Odds and ends

Tuesday I went out with a couple of NIST guys looking for a chill ride out in upper Montgomery County and had some great weather. Did about 28 miles at almost 18 mph avg.

Greenbelt Race #2

Wednesday I did my second Greenbelt race and it went pretty well. The race was 2 laps longer (whatever) and a bit faster, over 24mph this time but I felt better, It didn't seem like I was on the brink of blowing on every lap and I did about a lap on the front, which wasn't really planned but while I was there I purposely kept the pace reasonable and it was probably the slowest lap of the race but whatever, I wasn't trying to pull anything back, no one else seemed to get angry about it since they left me there and there were three laps to go. The next lap apparently in my head was the last lap, I was sitting about third wheel on the downhill, second wheel on the flat and then in my head the stars aligned and on the climb I jumped off the front to go for some sweet placings.... ha ha ha, the one lap to go bell was ringing and I realized what I had done... stupid stupid stupid! My lonely sprint cost me and I was cooked. Got dropped off the back and the last lap of the race was my cool down.

AABC DC Velo Ride

Today (Saturday) I met the AABC guys at Starbucks down the street for a 6:30AM roll out time. We were going to latch onto a hard groupride that starts downtown. I hadn't done one of these yet so I was open to pretty much anything. The really strong guys that run this ride (An elite team of cat1's) were doing a race in Wilmington DE. today so the pace was a bit more relaxed... about 25mph average relaxed! There were about 150 guys on this ride from all sorts of teams and abilities, and it is a hammerfest, if you can keep up thats great if not there are plenty others who can't as well. It was pretty cool to be on a major road in DC with over 100 other riders going really fast. On the flats we were pacelining at over 30mph and yes I saw the front once. Not pretty and rather than fracture the group, remove all doubt that I am a cat five wus and get all sorts of hate yells I kept my cool and suffered through it. I did not go to the front again. At some point the ride turns upwards and the speed decreases only modestly, This is where I popped along with what seemed like half the ride. It was a complete disaster, if it was the middle ages it would have been a corpse strewn battlefield and the group I was in would be the wounded slogging our way towards something but not entirely sure what. The group re-assembles at another intersection and we proceeded with another rolling melee. At a pre-determined intersection I got off with the other AABC riders for the climb back home. I was hoping for a little bit of a break on the way back up but thats not how our team rolls. If it was downhill perhaps there would be a chance but whenever the road goes up AABC's pace goes up. Got dropped twice during this chapter of the ride but it was all good natured and I love the feeling of relaxing when this type of ride is over... oh did I say relaxing? I meant going to the grocery store.

Lazy

A lazy blogger am I. It isn't that I haven't been up to anything, actually been quite busy but it's getting harder and harder to be motivated enough to post regularly. Anyway I'll give a recap of the things I've been up to.

Way back on April 30 I did my second race and did pretty well. There is a Wednesday night series and I signed up for the cat 4/5 race not expecting to last too many laps (1.4 mile circuit) but weathered it out to the end and was in the top 10 when I started my sprint, passed a couple people and then got passed by a bunch of people. Pretty sweet. Average speed 24mph and 100 ft of climbing a lap is pretty fast for me.

Wednesday April 30

Moving Time (h:m:s) 0:42:38
Distance (mi ) 16.95
Moving Speed (mph) 23.9 avg.
Elevation Gain (ft) +1,392
Avg. Heart Rate 179 bpm
Temperature (°F) 56.3°F avg.
Wind Speed ( mph) NW 4.6 avg.

My brother came down and visited that following weekend and He, Kelly and I did a bit of a ride on Saturday morning to kick off the days festivities. He took out the griffen and I rode the fixie. We did an hour and I think it gave him a pretty good workout and we felt ok gorging ourselves at an eventful Nats game and an evening at the DC Improv comedy club. Check out the link for the stats

Saturday May 3

The following day Steve M. called and asked if I was interested in a short ride, I was all for it and we hiked out to Sugarloaf for a climb. The highlight of the ride was two pronged, 1) the weather was amazing! and 2) We stopped for a wine tasting at a small winery at the base of Sugarloaf after the climb. In addition to the wine Steve and I dominated a platter of cheese. Now if you know me I really am not into cheese at all, something about the day and the time I guess and I was in. By the end of the estimated 1/2 pound of cheese however I am back to my previous position of anti-cheese... normalcy restored.

Sunday May 4

Kinda skipping the tedium of writing about training rides I'll skip up to the present and near past. Saturday I did a race, which is cool and all but I'm not really into racing a crit in near flooding conditions. It was raining hard and we were posting pretty insane lap speeds on the flat 6 turn course. Unfortunatly I can't really share what I actually did because I never pressed start on my computer. Doh! But as far as the race went I was in a group of about 6 guys off the front for almost the whole race, there was about 4 guys doing work and I was one of them. The wheel suckers where being taunted but perhaps I should have been one of them because with three laps to go after a pull I died... I was feeling good and then I was feeling bad. Really bad. So I got dropped, did a lap by myself and a lap with some other guys and finished after my half hour smarter and stronger.

