RIP Big Black. This post is for you....DO WORK
January is moving by rather quickly. Already we flew past the middle of the month and are rapidly approaching the end of the month. In the past, I have been touching 300 miles in the Month of January. Most of those miles were on the trainer. This year, I have already surpassed my totals for January of 2017. The totals are not outstanding, or overpowering, but they are what I would deem as solid.
Solid because of the circumstances. I lost 3 days. Not just in training, but of my life. I had some type of crud that pushed my temperature over 103 degree and gave me strange phantom pains in my entire body. So on the 4th day I mustered a trainer session. Then another short session before having what I can only explain as vertigo the following weekend. This caused me to lose another 2 full days and then another 2 days before I actually felt good enough to train again. Basically I lost a full week, so January is looking ok.
I did a group ride on Zwift with Matt, which was interesting. We met and started riding together. He destroyed me on a long climb. I could see him, but he was adding distance in what seemed like every second. As odd as a virtual ride is, a virtual group ride is even stranger. I say strange because it is exactly like real life. I would get dropped on the climb and catch up on the descent. Real. Strange. The ride was good though and chasing Matt made the hour go by faster than expected.
I had a couple of other sessions on Zwift making my legs feel better each ride. They are nowhere near "back" but they are at least welcoming an hour on the trainer. One ride I was at 18mph average speed for the first 30 minutes. The issue, I have zero endurance and couldn't hold it. Ended up under 16 mph for the ride. That last half hour was awful. The next ride I paced and was around 17 mph at 30 minutes and finished at 16.8 for the duration. Moral of the story, pacing is much smarter for me than going all out.
That reminds me of my first year in Sport class. I can ride "tempo" for a long time, but I cannot ride "fast" for a long period of time. I set goals of consistent lap times and not worrying about placement. My first XC race I was within a few minutes on lap times. I saw people that had stupid fast first laps and then 10 or 12 minutes slower second laps. That was exactly how I felt on the trainer session the night before....fast for a short distance....and trashed for the remainder of the ride. Ride smarter....
Last night was something totally different. I saw Grand Rapids Bicycle Company was doing a no-drop ride at Yankee. I figured it would be a 5-7 mile ride on fattys and that would be perfect. An hour or so of riding out in the dark on the snow at Yankee. Well, I was wrong. We started off with the group of 4 riders on the main trail. Little did I know, we were riding the entire 11 mile loop. Not a bad deal in itself, but Yankee is difficult for me when the trails are dry, let alone on a 38 pound tank in the snow. Thankfully the trail was in amazing shape.
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| Stolen without permission from Matt Acker's facebook |
As you can see from the picture above (that was taken during the day today), the trail is sweet. The odd thing is, I have never ridden Yankee in the dark, let alone snow. I have ridden a Turkey Burner on "snow" but never a full blown fatty ride at Yankee. Because the trail was so awesome it made riding in the dark easier. As the other three guys would disappear I would still see an eerie glow of their lights. Then you would see them coming towards you, before disappearing again. The snow made it almost light out. The darkness didn't bother me because it would be hard for something to sneak up on you in the crunchy snow.
The ride was hard, but I did the whole loop with the encouragement from Chris and the other two guys (who I don't know). I just plodded away a mile at a time. That damn long switchback climb (that sucks in the summer) was even worse in the snow. I just have zero climbing power in my legs right now, so I just got off and pushed. Not going to lie, I was off the bike more than I wanted to be....but it is January and I am heavy. I was out there in the dark and cold and snow.....riding my bike and having a blast....once it was over. lol. I survived.
I am off to a good start on my journey of 2018. I know it is a marathon and not a sprint. I know it is ok to rest. I know it is ok to have setbacks. I know that the only way to get to where I want to be is to keep moving forward. So that is what I will do....
