Tackled the stadium yesterday at lunch. I did 15 bleacher lunges followed by some 50 yard dashes. It was hot and it was challenging. Did some work on the abs to finish out the workout.
On the ride home I saw Chris hanging with his kids at the playground at Jackson Station. He said he has 3 triathlons in Florida for the next 3 weekends. Damn.
This morning the group ride was resurrected for spring. I set the alarm for 5AM (I usually get up at 5:30AM – without the alarm most days). Had my 2 cups of coffee and then hit the trace. I left the house at 5:45 and the morning light was sufficient – I did turn on my pathetic headlamp and rear blinky light just in case. I got to Jackson Station and the guys (JD, Keith and Lance) were unloading their bikes. Everyone was here except for Jim – he has said that he will be back in the groove in just a couple of weeks.
This is the time of the year that I enjoy the most. When my 6 mile bike commute looks like closer to 30 miles. We saddled up and headed towards Sumrall. Lance and JD had been at New Orleans with me and we swapped some race stories. There would be no warm up today. JD, Keith and Lance seemed like they had something to prove. I was on my road bike, Lance and JD were on their tri bikes and Keith was on his road bike – he has a new one that will be in any day now.
Everyone was faster! I was sucking the back wheel of everyone today. There was no way that I could have maintained a 2 4, 25, or 26 MPH pull. I nearly got dropped twice. The second time I almost got dropped was when I pulled aside (okay I did do a little pull coming back into Clyde Station) and the train kept going. There was a huge gap created and I really had to hunker down. I started counting one one thousand, two one thousand. I knew that I had to close that gap and then I would be cool. The exertion level would drop once I got that wheel. This is a fast section of the trace. They were really hauling. I looked at my cyclometer and I was 27.5 MPH. I would top out at 28 MPH (max speed measured today on my bike computer). I thought that I could keep this pace for maybe 15 seconds. I caught them at thirteen one thousand. Once on the wheel it still took a high effort to hang with them. A couple of minutes later and I was recovered again and all was well. This was a tough ride for me. LOVED IT!
No comments:
Post a Comment