...and some very good riding indeed.
I couldn't manage to drag myself out of bed at 6:30 yesterday morning to do the group training ride up 9W; I'd had a long week and desperately needed the sleep. That's one disadvantage of TNT's otherwise excellent training program; all the major rides are Saturday morning, and that's the day I most need just a few more hours. I'm sure yesterday's ride was beautiful, if probably a little bit on the cool side.
But I did make it out this morning, and did several loops of Central Park, for a total of 34.3 miles. More importantly, I pushed my hill-climbing past my comfort zone; instead of dropping down to my granny (the easiest crank) for Harlem Hill, instead even of relying on the largest gear in my middle crank, I forced myself to climb Harlem Hill in the second largest gear in my middle crank. Every time. It wasn't easy, but I made it up five times, which was pretty instructive. Even though I've got a little more padding around the middle than I did while training for El Tour de Tucson at this time last year, my legs are obviously still quite strong from all the hill climbing we did training for, and during, America's Most Beautiful Bike Ride around Lake Tahoe in June.
Of course, the endurance bicyclists among you know that leg strength isn't always the most important thing; I still need to ride often enough this fall, and long enough distances, for my ass to be ready.
I think, but I'm not positive, that next weekend our trainig ride is a choice of the 50-mile or 75-mile routes of the Twin Lights Ride, which I found fairly hilly and challenging last year. Again, my only complaint is likely to be how absurdly early I have to get up to catch the ferry from downtown Manhattan to New Jersey... but I'm looking forward to the ride.
Fundraising: $6,413 so far, or 32.065% toward my goal of $20,000. I finally decided that the only way I was going to find enough "free time" to send out all the remaining e-mails was to take my laptop with me pretty much everywhere I go now, so I'm queueing up those e-mails during my commute on the bus and subway. Stay tuned, if you haven't gotten yours yet, you will this week!
I couldn't manage to drag myself out of bed at 6:30 yesterday morning to do the group training ride up 9W; I'd had a long week and desperately needed the sleep. That's one disadvantage of TNT's otherwise excellent training program; all the major rides are Saturday morning, and that's the day I most need just a few more hours. I'm sure yesterday's ride was beautiful, if probably a little bit on the cool side.
But I did make it out this morning, and did several loops of Central Park, for a total of 34.3 miles. More importantly, I pushed my hill-climbing past my comfort zone; instead of dropping down to my granny (the easiest crank) for Harlem Hill, instead even of relying on the largest gear in my middle crank, I forced myself to climb Harlem Hill in the second largest gear in my middle crank. Every time. It wasn't easy, but I made it up five times, which was pretty instructive. Even though I've got a little more padding around the middle than I did while training for El Tour de Tucson at this time last year, my legs are obviously still quite strong from all the hill climbing we did training for, and during, America's Most Beautiful Bike Ride around Lake Tahoe in June.
Of course, the endurance bicyclists among you know that leg strength isn't always the most important thing; I still need to ride often enough this fall, and long enough distances, for my ass to be ready.
I think, but I'm not positive, that next weekend our trainig ride is a choice of the 50-mile or 75-mile routes of the Twin Lights Ride, which I found fairly hilly and challenging last year. Again, my only complaint is likely to be how absurdly early I have to get up to catch the ferry from downtown Manhattan to New Jersey... but I'm looking forward to the ride.Fundraising: $6,413 so far, or 32.065% toward my goal of $20,000. I finally decided that the only way I was going to find enough "free time" to send out all the remaining e-mails was to take my laptop with me pretty much everywhere I go now, so I'm queueing up those e-mails during my commute on the bus and subway. Stay tuned, if you haven't gotten yours yet, you will this week!
Leave a comment