What a great few days of cycling. Painful, but great non the less.
Sunday had me toed up on the line at the Great Glen cross series with the other intermediate/elite racers. I put myself in the intermediate group because I knew there was no way I was going to hang with the big boys. I was right.
We started off and I was in the top 5 of the group around the first barrier, but that is where the fun stopped. I was quickly passed by people coming around and after the middle of the 2nd lap. Being up in the lead was certainly short lived. I ended up being DFL, having been lapped by the eventual elite winners. The nice part about that was that them lapping me ending my suffering a lap early. Not exactly the results that I was looking for, but ohh well. I guess I need to switch my training over a little bit sooner to more interval based vs endurance based.
The Face of fun:
No man’s land:
Stop the pain. Getting pulled from being lapped:
Monday night, I kept the wheels spinning by taking the mtb out (first time since my last race) on some of the trails around my house. I have to say, I really do enjoy night riding. I have ridden the same set of trails hundreds of times this year. Just about every mountain bike ride starts and stops with these trails, plus, I used them to commute to work 2 years ago. I’ve ridden them a lot. But with night riding, those trails are COMPLETELY different. Sure, the trails are lit up with my 2 Triden Xs, but turns come up on your quicker, and things just generally look different. That and all of the fresh leaves on the ground made for an interesting night.
Tuesday was a nice day for commuting, so that is what I did. I grabbed my roadie and went off. On the way to work, I tried just to keep a steady state heart rate to work on the pacing part of cross racing. On the way home, ladder intervals were the name of the game. 2 minutes on, 2 off, 4 on, 2 off , 6 on, 2 off and a final 8 minutes of hard effort (zone 4) to finish off the ride. Good workout.
This morning I met up with a bunch of people from work to try and map out a few of the trails being worked on and we wanted to beat them in a little bit. The pace certainly wasn’t break neck speeds, but I put forth a good effort on the climbs to get my heart rate up.
The biggest disappointment about this morning rides was that I keep forgetting to put my helmet cam on. I recently bought a vholdr and it just sits there in the box. When I head out for night rides, I try and put it on, but with a light, there is no room. Then, on a great ride, like this morning, I forget to put the damn thing on. I am a dope….
