Shut up, Legs!

We are into Week 3 of our Century Training and we have two of our longer Saturday rides behind us.  To the more seasoned cyclists 30 and 36 mile long rides are not long at all, but to me, my longest ride being just under 60 miles and that was a year ago, the work that goes into these longer rides are killer.  Our first ride was way worse because, being from Michigan, riding in 90 degree sun for 3 hours on hills my legs were not conditioned for, was a b*^&#.  Compounded by the fact that we were on roads I was not familiar with, riding with Adam, who is so much more in shape than I am (jerk) and that we ran out of water 10 miles from home made me into a whiny and very tired person who could not sustain what we wanted to be a pace of 17-20 mph.

I was miserable and it is so unbelievably frustrating to know you are gutting yourself trying to keep up with someone and they are still pulling away from you! I wanted to kill him, but I didn't have the strength.  So we spent a significant amount of time going much slower (12-14 mph, and 7-9 mph on some of those g*& d@!#$ hills).

But there was hope!

There was an MS fundraising century ride that was going on whilst we were pounding out our pitiful 30 miles and the organizers were kind enough to let us refill our water bottles so we wouldn't keel over on our way home.  If I hadn't been so sweaty and gross I would have hugged her.  Thank you so very much!

Side note: it probably would have helped if I wasn't wearing my pink and black Fat Cyclist jersey.  Black material and sun are bad choices.  But I was stylin'.

Anyway, we managed to drag my sorry carcass home and continue on with our lives and training for another week.

This past weekend we had our 36 mile ride planned for Saturday, but we weren't going to be in Lansing, we were going to be in Petoskey to go camping with the best people in the world and we weren't comfortable trying to come up with a 36 mile trek in a place neither of us were familiar with.  We felt it would be a poor life decision.  So, we did our ride on Friday riding from my in-laws house in Big Rapids to my parents' house in Reed City to Hersey and back to Big Rapids.  This one was much better.  I was about to sustain our pace much better, in part because a) it wasn't a billion degrees, b) it was cloudy, c) it was mostly flat and d) I am very familiar with the trails we were riding on.

But then! (dun dun dun!)

I rode over something bad on our way back and got a flat. Frick!  But fortunately my handy-dandy patch kit was able to save the day and we didn't have to change the whole tube!  I had never been so glad I had a patch kit in my whole life.  It was annoying to have to stop for a half hour to fix it, but all in all this ride was much more successful than the previous week's.  I only had to tell my legs to shut up 4 times instead of 20!  So glad I had Jens Voigt humor to pull me through.

Even though we have 6 more weeks before we ride our century for the Michigan Pink Tour, I am finally, for the first time, feeling like a century is something I am capable of.  During the first two weeks of training I was rather, shall we say, unsure of my ability to condition myself to do this ride.  But today, after 2 unplanned rest days because of camping and my exhaustion from Friday's ride, we went out for an at pace ride for 14 miles.  And it felt easy! 17 mph? Puh, nothing!  I felt great! I even felt great riding at 17 mph after going up a steep hill at 20 mph from base to summit.  I know that sounds like nothing, I did it.  And I am so freaking proud. I can't believe after 2 weeks of training how much my body has changed and I am really looking forward to where I will be in 6 weeks.

So if you're in Michigan and feel like riding for Breast Cancer Research, I'll be there, with my husband and wearing my 'Fight Like Susan' Fat Cyclist kit.

Come ride with us!

What is Strong? Century Training Days 2 & 3

Yesterday was day two of century training, and we rode brisk, instead of pace like we were supposed to.  It was a good ride, hard ride, but good.  I was toast at the end of it.  Trying to sustain a brisk pace while riding on rather hilly roads is not easy.  And then I went to yoga last night which was great!  We really worked our arms.

Then, today was day three of training.  Windy day today and so our speed wasn't quite what I wanted it to be.  We were supposed to ride at a brisk pace today, but we rode brisk yesterday on accident, oops.  So we were going to ride at pace, which is how fast we want to ride the actual century.  We did alright heading out, but we hit a nasty head wind on the road we take for a significant stretch to come back in.

Slowed us waaaay down. Suck.

But on a stretch of different road I got up to 27 mph, which isn't really sustainable for me yet, but it was fun!

The best part of our ride today though was when we pulled into our complex and rode past a group of kids who attend the day care that our complex provides.  They were all excited to see two bikes, it was so cute!  They started yelling and chattering excitedly, "Bikes, look bikes!"  "Hi Bikes!"

So adorable!

I hope it helps them want to keep riding, and to wear their helmets!

"Bye Bikes!"

What is Strong? Century Training Day 1

As I mentioned previously, Adam and I want to ride a century.  Adam already rode one a few months before we got married, but he wants to do longer training this time, instead of the short training he did before.  He told me the other day that he was 80% spent by the time he made the halfway point and did not want to do that again.

So, we started training today.  What better day to start training than the first rest day of the Tour? It was rather short, only 6 miles at an easy pace, but there was an element of excitement in training this morning.  We awoke to a Severe Thunderstorm Warning and the storm front was bearing down on us quickly. We ate and dressed quickly and headed out.  With what it seems 90% of Lansing under construction we had to zig zag a bit to get to the River Trail, but we rode 3 miles out and 3 back.  We rolled in about 2 seconds before the storm hit, whew!  It was a great ride.  I felt so good after.

And since I had a brand spankin' new cycling computer from Meijer it was great fun to watch how fast we were going and our distance.  I also was able to watch my heart rate closely too, since Adam found my heart rate monitor yesterday in a box (we are still not unpacked!).  That was a kick too.  If only we were able to get a cycling computer like the pros have and I would only have to look at one thing instead of three!

This weekend I also tried the iMapMyRide that they've been pushing for the Aquaphor Challenge against Levi Leipheimer.  It's an interesting app.  There are some things I don't like about it.  For example, I can't get it to stop automatically posting my rides/walks to Facebook without revoking it's publishing rights, but if I do that I can't post the rides/walks myself when there are ones I want to post.  Kind of annoying.  And when I try and log in on the website, I can't because I never got a password, I only have a username and they didn't ask for a email when I signed up, so I can't have them send me a password.  ARGH!

Other than that though, it's a pretty app!

Great ride, fun stuff to play with and I can't wait for the actual century!