Cycling stuff.....some running too.

Saturday, December 30, 2006

Brick

To use the triathlete lingo, I did a brick today. No, not in the toilet. A brick is at least 2 workouts on 2 different disciplines. I rode for 23 miles on my super duper trainer and then ran 3 miles.

I bought a velodyne trainer about a year ago for $300. They're worth about $1500 brand new. Although mine is over 10 years old it only had 50 miles on it. It was and still is one of the most advanced trainers available. You take off your front wheel and clamp your rear wheel in like most trainers but that's where the similarities end. It has a magnetic resistance and a motor assist drive. By using icons on the screen, if you're in the pack, resistance is lower, off the front or back and resistance is higher. At 20mph the resistance is perfect, just like on the road. There are several modes. You can program in your own course with hills or you can choose from several, like the 1986 world championship course or 1988 olympic course. You can choose the steady resistance mode, race mode. The race mode is pretty cool. You choose the "level" you want to race at and the "pack" ebb and flows as on the road. Also you can program in the heart rate range you want to keep and it will adjust the resistance to keep you in the zone.

I only did 3 miles but did them a little quicker. My natural stride omes under me at about a 7:30 mile. Not quite there yet but I did do an 8:14, 8:22, 7:56. Not bad for an old bike racer just trying to keep in shape to run with his wife. I didn't get hurt last time I ran 2 years ago until I started running those 1:20 quarter mile sprints. I think I'll lay off of those this time and see what happens. I'm gonna hold steady at 3 mile runs for a while until I'm impatient with the distance and then bump it up slowly.

Tuesday, December 26, 2006

Great Christmas Eve

Got a good ride in on Christmas Eve. Rode 69 miles with the guys from the Lake. We went out to Haines City because the wind was coming out of the east and I thought we should head out into the wind. Little bro jared did great again. He's going to make a really good bike racer some day soon. After last week most people would have quit but I guess he he's a glutton for punishment like the rest of us. I got 119 minutes at the front plus another 18 minutes by myself.

Rode today with my wife. We got in 31 after the rain. Pretty chilly. Check out the video of Mrs. Goofy.

Saturday, December 23, 2006

What rain?

It was supposed to rain this morning. It did at about 3am but it was all done by the time the ride started. Did the usual Greco thing. Stayed at the front a lot. A guyhad a flat with about 15 miles to go and 4 of us stopped. The other 12 said they'd ride slow. Yeah, right. When we got going again Simon took a big pull for about 5 minutes. Then it was my turn and I didn't let the pace drop at all. After about 2 minutes the guys started whistling for me to slow down. That made me feel good.

We caught some of the guys who'd turned around and I led Ross Glass up the final hill for he sprint. He got it uncontested. I did almost 500 watts for over a minute. Pretty good considering I haven't done anything but tempo ride since my comeback. My goal for now is to be able to hold 4.5 watts per kilo for a 20 minute time trial. That should put me in good shape to win some races. I'd like to win the state road race championship this year and make a good showing at the national tandem championships with Sharon.

Friday, December 22, 2006

Thursday ride, Friday rain

Rode 20 at Lake Hollingsworth with my lovely wife last night. Got home at the usual 6:45 and rushed around, loaded bikes and headed out. She wanted to do a 50 minute power workout in her biggest gear and that's what she did. I just rode along with her talking. She was going too hard to talk so it was a rare chance for me to get a word in edgewise. Today is Friday and I got off work to start my 4 day weekend at 3:00 instead of 6:00. Nice, but it's raining and I'm not so dedicated to ride on an optional training day in the rain. Sharon's running right now without me. I've got a sharp pain in my knee and I don't want to jepordise my riding by running through a sharp pain. In my experience dull pain is usually nothing to worry about, but a sharp pain that persists should be monitored closely.

Check out these gator pictures. I'm a little dubious about the one hanging. The e-mail said he was 23 feet. That would be a world record by about 5 feet. He's big to be sure but not THAT big.

Thursday, December 21, 2006

Tuesday ride??? Huh?

Tuesday I had to stay home from work to take my kids to the doctor. All three have tonsilitis. They are miserable and my oldest went to school anyway because she didn't want to miss finals.

Sharon and I got up at the crack of dawn and went out on the tandem. We eaded out into a headwind, towards Polk City. Once in Polk City we headed north to Fussell Rd. Fussell Rd. is one of the best roads in the county, well paved, curvey, shaded, scenic but out of the way. And you have to ride 2 miles up a road that has a lots of trucks. We continued west until just before Haines City and then headed back through Lake Alfred and Auburndale. We got 74 miles. A real good ride for mid week. I won't be getting those kind of midweek miles until late spring when the time changes. Then I hope to ride into work 2 days a week. That's almost 40 miles each way so I be piling on the miles. Another 150-200 on the weekend and I'll be set.

A couple of teams have been talking with about being on their masters teams. Maybe I can work a package deal and get my wife on too. She could use some more cycling clothes.

Sunday, December 17, 2006

Near death experience

Jared and I did the Greco ride in Tampa on saturday. I introduced him to the guys and he did great. He's a natural for group rides. He chatted while I tried to work at the front as much as possible. I got 1:25 at the front with most of it in the 53-11. 12 miles from the end of the ride there is a hill that the guys tend to ride hard even when we're doing tempo rides. I pulled off the front to go back and check on him. He must have been feeling good because he was next in line and pulled hard all the way to the top. No mercy. They rode hard over the top and he got himself into a bit of bother. I made sure he got a wheel and then I bridged to the front and sat up for the sprint up the next hill. I rode back to and paced him and another dude back to the group.