After the race Kelly and I went into Frederick where we were going to meet Steve and Eva for a particularly hard ride. I kept walking to keep the stiffness from creeping into my legs after the race and really didn't feel bad at all, c'mon it really was only half an hour! After a bite to eat the four of us headed out on an exelent ride spent going up and down. Check out the elevation profile on this one (The Catoctin Climber) ...



And here is the route for those interested...


View Larger Map

I must say one thing... Harp hill (Mile 10) is a killer... one of the hardest things I've done, certainly the hardest thing Kelly has ever done and she was a super star up it keeping the motor running all the way to the top. Again this thing was nasty.

Today (Sunday) I went out with the team for a ball breaker ride after the Saturday I put myself through. It was a joint ride with ABRT that seemed to be focused on climbing. We took a textured ride to Sugarloaf and I did two laps on the sucker while those feeling the love did three. Motionbased Link.

So lets briefly recap the weekend.

>10,000 ft of climbing
7.5 hours in the saddle
1 race.
Sore legs.

Monday will be interesting.

Weekend Riding

Saturday I was still feeling the effects of the week in my legs so I went on a ride with the Kdog. We did a chill 20 miles and called it a day. Sunday was a bit harder riding with the guys. Harder, colder and wetter. It was pretty miserable but since the suffering existed there was something other the weather to concentrate on. We did a reconnaissance on the Poolsville Race course and the Murad course and booked it home because Doug had a spousal deadline to meet.

Moving Time (h:m:s) 2:35:06
Distance (mi ) 49.70
Moving Speed (mph) 19.2 avg.
Elevation Gain (ft) +2,310
Avg. Heart Rate 162 bpm
Temperature (°F) 55.4°F avg.
Wind Speed ( mph) NE 7.1 avg.

Weekday Workouts

Been pretty active during the week, Did an hour's worth of intervals on Tues, Hard ride with a co-worker on Wed (about two hours and 57% of that time was in the winter's zone 5... I don't even know if that is good for me) and an hour's worth of easy spin on Thurs. I am wrecked right now, it's kinda nice.

Fast Saturday

Went out with the guys and did an "easy" pace because most of them were racing tomorrow. Dang dude, it was the fastest ride I've ever been on! It was really nice out and there were a bunch of riders to keep the conversation good. It has been a while since I've been on a AABC ride and they have been racing a lot so I was afraid that I wasn't going to be able to pull my weight but perhaps some time not riding with them made me stronger because I felt really good today. I didn't even have a tough time mustering the motivation to go on a hike with Kelly and Wilbur after. Good times, now I just need to get in some races before they fill up and get even faster!

Moving Time (h:m:s) 2:15:33
Distance (mi ) 44.91
Moving Speed (mph) 19.9 avg.
Elevation Gain (ft) 2,708
Avg. Heart Rate 165 bpm
Temperature (°F) 61.4°F avg.
Wind Speed ( mph) ENE 1.9 avg. ENE 5.8 max.

Activity LINK

Falling behind

I haven't been good about updating my blog recently... I have some catching up to do and I think I'll just post the links to my public workouts from garmin to quickly return to the present.

GM Groupride Road Biking 8-Apr-08
Letchworth MTB Mountain Biking 7-Apr-08
NIST Training Road Biking 2-Apr-08
NIST Training Road Biking 1-Apr-08
Sunday Sugarloaf Road Biking 30-Mar-08
AABC Team Ride Road Biking 29-Mar-08

Thursday Intervals

It wasn't as nice out today, in fact it was raining, so out with the fixie and a workout to suit it. My health seems to be holding, lets hope this foul weather outing doesn't ruin it.

Turning The Corner

Today is the first day in a long time that I feel like I'm not sick. I've been oscillating between kinda sick and sick since I got back from Colorado! On top of feeling well the weather is incredible. I did some cadence work and some sprint/recovery work. Exellent.

Manic Monday

Today I had off courtesy of some dead guy (isn't that always the story, I'm not complaining about it I like days off) and I took the opportunity to go for a big ride, my first one since I've been sick. I also decided to go on some new roads... with hills on them (hills not mountians, it's maryland people) and with wind! I'm working on dominating in the gusts. The ride went well and pretty much destroyed me, so I feel good.

Moving Time (h:m:s) 3:10:00
Distance (mi ) 54.32
Moving Speed (mph) 17.2 avg.
Elevation Gain (ft) +4,562
Avg. Heart Rate 167 bpm
Temperature (°F) 48.2°F avg.
Wind Speed ( mph) NNW 10.0 avg.


View Larger Map

Update

Finished my first race post.