Luck

Found this yesterday on a walk with Cezanne and our dog Bono.

I'm off for a week vacation with high school buds, RVing, Camping, and hiking in Zion and Bryce Canyon National Parks.

Happy Birthday to me

It would be nice if my birthday gift every year was to ride with a pro cyclist. Better yet would be an annual ride with Lance. I haven't posted this picture on my blog yet, but I know I've circulated it.

Thanks to Bob Cullinan from www.cycleto.com for the pic from the 2008 San Jose LiveStrong Ride. I'll have to post this picture once or twice a year to remind myself of this incredible experience.

Yesterday was my birthday, but Cezanne and I are celebrating it tonight. Having her as my wife is gift enough, but she decided to renew my "Bicycling" subscription as well as get me a massage for this Saturday. It's been a long time.

It was supposed to be sunny all afternoon yesterday. Turned out it wasn't. I still made it out for a ride in Rock Creek Park. It was decent. The rain stopped, so I just had to deal with the spray coming of the tires.

The deer were out in full force yesterday. There were packs of them all over. I stopped less than 10 feet from one and it just sat there staring at me. I thought for a minute it was either going to run away or come after me... I snapped the above pic, but it doesn't do it justice. By the time I pulled up my vest, got into my pocket, took my phone out of the plastic sandwich bag...the deer had made it's way across the street.

The Manayunk Wall. Cezanne used to live in Manayunk and is familiar with the "wall" as they call it. I think it's part of the Philly week races and the cyclists do the wall several times. Last time we were in Philly she saw this cool piece of art and she decided to get it (while I was driving from the Ephrata RR to Philly).

JW previously posted a video link to a guy doing a one-handed wheelie up the Manayunk wall:

http://jwbender.blogspot.com/2009/04/you-wish-you-were-this-cool-i-wish-i.html

Jeff Cup to Bunny Hop: Good to Awful

So the bike racing season goes for me: Good to Awful.

I don't know what I'm doing. I've gone from being in the top 6 or 7 heading into the last 50 feet of Jeff Cup (before 2 guys crashed a few feet in front of me and ended my top 10 finish) to getting dropped and lapped at Bunny Hop, a self proclaimed "good crit for beginners." Pathetic really.

I'm actually chuckling to myself right now (and shaking my head). Things have been off since last Thursday, starting with tired legs, but I was still able to post respectable top third finishes in the Tour de Ephrata RR and TT (not so much in the crit).

Maybe crits aren't my thing, but still, I usually have no problem hanging in and giving it a go even. It was raining pretty heavily today and I can honestly say that I cornered like I was 8 and it was my 5th ride on a bike. I consistently lost ground at every turn and it eventually became a TT on every straight-away to try and catch up to the main group. In the end it wasn't doable.

I didn't use my bike computer for the race. I'm sure it would have been fine, but I didn't want to chance getting any water into the Garmin 705 head unit with the heavy rain. Maybe in retrospect I just wasn't too excited for this race and that manifested itself in more ways than not using my computer.

I wasn't too upset at the end and managed a smile for Cezanne. She, of course, was being a really supportive wife and out there in the rain cheering me on...and watching me drift further and further back. She also put up with my slight grumpiness on the drive over to the crit. This has been the closest race to our place, but leave it to downtown DC to always have stuff closed off! We had to detour, u-turn, backtrack because the police had shut down what seemed like random streets.

So, I'm not sure where this leaves me and racing. I'm scheduled to race next Saturday (May 9) at the Fort Ritchie Criterium. After that I leave for a week long trip to go RVing, camping and hiking with my best highschool buds out in Zion National Park and Grand Canyon National Park. I'm out of town Memorial Day weekend as well as the weekend of June 6/7 (Toon's wedding!!!), so it's possible that after the race on May 9, I might not race until the Tour of Washington County on June 20-21, which is a stage race like Ephrata.

The possibility exists to do a the Fulton Road Race in Lancaster County, PA on May 30, but not sure about that weekend yet.

So I'm thinking I should try to bury myself with a tough week of training this week (if I can muster it) and not worry about a result in the Fort Ritchie Crit and then use this next week's trip as a rest week and start things from there.

Including the 2 crits I did in San Diego last year, the 3 Tradezone practice races at the beginning of this year, today was my 10th mass start, so I could put in for my upgrade to Cat 4. I'm still undecided if I'll put it in soon or after the last race of the season and then just start fresh as a Cat 4 next year.


On Saturday Cezanne and I visited 2 Embassies in DC as part of the Passport to DC event. The 2 closest Embassies to our place were Iraq and Nepal, so we decided to walk to both. The line to get into the Iraqi Embassy was so long we went to Nepal first. Above is my gorgeous wife outside of the Nepal Embassy.


We learned that Nepal is bordered by India on 3 sides and China on the other. They served some curried potatoes with some sort of dry rice cereal. It was good!


