Epic Ride - Saturday

I'm a few days late in reporting but I had one hell of a ride on Saturday.

The first leg of the ride started with the weekly Team in Training Saturday session. Saturday is long mileage day and we are working our way up to the 109-mile ride in Tucson in November. This week's planned mileage was 45 or so but the goal was to really increase the hill work.

We started out at the UCSD campus and an immediately dropped down Torrey Pines road. We had essentially zero warm up as the downhill is no more than a mile away from our start point. The downhill is a little over 1.5 miles. I decided to have a little fun on the down hill and really wailed down the hill reaching a top speed of 42.9 mph by the time I reached the bottom. We regrouped and then made a U-turn. What goes down must go up, so we started the 1.5 mile climb back up the the very steep hill. One thing became immediately obvious, I am very out of practice when it comes to hill work. At the end of the Tahoe season, I used to just fly up the hills. I've lost a lot in the time between the Tahoe ride (June 1st) and now. I used to regularly be the first up the hill, but only managed to make it in 5th or so position. It was very painful.

We reach the top and then back down. This time I take it a much easier. We continue up the coast and do a partial repeat of last week's ride of the Faraday street loop. I'm feeling pretty sluggish, particulary in my legs. I just can't seem to get warmed up and the legs are SORE. I'm also having trouble getting into a good rhythmn but just keep chuggin' along. I think the problem is that I have been missing my "noodle" rides. A noodle ride is an easy ride you take the day after a big ride to remove all the lactic acid buildup from your legs to help with recovery. I've been riding very hard on Tuesdays, Wednesday and Saturday on a regular basis. Up until recently, I have been riding to work a couple of times a week. The occassional ride to work that was acting as my "noodle" ride. I've been so busy lately, with lots of meetings that I have needed to drive in so I haven't been getting the short easier rides to work in.

I start to feel better 25 miles into the ride and settle in to enjoy the scenary. The conditions are perfect for bike riding with it being cool and slightly overcast. The stretch along Faraday canyon is really nice and there are no cars to be found. After the loop we head back to the coast along La Costa Avenue. La Costa is a straight shot west back towards the coast and the wind is always very heavy. We get into a pace line of 6 riders and plow through the strong headwind. We each take 1 minute turns at the front before rotating to the back. I'm lucky to have another rider in my group that is big enough that I can draft behind. Last season, the times I was able to effectively draft behind someone were few and far between. I stay behind Jeff for a while and let him do all the heavy lifting. It's all going great until its my time to be up front. Jeff rotates off the front of the line and the wind hits me square in the face and I immediately slow down by 2 mph. I lower my head, get into my handlebar drops and grind it out to get back up to the 18 mph he had been maintaining. We finally make it to the coast and then head back south to finish up the team ride. Unfortunately, this means that we have to climb Torrey again. Still tough going but I make it and we head back to the parking lot with a respectable 47 miles under our belts.

Road coach Jack and I decide to go for a little extra credit. I've got the Lighthouse Century in a couple of weeks and I really need to get my mileage up. Last week's planned ride was cut short due to very hot weather so I need to get at least 80 in today. Reviewing our work so far, we decide that we don't need to chase any more climbing because we have already logged over 2500 feet of climbing. We decide to simply head 20 miles up the coast and then turn around and come back to grab a total of 40 miles. We are both pretty tired at this point having ridden nearly 50 miles and keeping a pace over 16 mph for the duration. We settle into a line of two and start banging it out, rotating every 5 minutes or so. Not a whole lot of conversation goes on except to moan a bit at each of the stop lights.

We stop at a liquor store in Del Mar and fill up on water and continue on. I'm starting to tire quite a bit after 10 miles, which is a bad sign when you have 30 more to go. Hmm, the coast is supposed to be flat right? Well every little hill is magnified and the legs are starting to really ache. On the flats we're hitting nearly 20 mph but I slow down to 14 mph on the hills. I'm getting murdered on the inclines. 10 more miles and we head back. We crest another couple of hills and go 5 more miles and I beg for a break. We pull over beneath a shady tree. I pull off the helmet and gloves to cool off. Back on the road a few minutes later. We go another couple of miles and then I get a huge thigh cramp and nearly fall off the bike. I'm starting to feel like a big wuss, here. I dismount and walk it off. Another 3 miles and I'm out of water ?!? Another stop to fill up and I'm feeling like I'm letting Jack down. I mumble an apology to Jack and he tells me that he's actually thankful for the break as I have been apparently "killing" him with the pace on the flats.

Back on the road to knock it out but there is one more Torrey Pines climb to contend with to make it back to my car. I tell Jack that I'm going to take it very slow as I'm wiped out at this point. He goes on ahead and I tackle the hill for the 3rd time today. My pace is a ridiculously slow 5 mph and I crawl up the hill. I make it to the top in surprisenly good shape. I took it so easy that I'm hardly out of breath. We regroup at the top and head back in. We stop at Jack's car and he reads his bike computer to give us the totals. 86 Miles at an average pace of 15 mph with 3998 feet of climbing. Two lousy feet short of 4K. The heck with that. The parking lot is slightly inclined and we both hop on our bikes and get our extra 2 feet in!

86 Miles with 4,000 feet of climbing at that pace is one hell of a bike riding day. We're finally done for the day after 7 hours of being on the bike. We had some rest stops in there but it was still one long day.

I think I'm almost ready for the Lighthouse Century coming up in two weeks. I wish I had one more week to get long mileage in but this ride really helped. Next week, is taper week so I'm going to limit my ride to the Team ride which should be around 50 miles.