Thursday group ride out of Single Track again today. Only when I got there Eric was in street cloths carring a SLR and not looking like he was going to ride. Nobody else turned up so after telling Brandon about the ride we had last week (Eric confirmed my 17mph pull up 140th and said it was the fastest he’s ever done that stretch as well. Go Eric!)
Since I had Kim’s Forerunner I wanted to climb some hills to get some elevation but couldn’t decide where. I also wanted some miles (I’m still arguing with myself on miles vs time) so I decided to do the standard ride out to Edgwick / Middle Fork and then finish off with Hospital Hill.
Took off at 19mph feeling pretty good and decided to take it down just a little from last week but push myself all the same. I held 15+mph up 140th past Wood River (vs the 17 I did last week) and decided to do Edgwick Rd first. Definitely didn’t have the speed at the bottom we did as a group last week but I kept it in the big ring and tried to spin.
When I could remember to spin, I hit a few moments of what I dubbed “harmonic motion” - that gear/cadence/grade combination where the effort seems to fall away and you almost feel like you’re relaxing instead of straining. It’s a fleeting feeling and takes concentration to get there. I think it’s what George Hincapie means when he says “no chain”. In Rowing it’s called swing - the feeling when all of the rowers in the boat are exactly together and the stroke rate is perfectly matched with the speed of the boat.
Anyway, as I rode up the hill, I started to feel some drops. I convinced myself it was dripping from the trees from the rain earlier. It had rained on and off all day (had to pull over and put up the top on my convertable on the way into work) and I messaged Kim before I left work to see if it was going to be raining. Her reply was, “yes, but it’s a warm rain.” It was pretty sunny when I left the bike shop but things had changed while I was concentrating on that elusive feeling of harmony with my bike. Again, I was able to hold a 15mph pace, slightly slower than the effort from last week.
On the descent the drops from the sky really started to pick up and I started to debate with myself when it should be considered raining. As I was climbing past the “Truck Town” truck stop back towards the right turn onto Middle Fork Rd. I decided it was getting close to raining but since the water wasn’t dripping off my nose it wasn’t raining yet so I’d keep riding. About 100 yrds before the turn, the water started dripping off my nose. Well, maybe I should head towards home and see if it stops, it’s not really raining hard enough to stop riding if it’s only dripping off your nose.
As I turned onto North Bend Way to head back into town I decided to see what kind of speed I could hold. I usually do the pull down 140th and then let someone else take the pull back into town. 22-23mph was the answer. And it really started to come down on that stretch. Then I remembered the “if your shoes are full of cold water, it’s probably raining” rule as there was just enough of a cross wind to blow the spray from my front wheel right into my right shoe. I decided to call it a day and get to eat dinner with the family.
18 solo miles at 18.5mph, not a bad hour’s workout. Not what I planned but not bad. Hoping to get 100 miles in as two 50’s over the weekend.
Workout:
- Type: Cycle
- Date: 06/28/2007
- Time: 17:15:00
- Total Time: 00:59:13.00
- Average Heart rate: 178
- Max Heart rate: 199
- Distance: 18.22 miles
- Average Speed: 18.46 mph
- Max Speed: 36.7 mph
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on Thursday, June 28th, 2007 at 5:15 pm and is filed under Cycle, Snovalley.
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