Merry Christmas!

I hope everyone has a very Merry Christmas. We had a good time with friends and family. A nice choppy work week (Tuesday and Wednesday off) helped make the time go faster. This week is the same, no work Tuesday or Wednesday. So that helps.

What this does do is remind me that the end of 2024 is here. It has been an interesting year for sure, but I am not ready to post on that yet. This post is more about my last few rides and some races for next year. 

The mental battle a few nights ago was a pretty solid win for me. I decided to follow that up with a few days off with the family. I jumped back in on Friday with a Zwift Camp baseline workout. It didn't go exactly as planned, but it was a solid ride overall. Trying to hold high power output for me is proving to be difficult. This is part of why I did the base camp to figure out the strengths and weaknesses. 

Sunday, I took on state 6 of the Zwift Camp. This meant the Elevation Evaluation route. While the route itself is only 15.3 miles, all of the climbing happens early. I did a warm up first to get the legs ready, then went on to tackle this route. 

It is just a steep grind for 2.2 miles. There is a short break in the middle, then it ramps up again to the finish. On climbs like this (or the climb portal), Zwift is nice enough to show a progress bar. This bar has a % of how far you have gone over the course of the climb. That is a very helpful tool for me, because I use it to just tell myself "you only have XX percent left, keep going".  Again, this ride was far from perfect, but I did everything in my power to stay ahead of my ghost pacer. 

I set a PR on The Grade KOM. Taking about 1:30 off my previous personal best. I literally just put my head down and pedaled. I only looked up to see the status bar and calculate how much misery I had left. Brutal climb, heavier rider, wrong gearing. Sore legs. Nice. 

The payoff is the stupid fast downhill on the back side. I crested the hill but I kept pedaling on the downhill to flush my legs out. This is another thing I am working on. I normally stop at the top of a climb and rest....just coasting. I try not to do this so I keep moving. The climb was done, but not the entire ride. I still had about 8 miles to go.

After the descent there are some rolling hills to the finish. Amazing how hard a small 1% climb can feel when your legs are torched from a nasty categorized climb. I pressed on, counting down the distance to go.  I set a PR on the woodland sprint, so I was feeling pretty confident. I wasn't able to ride with anyone, but I just tried to keep my speed up and keep pushing. I finished the route with another PR on the final Sasquatch sprint. And I was down under an hour on the route. 

This time I took nearly 3 minutes off of my time for the Evaluation. That is a pretty solid jump, and I will take it. Not only did I best my PR on the climb, but I was able to mash the final section and pull more time out. For me, this is a good indicator that I am progressing toward being a better and stronger rider all around. Fitness is increasing. Weight is still dropping. Mentality has it days, but more good than bad. Progress.

So, onto the other things happening. I am now signed up for 3 races. I am still on the waitlist for Barry Roubaix, but I did get into Lumberjack 100 and I signed up for Coast 2 Coast (only the 100) as well. So that will be a mountain bike century followed the next weekend by a gravel century. Just asking for trouble, lol. 

I will have a better schedule post in January, but with the introduction of the Offroad series I will be focusing more on mountain biking than gravel this year. Its where my heart longs to be, in the woods and on the single ribbon of dirt. 

There is still work to be done, but December has been my best month all year. Both distance and hours are solid. January will be better, but I am happy with how I am progressing. My riding buddy Tom is all moved and will be ready to ride soon. This will likely mean more outdoor rides and dragging the fatbike around. Will be good to mix it up and test the legs in the real world. I know I need more endurance, but all these things are building. This year wasn't great for me with 2 surgeries. But it will be worth it and I am looking forward to the challenge that 2025 presents.

Until then, keep the rubber side down and keep moving forward. 

A mental battle

 First off, I hope everyone had a Merry Christmas. Secondly, it once again has been a month since my last post. sheesh, time just isn't slowing down.

What has been going on? How is everyone?

I have been steadily riding, but not a ton. The rides I have done have been solid and I am steadily getting stronger. I still have a lot of work to do, but I am building a solid base that will get me where I want to be. December has been my best month since my surgery. The miles are ticking upward. Still not exactly where I want to be, but I will get into more of this battle in a bit.

I wanted to specifically talk about my last trainer session on Christmas Eve. I headed to the basement to burn some calories before spending time with the family. Looking through Zwift at my badges I chose a route that I had not accomplished yet. I landed on the Mayan San Remo route, which is one of the newer releases.

Overall, 13 miles with just over 700 feet of climbing. Shouldn't be terrible for me to get some time on the bike before festivities. What I didn't do was look at the route or where the climbing was. If you look at the image below it shows the elevation profile. I didn't know it was downhill for the first 6 miles followed by 3.5 miles of climbing. Not major climbs or elevation, but everything all at once is a bit excessive. ;)

The ride started easy enough. For some reason I was letting my mind wander to the events happening later in the day and to Christmas morning the following day. Very quickly I was at the base of the first climb. The Mayan mountainside KOM isn't terrible. It starts with a steady grade and then gets a bit steeper at the end. When the road ticked upward and that grade percentage got steeper I was struggling. 

