Hiatus breaker
It’s been a nice little break for me from here these past few weeks. It’s given me time to focus on me and on riding and other things.
I was sick for three weeks straight after the last entry in May. I was still sick when the weekend of the Great Finger Lakes Bicycle Tour rolled around. The weekend was great, even if I rode only two of the three days again this year. Next year, all three days…
On the other hand, I was well-rested for the Saturday ride. It reached 93°F that day and I rode over 50 miles. I wanted to do the century, but I also wanted to ride on Sunday. Discretion being the better part of valor, I took the 50-mile cut. It was a great ride, and there were a couple of epic climbs in it. Photos exist, but I’m having trouble with the gallery.
The Sunday ride was around Keuka Lake. The Saturday ride had finally cleaned out the sickness and I was feeling myself again, if still a little weak. A case of the friskies hit a couple of miles into the ride and I took off, leaving the group behind. I sailed up 14A effortlessly and in excess of 20MPH all the way. It was pure joy.
Partway along, a chick on a Cannondale smoked by me. She was going TdF speeds. Amazing.
After a while, the friskies chased from my system, I pulled over and waited for the guys to catch up. We rode the rest of the day together at a nice conversational pace. Even so, I’d set a goal of 3 hours for ride and I hit it at 2:58:32 for the 45.47 miles, or an average of 15.28 MPH. What a day!
The more I ride the Finger Lakes the more I appreciate them. I’m getting to the point where I think I could just start here one morning and ride through some of the lakes, then ride back.
In fact, I’ve been doing longer rides myself lately. Hndlebar is back to his regular schedule for work so I’ve been doing my own thing on Wednesdays. Some weeks I’ve set off on solo 50-milers, and other weeks I’ve ridden to Mendon Ponds Park to ride with the Club at 6pm.
And although I was 100 miles short in March and another 70 miles short in May, I ended June 26 miles ahead of goal. It’s been good riding.
Nearly 15% of my miles to date have been on Yellow Bike. We rode two days in a row yesterday and today. I love that bike, but in small doses. Ten miles are great, 20-30 is fine. After 40 I’m done.
Meanwhile, the Portland continues to be fine ride. I’ve had some butt issues lately so I got a new saddle for it last week, trying to sort things out. I want the matter resolved before riding in Colorado later this month. The new saddle may help, but breaking it in is almost worse than it was before.
But, or should it be butt? In any event, I found it was worse with my Pearl Izumi shorts. Investigation revealed a seam right where bun meets thigh. Those shorts now go to the short ride category. Worse, the shorts that are otherwise my favorites, have a seam there too. I own five pairs. Fortunately, Chamois Butter seems to do the trick. So once the chafing heals I should be back on track.
This also explains two consecutive days on Yellow Bike. I sit differently on it.
It also works my legs differently, and in a good way. I’m going to have to get more miles in on it before Colorado.
In the meanwhile, I leave for Canada on Monday. I’ll be repeating the types of rides I did last year, if not the exact rides themselves. I’m taking the Portland and both wheelsets. My cyclocross tires are mounted on one. Those will be used on fireroading days. I enjoyed that last year on the hybrid, and hope to do even more of it this year. There are a couple of 20-25 mile dirt road rides I’d like to take. Last year, the hybrid wasn’t quite the right bike for them, and I wasn’t in quite good enough shape for them either.
I’ll alternate that with real road riding days, hoping for a metric century each day out on asphalt. It will be my last real training for Colorado. I can’t train for the altitude, and I can’t train for a 30-mile climb. But I can work shorter and steeper climbs, hill repeats and endurance. Endurance is going to be the key, I think.
There are two other entries below. One is a piece I tested on Bikejournal’s forum. The other is a ride report from when the BikeJournal Reunion hosts pre-rode the Epic Century route last weekend. After reading that you’ll understand why I’ve been training relentlessly.