We worked our way back around to the Iraq Embassy and the line was about half the size. Above pic is of the line.


Yup, this is the Embassy. We went through a metal detector and on in. They had some old artifacts and a brochure with the history of Iraq and a ton of photos of the Iraqi troops working with US troops.


Out back they did a little Iraqi dancing and they had Iraqi food. The dancing and food was surprisingly like Greek dancing and food.

On the way home we walked a different way than we had ever been and approached the National Cathedral from a different angle.

More Ephrata pics...and "I got dropped"

Found some more photos from the Tour de Ephrata. The links are to the website, the photographer doesn't allow downloading.

TT

http://mlkimages.smugmug.com/gallery/7892276_jdpFp#521856145_3CaMn

http://mlkimages.smugmug.com/gallery/7892276_jdpFp#521851311_Nq3J7

Road Race

http://mlkimages.smugmug.com/gallery/7892264_jqmLT#520933573_hgHrA

http://mlkimages.smugmug.com/gallery/7892264_jqmLT#520996584_4tB7e


I also got my picture posted on the "you got dropped" blog. It's a blog where the owner puts photos of riders who got dropped in racing from the previous weekend. I thought it would be funny if I sent in my own photo, so I did.

http://yougotdropped.blogspot.com/2009/04/back-to-action-or-back-to-non-action.html

My legs are starting to feel a little more recovered. It was weird how dead they felt this week and going into the Tour de Ephrata race. This week's training has been real easy, on purpose. I did easy spins on Monday, Tuesday and Thursday, then did a little bit more of an effort today, but nothing tough.

I was riding in Rock Creek Park today and saw my teammate David Kirkpatrick. He banged a u-turn and we wound up riding a few laps together. It was a good time and nice to have someone to talk to. My cornering was sucking (it was a bit wet and I was being a wimp), but I got some good advice from Dave.

Tomorrow I'll just do an easy 30-45 minute spin to loosen the legs up before the crit on Sunday.

Tour de Ephrata 2009 Cat 4/5 Full Report

Thanks to Jim Wilson for this photo above (and the last photo in this posting). Not only does he provide great images at http://images.jameswilson.com/ but he also has a blog with a great write-up of the scene around the weekend, especially the area of the road race: http://blog.jamesrwilson.com/

All the links to each Garmin race file are at the end of this posting. They show the actual course ridden on a google map, elevation, heart rate, speed, and lap data. Now to the post.

Plan much? That is what I should be asking myself right now.

Logistically, this weekend was a disaster. I feel bad for Cezanne because I was pretty darn grumpy on Sunday night unpacking all my race stuff and putting my cycling gear away.

I don’t ever want to get up at 4:30am on a Saturday and 4:40am on a Sunday and put my body through 3 bike races.

I did the Tour de Ephrata Category 4/5 Stage Race this weekend.

This was my first foray into competing in more than one race on a weekend. I was nervous going in about how my legs would feel on the 2nd and 3rd stage, but tried not to think about it too much. My results are in my post below, but I’ll recap: Road Race – 19th, TT – 18th, Crit – 40th. That equates to 28th overall on points.

Last week on Tuesday I had one of the best interval workouts I’ve ever had (on the trainer). It was really hard, but I felt strong. I think I spun the legs easy for 30-45 minutes on Wednesday then set out on Thursday to do an hour and a half medium effort ride. My legs were completely flat. I tooled around somewhere between a recovery ride and a medium effort ride. My legs felt like they had no snap and that feeling wasn’t encouraging for the weekend.

Cezanne left for Philly (visiting old nursing school friends) on Friday afternoon and after I got home from work I headed from DC to Annapolis to my Mom’s to drop of our dog, Bono, have dinner and sleep on the pull-out sofa.

I woke up at 4:30am on Saturday and got out of the house around 5:40-5:50am. My Mom was nice enough to get up with me and help with breakfast. I got to Lititz, PA (seriously, funny name, French I think…), the site of the Road Race, around 7:50am. I proceeded to wait in the line to pick up our race numbers (photo above) from 7:55-8:35am. Man, that was rough. So after I got all my gear on and headed out for a 5-10 minute warm-up and rode the last kilometer of the course. Our 9:02am start time was delayed (probably to allow for the long lines), so we all sat around at the start line for a bit.

We got underway and the pace was relatively easy at first. I was somewhere towards the back, as I usually am (I know, I know, it’s not the place to be). The pace picked up and I could really feel it in my legs. I was already fighting. The first incident was on the steepest and longest climb of the course. You can see it on the elevation tab of the Garmin race file. Somebody dropped their chain and took about 3-5 people with them.

I was able to go around and the mad chase to get back on ensued. I worked with Grayson (can’t remember the last name) from Bike Rack to get back on, but it wasn’t easy. Looking at the heart rate tab I see that I hit 192 bpm on that chase (it’s the biggest blip on the chart). I usually only approach that in a full on, worked-up, sprint. That’s a new high for me.

