Friday Night, May 27th.

(Not listed in any particular order…)

Arm warmers-check

Leg warmers-check

Ear warmers-check

Socks-check

Wind/Water resistant jacket-check

Gloves-check

Helmet-check

Shoes-check

Sunglasses-check

Jersey-check

Bike shorts-check

Sustenance-check, check, check, check

Hydration-check

Sunscreen-check

Air pump-check

Biiiiiicycle, Biiiiiiicycle, Biiiiiiiicycle, Biiiiiiiicycle…check

Salad-check

My head-check

Ok, I’m ready for Saturday’s 80-mile ride. This is the last long team ride before A-M-B-B-R, BABY! WOHOOOOO! 8 days and counting.

1 year ago

5/21/11

A few weeks ago, I received a comment, as I was getting ready for one of our long rides. “You look like an athlete!” Hmmmm. I don’t think of myself as an athlete. Yesterday I was called a hero. I don’t feel like one.

I am just me.

I bought my bike and cycling gear just over a year ago, after thinking long and hard about doing a century ride with Team in Training. I vividly remember the day my friend was training for her marathon with TNT-she was running 19 miles up towards Lucky Peak. That same day, I passed my Broker’s exam for Real Estate and wanted to find her, cheer her on, and tell her the good news. When I found her, she was over halfway done and was headed back-in pain due to knee problems. We talked for a couple of minutes, and I offered to take her back to her car. She said no-she needed to do this. I said, “OK.” As she took off, her coach stopped and asked when I was going to start training for a marathon. I said not with the knees that I have. Then he asked about a century ride? I remember saying something like; my back and neck go out of whack pretty regularly, so-no. He said thanks for supporting my friend. My friend couldn’t quit, even when she was in pain, because her mom fought cancer for 3 years and didn’t have the option to quit. Just a few weeks after my friend started training for the marathon, her mom passed away.

We are down to 12 days until our event in Tahoe. Last week we rode our bikes to Idaho City from Boise, a 71-mile ride. This week, I’m doing a lot of stretching and am taking a ride either Tuesday or Wednesday-probably the dump loop. This Saturday is our “last” long training ride before our event…80-miles. Where? I don’t know yet, but I’m sure it’ll be a decent representation of what AMMBR will look like. After the ride, we eat BBQ. Yu-u-u-mmm-y! And prepare our decorations for our helmets.

The ride to Idaho City was fantastic, but it was not without incident. (No one was seriously hurt, just a bike, a skinned knee, a few bruises, and a bellyache.) The weather was gorgeous. The bantering was enjoyable. The pace line was fast and “fluid”. It was nice riding beside the creek, smelling the pine trees, feeling the fresh air on my nose, and breathing deeply, not from lack of oxygen and due to heart pounding, but because of deep contentment.

71.11 miles

5 hours 6 minutes. (?) I bumped my computer and lost the data for the first half of the ride

14.6 Average Speed (for the 2^nd half of the ride).

33.5 Max Speed (for the 2^nd half of the ride).

Total Miles on my bike: 1,643.5

Total Flats-1

Sneaking up

Only 30 more days till America's Most Beautiful Bike ride!

Took a short 14 mile ride yesterday on the prettiest day of spring so far. Did hill repeats on what coach Brad likes to call the mini dump loop. That was a GREAT hill! And as always, super fun to go down.

Half Century

Alarm

Snooze

Alarm

Snooze

Alarm

Get up

Feed the dog

Prepare and eat breakfast-consisting of toasted English muffin with homemade marionberry jam and egg, banana, water

Put cycling clothes on

Let the dog out

Pump up front bicycle tire

Rotate back bicycle tire to pump it up

Notice that back tire has a bulge in it

Flat as a pancake

Pump it up

Let the dog in

Load the bike in the car-hoping the tire will hold air

Load me in the car with all gear, food, and drink

Drive to meeting point

Unload bike

Flat rear tire

Received help changing the tube (THANK YOU!)

Decided not to wear leg warmers

Decided to wear my windbreaker

Communication throughout the ride: Going! Stopping! Spitting! Trailer! (Laughing) 8 seconds!

Cheered on TNT runners running a mock marathon “GO TEAM! WOHOOOOO!”

Started up the 4 mile climb of Hilltop

Passed like I was standing still-which I practically was at 6.5 mph (but was asked “Good morning, are you doing ok?” by the passer

C-c-c-c-cold.

Wishing I had my leg warmers, wondering how I can wrap myself around my knees to keep them warm and still ride.

Glad I had my windbreaker

Cheered on to the top of hilltop by those before me and waited and cheered for those behind me

Gathered together and headed down the other side to the end of the pavement before Arrow Rock dam

Frozen by the time we hit the bottom-I’m sure my teeth were chattering

Warmed up as we got into the more sheltered area on the way to the end of the pavement

Hit the end of the pavement and turn around.

Get out of the sheltered area of the pavement and notice that it’s a little cool, but not too bad

Start climbing the mammoth backside of hilltop

4.5mph (uugh)

Tried to get my cadence up

Burning legs

Slowed down

Cheered up to the top without sucking wind

Clapped and whooped it up for those behind coming to the top

Allison met us at the top

Downhill and flat the rest of the way back to the car

Urban assault (Group sticking together to get through stoplights downtown)

Negotiation of traffic

Crossing the street and I almost fell over while traffic was waiting

Lots of Laughing, talking, enjoying the day

Feel great

51.3 miles

4 hours 6 minutes.