Today, we set out with about 18 guys and gals for a 50 mile ride. We stopped at a store at 30 miles. I knew at that point it would be at least 60 and when we headed out from the store and were still traveling away from home, I figured Jared would be in trouble. He was having trouble finding the sweet spot in the draft in the wind so I showed him where to ride to save some energy. It was at that point that I discovered he had got some poor advice on the ride yesterday from one of my buddies. He was told that to lose weight not to eat before or during the ride. No calories at all. Just water. I hadn't noticed that he didn't have anything at the store. I'm the only person I know that does stupid stuff like that to lose weight. We got a gel into him and I gave him my sweet tea. He did good until 4 miles to go and the wheels came off. He stood up to accelerate and cramped in his calf so he limped in, literally. 71 miles was the total. His longest ride ever by about 20 miles.

I rode beside him for about 10 minutes at one point when he was still with the group and his heart rate was in the 180's the whole time. Incredible. He gets my utmost respect for his ability to suffer. Hopefully he keeps riding. That's the stuff that keeps me in the sport.

Friday, December 15, 2006

Run--Ride--Run

So much stuff to do. Never a minute to relax. Wednesday Sharon and I took a little run after work. About 3 miles, no exactly 3 miles according to her bodylink gps. We ran a combination of two loops that gave us right at 3 miles. I like having known routes with known milage. I still don't really enjoy running yet. I know from experiance that once I get to about 5 or 6 miles I'll start to like it. When you can run about 45 minutes to an hour, it seems like you can run forever and still want more.

Got up early Thursday morning and rode on the tandem with Sharon. I wanted to ride fairly hard and she had just ridden 70 miles and I didn't want to kill the ole gal so the tandem was perfect for that. We only did like 21 miles but it's more than I have been getting during the week. I could ride the trainer, I know, but even with a nice trainer it's not that fun.

Got up early again this morning and ran the same 3 mile route as the other night. This time Sharo brought a little light for the dark path around the lake so we didn't step on any gators. I'm really not kidding about that. Not so much in the winter as in the summer. Nothing worse than tripping over a gator in the dark and waking him from a peaceful nap on the warm pavement.

Plans for tomorrow are to do the Greco tempo ride again and hopefully my bro will be able to make it.

Sunday, December 10, 2006

Who needs shoes?

I had planned on riding to the group ride to get some real miles in today but....my daughter had to be at her school for a play, "You're a good man Charlie Brown" in you must know. Soooo I had to cut the riding short to be back in time for her. So I drove the 8 miles(13 k) to the ride. I got there with 10 minutes to spare. Put on my arm warmers, knee warmers, wind vest, gloves, ear warmers, sunglasses, got my bike out, pumped the tires chatted with my brother and my buddy Bruce. Hid my keys and sat down to put on my shoes and no shoes. 2nd time in 26 years of driving to rides. I deserved it too because I had just bragged to my brother that I'd only ever done it once. So I arranged for the guys, and gal to ride in my direction and I'd speed hoe and meet them. That's what happened but I lost my gloves and had to sarch the car for em. I had lectured my little brother about how to set every thing out and pack the car the night before so you don't forget anything. Even make a check list if you are forgetful. What a dummy I am.

The ride was uneventful but I felt very good especially considering the hard Saturday ride. I ended up with about 40 miles(66k). I did about 40 minutes at 200 watts. I had planned on 70 miles(116k) life sometimes gets in the way of training.

I made a yummy soup of pink pintos with green bell pepper, garlic, and onion and ham and a hamhock for porkity yummiosity. Served it to myself on white rice and washed it down with cranberry juice and a diet pepsi.














Pot on the top is the beans and ham hock and the pan on the bottom is the veggies and ham before I mixed em all together.

Saturday, December 09, 2006

Good Ride

I won't try to get all caught up but I've had some good workouts in the last couple weeks since my last update.

Last night I got home and ran on the treadmill with the fetching Mrs. Williams. Started with 9 minute pace and upped it 1/10th mph every 1/10th of a mile. Ended my 2 1/4 mile run at a 6:40 pace. I know, if you do the math it doesn't actually work but I upped it a full mph a couple of times. My stride actually feels most natural at 7 or 7.5 minute a mile pace but my aerobic system can't take it yet.

Now the real stuff. I rode with the Greco group in Tampa. We did 50 miles. I rode at the front for a total of 1 hour in 3 parts. 212 watts for the first 20 minute pull. 207 watts for the second and 197 for the third. That's 205 watt average for an hour. I was happy with that. I did the whole ride in the 53-11 as a big gear power workout. Heartrate on the front was about 150. I did have more to give but in the shape I'm in I still didn't have the confidence to make it the whole ride at a higher pace. What's hard for one guy is easy for the guy on his wheel. When in the group, not on the front, I was putting out something like 130 watts. The powertap has become my new best training partner. My weight is coming down a little too. I'm right at 160. That's 72.72 kilos for my metric friends. The key to my continued progress is going to be a couple rides during the week so I'll let you know how that works out. The running definitely helps but it's no substitute for riding.