pairs with both bikes) so a bike change doesn't lose the data.
- Pair the trainer or power meter for warm-ups, so warm-up efforts can be checked.
- Fix Sunday's morning file: unpair it from the planned top-up, rename it "Charm City C2 - Pre-ride", and remove the top-up she didn't ride. Rename the warm-up and race files to match Saturday's format.
- Apply the recommended schedule to the calendar and TrainingPeaks. Tuesday's threshold session is on her calendar now, so this is urgent.