Just not much I can say for this year. Like last year the weather report was not good, but Mike Quick and Gary Quellet came by a little after 5 this morning to pick me up and head north to Chattanooga. We checked in early, got our gear ready as a number of our group collected. Today we had Neal, Glenn, Nancy, Jack, Mike, Gary, Peter, Kit and Derek met up with us as we rolled out. As we lined up with hundreds of other hopeful cyclists the rain started lightly. Within a few minutes most of us were soaked, but the air temperature wasn't too bad so I was content to keep my light weight Sugoi jacket rolled up in the back pocket. Not a bad choice as we climbed Suck Creek, which is a mild 5 mile climb. I kept my watts low and tried to reserve not knowing if the group would want to ride the century in the rain or cut it short. On the descent I heard from almost everyone about experiencing sore hands from riding the brakes all the way down. Normally this would be a very fast and twisty downhill, but surface water was sheet flowing and rain stinging my eyes. I am glad I put my jacket on before descending because the rain was pelting us pretty good.
When we came to the 40 mile sag stop our group pulled off and there most everyone with the exception of Neal and Glenn were ready to call it a day, but of course we still had 22 miles to go in the rain. I was quite happy this time around to call it a day with a metric. It wasn't until we got near Chattanooga in the last miles that the rain stopped.
I can't say or elaborate on much else because I had so much water in my eyes for most of the ride that I was doing good just to see the road and riders in front of me. After changing into some dry clothes we collected at the stadium for a several pieces of pizza and then headed off for home. A hot shower and some time to reflect on this I am still glad we bailed out of the 100 and just did the 62 miles.
Performance & Training
I had been experiencing a good amount of fatigue trying to rush training this year. We had a lot of rain this winter training season and though we still trained in the rain a number of times we kept our rides in the 50 mile range. I also did a lot less climbing training leading up to this event and in a panic ramped up too quickly in the last month with both the group training and indoor training. I believe this left me very fatigued, but I rested this past week and I tried my best to stretch out my overly tight leg and hip muscles.
The climb today felt effortless and on the flats my legs felt good, but around mile 50 something I could feel my legs begin to get tight. I feel a little better, but I still do not feel like I am in the condition I was in last year. I will just keep plugging away and I hope to perform better in the 100 mile Up the Creek Without a Pedal event next weekend. Because the ride was a "wash out" I not only kept my pace down for safety, but I also reserved for next weekend and why my power output numbers below are lower than normal.
1 comment:
Just a note to let you know we were thinking of you. Some of the guys from Skip's Cycling Team went to the race this weekend. Haven't heard how they did. I hate that the weather was so bad for the race. It sounds like you have a great attitude about it. After all---its weather. We had torrents of rain here off and on and I keep thinking how great it is to be building that water table up before drought season. We'll be thinking of you and your team as they prepare for the next big ride.
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