My legs felt sluggish and mentally I was just checked out. Legs were heavy and the steady pressure of a climb were just making them feel worse. My mind was telling me to just shut down. I could click "turn around" and just coast down the hill and call it a ride. I know there are times when this is exactly what you should do....because some days your body just tells you NO. I kept going.....very slowly up the first part of the climb. But I was struggling, especially knowing there was another 2 miles of climbing ahead of me. The one thing that kept me going was the "distance to go" showing on the screen. Well, that along with the big ass downhill that is after the Itza KOM. 

If you are not familiar with Zwift, it shows you how far you are away from the end of the route that is selected to ride. While I knew I had 2 miles of climbing left, there was only 5ish miles left to finish the route....so I pressed onward.

As I said, Mentally I was checked out and thinking about the day. I think that my wandering brain was making the first climb harder. I was able to channel my thoughts and focus hard on the next climb. It was far from easy, but I was able to set a PR on that climb. I went from ready to quit to the first climb to setting a PR on the second. This is how I know it was mental and not physical.

If you have ever read my posts you know that mental toughness can be an issue for me. So this ride was a huge win as far as I am concerned. I was able to pull myself back together and get the job done. The payoff for regaining focus was a stupid fast downhill and cruise into the finish of the route. Not big distance, but that really wasn't the point of the ride in the first place.

A win is a win.

On another note, there is a new MTB series back in Michigan! I used to do the CPS when it was relevant before gravel took over the cycling scene. I am looking forward to getting back to my roots in 2025 and doing more mountain bike races. Gravel is fun, but I love the trails and that is where I thrive to be. 

Keep moving forward my friends! Merry Christmas to everyone again. 

Turkey burner?

 The funny thing is....when you don't eat all day on Thanksgiving, you don't "need" a Turkey burner ride. I still should have.....just for riding sake....but I will get into the details. 

The weekend before last I drove to Lansing to pick up Chris's youngest son from that dreaded school in East Lansing. Yes, he is a Spartan right now. But that isn't the point of the story. The point is that I believe he brought some type of illness with him. By Tuesday I was noticing a minor tickle. Wednesday I woke up with a sore throat. With a minor cough and some rasp in there, I opted to take it easy Thanksgiving week. I still got my weights in, but avoided the bike so I didn't tear myself down. I skipped a Turkey Burner (especially outside) for that same reason. I could have ridden, but with this new immune system I have I didn't want to shred what was left and end up super sick heading into winter.

Instead we played cards and slept in for a few days. Not a fan of Black Friday, so avoided that as well. Saturday we watched the Boys in blue get a win over that team down south and then headed to see Wicked. This is where the week turned a bit shitty for me.

We were on our way to the movie. After getting gas I swung onto M89 and headed out. To my surprise there was a Tahoe XL in my lane going full speed right at us, Thankfully I was able to bail into the carwash entrance but the ice threw me into and over the curb. The asshat coming at us somehow managed to avoid an accident, but he did kiss a curb and lose a rear wheel. I swung around and found him stopped in a parking lot down the road a bit. He was incoherent. I was less that friendly when I got out of the car. This guy appeared drunk....couldn't talk....didn't appear to know where he was...and had pissed his pants. My guess is he fell asleep and nearly fucking killed us. Thank GOD I was paying attention and was able to avoid any collision with him. I did manage to knock the drive connecting the drive train out to my rear wheel drive, but otherwise.....things seem ok with the car.  This was one of those moments where I am thankful to be alive.

Nothing more to report here. 

I did decide to jump on the bike last night. I did a loop on zwift and it felt pretty good. I did notice I was raspy after the ride, but I am feeling pretty good today overall. The route that I did has a small climb segment at the end. I wasn't able to produce the power to keep up with my PR, so I just rode my pace. Was good to be back on the bike. I will probably be back at it again tonight and more this week. The weather has changed to Winter settings, so I am thankful that I don't mind the basement much. Mixing up the routes, and having badge goals is helpful. Plus there are goals that I am working towards.

Thanksgiving was a nice day. Had my family here in the morning and visited with Chris's family in the afternoon. I was able to eat a little of everything and then a piece of pumpkin pie in the evening. Not my normal day of eating from the time I get up to the time to go to bed. Not feeling like a sloth is a good thing! 

So I had a decent week overall. I dropped another 6 pounds and my fitness level is up to a blistering 24 on Strava. I am almost halfway to my Ultimate Goal weight and I am progressing the way I need to. I have my race schedule laid out and I am planning what I can do. Then I see LJ100 opens the end of this month. I am excited about that, especially since I am now at the weight I was back in 2015. Major difference to when I attempted in 2023. There are some nuances to the race that I am not sure on....like it being 4 laps instead of 3. Mentally I will have to prepare for that. 

Just have to keep moving forward!