12.4 Average Speed.

32 Max Speed.

Total Miles on my bike: 1317.2

1 flat tire

Blue skies smiling at me

We had a much needed and long overdue break in the weather yesterday. For the first time since we started doing our long rides in February, I started out a ride with two layers and finished with one-and bare arms. I thought about removing my leg warmers, but I had not thought about sunscreen (besides the fact, I would have blinded my entire team, AND the drivers coming up and down Hwy 16). I was SO thankful to have warmth and sun rather than rain and wind.

We started in Eagle and rode to Middleton, where we all gathered up and had a water and bathroom break. As we took off again, one of our team had an issue with his tire. He pulled over and started to fix it. The guys stayed behind and helped, and the gals decided that the guys would catch up quickly, so we kept moving. We got to Purple Sage and Blessinger where the “Shoot Me Now” hill (written about in my blog on 6/27/10) is. I stopped and looked down the hill, thinking “If Brad were with us, he’d probably make us all go down it and back up.” Jen said that she would come if I went, while Brandee and Macey said they would wait for us. Down the hill I went (I have a hard time resisting the down-it’s the up that gets me) Jen following close behind. When we turned around, I was thinking, “Why oh WHY did I decide to do this?!?!?! I hope I don’t regret it later in the ride.” (I didn’t.) Jen powered on up past me, and I settled back for the ride. Getting to the top, I pulled over for a rest, seeing that a couple of others in our group had caught up with us. It didn’t take long before we were back on track and headed on to finish our ride.

Back at the car, I felt better than I have after any long ride. A lot of it had to do with what I’m eating and drinking. I’ve discovered that I’m not doing enough of that. Asst. Coach Daniel sent out an email earlier this week, telling what he was going to eat and drink before, during and after the ride, so I tried something similar. I know I didn’t eat as many calories, still, as I should have, or drink as much as I should have, but I did eat and drink more than I ever had, and felt really good-and recovery time after the ride was much faster. I didn’t feel like I had to lie around on the couch all day. In fact, I took my pooch for close to a 3-mile walk yesterday evening. Aaaah, what a difference.

43.6 miles

2 hours 47 minutes.

15.5 Average Speed. (my fastest average speed for a ride so far)

35.4 Max Speed. (only because of the “shoot me now hill”

Total Miles on my bike: 1265.9

Catching up

Two weeks ago, we cancelled our ride on Saturday, due to a wind advisory of 35-45mph gusts. Having experienced cross and tail winds going up and down Hilltop, I was glad that we postponed until the following day.

Sunday, four of us started out from the North end of Boise, and headed toward Hwy 21 and the 4-mile climb. This ride was to be 34 miles, with the climb early on. When we got to the bottom of the hill, our assistant coach gave each of us a timed challenge to get to the top. For me, my challenge was to make it to the top in 35 minutes. Having never timed myself, but having watched my speed going up this hill, I was trying to calculate how fast I’d have to go all the way up in order to make the time. For some reason, I couldn’t make that calculation, but it kept me mentally busy while climbing. I made it to the top in 35 minutes 20 seconds. So, now I’m curious if I can beat that time. (I also beat coach up the hill. This has never happened, and I’m not so sure it will happen again. But I enjoyed the experience while I was going through it.)

The rest of that ride was pretty uneventful, other than when coming down hilltop, I put my bike in what I thought was my hardest gear and I just could not get my chain to engage as I was pedaling. I ended up coasting the majority of the way down the hill, and finally realized that I was in my middle ring. As soon as I got in my biggest ring, I was able to pick up speed and battle the crosswinds that hit me while coming down that hill.

4/9/11

Brrrr!

This past Saturday’s ride was tough for me. It was the coldest temperature that I’ve ridden in, and within just a matter of a few minutes, my face felt frozen. The first half was great (tail wind), but the second half was into the wind and I had a hard time keeping up. I think that was a combination of not eating or drinking enough throughout the ride (though I didn’t realize it until we were nearly back to our cars) and some mental warring with myself.

One thing I struggle with is losing momentum going up short hills. I was reading an article in a bicycle magazine that reminded me that there is a difference between going up short hills and long ones. Short hills, should be attacked, gaining speed before getting to the bottom of the hill, and powering up it. Long hills should be settled in to. Having just found out what this week’s route is, I have a couple of goals. Eat and drink a better amount. Power up short hills. Take control of my thoughts and start changing them.

39 miles

2 hours 50 minutes.

13.7 Average Speed.

36.8 Max Speed.

Total Miles on my bike: 1222.3

Hello, Muscle, Have We Met?

Our assistant coach arranged to do core/cross training as a team on Thursday evenings, which began tonight. There were two of us that showed up besides him, and there were a lot of laughs. Most of the giggles came from me. Some of the exercises that we did reminded me of PE in school, and some of them were completely new to me. He would tell us what we were going to do and then proceeded to show us. I’m sure that I had the deer in the headlights look every-so-often. Come to find out, some of the things we were doing were yoga exercises-which has been completely foreign to me…until tonight, that is. Macey was the other participant and she was such an encourager, and would give me helpful hints. I have never thought of myself as being overly coordinated, and I would get in a position, and then I’d crumple, fall, and laugh. I love that I can usually laugh at myself.

2 hours later, I still have legs that feel like jelly. I’m sure that I will be reintroduced to muscles that I had forgotten that I’ve met before tomorrow. This is a good thing. After all, “pain is weakness leaving the body,” right? I look forward to more Thursday evening training sessions.