Friday, June 18, 2010

Big WEEKDAY riding

I got bike heavy this week. On Tuesday, with commute I got about 34 miles. I hit the treadmill at lunch. On Wednesday was a swim at lunch and then I did an after work ride.

This ride is, as Butch puts it, this is a WEAR YOUR BIG BOY PANTS AND KNOW YOU WAY HOME ride. I was a little bit worried. I asked Sam if he had ever done the ride. He said, “What ride – that is a race!” He gave me a little bit of advice and said do not take a pull – just cycle out on the pace line. They will wait and detect when you are tired and BAM – you are dropped.

I rode from campus to Jackson Station. My legs were heavy. I was going to go ahead and ride home but Butch persuaded me to partake – he should be a politician. We headed out at an easy pace. Chewing the fat – easy riding. I still did not jump into the lead. We pulled onto Military Road which is just past Eply Station. Once we crossed 589 the pace picked up. Like I said, I was not going to take any pulls. I just grabbed onto the fastest wheel and hung on. The ride was a challenge and it was GREAT FUN! I think this will become a weekly ride.

I still made the Thursday morning ride and it ended up being a ‘King of the Mountain’ type ride. We headed out from Jackson Station at 5:45AM. There was a little bit of jockeying until we got to Eply Road then it broke open. We had a new rider doing some research here from Purdue. He was a strong rider. I, once again, rode a tactical ride. I only took a pull here or there and really just to break the ride up. I sprinted ahead hard towards the end of the approximately 10.5 mile hilly out and back and forced the peloton to pick up the pace. It was a little dirty to sit in the pack and then sprint at the end but I did capture the KOM for the day.  The KOM portion averaged 23 MPH.

Three weekdays and about 100 miles + the 50 or so from the weekend; this has been a big cycling week for me!

5 comments:

Matty O said...

Thats some awesome biking man. When I get some more endurance and power on the bike I want to do some serious group riding. We were coming back from a ride one day doing 18-19mph (nothing crazy) and saw a group of cyclists 20+ deep FLYING toward us. The whir that we heard when they passed us made me so jealous and envious of their workout.

So this is one of my training goals. That and a century ride.

Keep up the good work man, solid performance once again!

TRI-james said...

I noticed how silly that sounds – KOM here in Mississippi – 484 Ft of climbing … haha

Big Daddy Diesel said...

23mph is extremely impressive, nice work

Caratunk Girl said...

Wow, awesome riding - that is some great speed.

Jeff - DangleTheCarrot said...

Great job James ... that is killing it!


hey, the LT test was crap. The data really didn't tell me too much. The gym should really name it LT Lite!