I eventually latched back on, but honestly, the rest of the race I was teetering on the verge of being dropped. The course was actually really nice in a beautiful area. There were a ton of turns for a road race and a decent amount of rollers. Wound up being just over 700 feet of climbing per 13-mile lap. Nothing too crazy, but not pancake flat. The only criticism I have is that about half of the turns had gravel on them. That’s just not fun, they should have swept them. Other than that and the long lines to pick up numbers, it was a really nice setup, complete with regular restrooms and timely results reporting. I guess it was timely, this is the only race where I’ve ever checked the results at the venue!

Above photo credited to Linc Brookes: http://linc.zenfolio.com/ Like Jim Wilson, a father of some of our Juniors. We're all lucky to have so many quality photographers at these events!

As the race went on, my plan developed into staying with the lead group if I could, then wait for people to fade in the run-in to the finish line and gain just a few spots that way. Things were going as planned until I was caught behind another crash of 3 guys at the 1k to go sign. At that point there was no getting back on the train, so I rolled into the finish in 19th spot. That is a better result than my legs felt.

After that I cooled down, waved to an Amish boy outside his house and briefly chatted with an Amish guy (probably mid 20s) who had his scooter (non-motorized of course) out and was watching the races. As a side note, we actually passed a horse and buggy during the Road Race, it was kind of cool. I saw a few more on the way to Philly that afternoon (photo taken below as I was driving up on one). Above photo is of another race at the start/finish. I chilled for a bit after the RR and ate a couple of hotdogs as I watched the other races.


A note about the centerline rule: The motorcycle official patrolling behind the main group was really getting on people about the centerline rule. I’m not sure if he booted anybody for it, but if someone stayed out there for more than 2-3 seconds, he would call them out and bring them to the back of the pack where they would have to “start over” in their quest to get to the front. I have to say that I don’t disagree with this. I know it’s a pain and there isn’t much room to maneuver and get ahead, but he also doesn’t want someone getting killed by an oncoming car.

I hung out with Cezanne once I got to Philadelphia. We went to 3 different spots (a restaurant and 2 houses) and eventually got to bed around 10:30pm. I woke up wide awake at 3:08am. I fell asleep again at some point…probably just as my 4:40am alarm went off. I forget when Cezanne and I left Philly, but we had a 70-mile drive ahead of us to get to the Time Trial start.




I’m glad we drove separately at that point because I was getting a little nervous/frustrated because my gas light was on for the last 10 miles of the trip and we were getting there after 7am, for a 7:22am start time. Can’t remember when we got there, but I just remember it was after 7 and hectic getting ready. I rolled up to the start house around 7:17am, with just the minute and a half warm-up from the bike over to the start house (photo above, white tent in the distance).




I used my road bike (don’t have a TT bike), but I put on clip-on aero bars and a TT friendly seat. In retrospect, I wouldn’t have used the clip-on aero bars and then wouldn’t need the aero seat. They probably added an extra pound and my knees hit the elbow pads when I was climbing out of the saddle, which I did a lot of in the 2nd half of the TT. My left leg tends to get numb and not produce much power if I’m in a leaned over or aero position for a while (protruding disk in my lower back), so it's sort of a welcome change to get out of that position.

My plan for the TT was to keep my heart rate around 168-170 bpm. No real reason other than I thought that is what I could probably hold for it and that has been about my race average this year. I kept it pretty close to that on the first half (the flat and rolling section) and then the last uphill half I was closer to averaging 175 I think. That last half is tough, especially the last third! The first big hill is really steep (photo above, credit to Linc Brookes). I was in my lowest gear 39-25 and was out of the saddle. After that, you get a quick break and think the pain is over, then road heads uphill again. The next section isn’t as steep (I thought), but it didn’t matter, the first steep section softened you up enough to make it feel like the first section all over again.

Linc Brookes was taking photos on that steep first section. You can see my 30 second man behind me in the pic above. I caught him about mile 4-5 out of 8 I think.

There is a short flat part before the finish line. I forgot to stop my computer until about a minute after I finished, not a big deal. I turned in a time of 28’10” which was good enough for 18th. I’m not sure if I could have done better if I would have had a solid warm-up. My average heart rate wound up being exactly 170 bpm.

Above pic is of my cool down...sweet tan lines. Also, I don't have 2 sets of our team kit yet, so I hand washed the kit on Saturday night in the bathroom sink and at the time of the TT it was sitting in the car drying, so I could wear it in the crit. For the TT I wore last year's jersey (a hand-me down) and Garmin shorts.

Cezanne took the above photo. It's of the area near the TT.

Above photo is one Cezanne took of the TT parking lot.

On to the Crit!!! I was not super excited about the Crit. The lack of sleep and the sluggish legs were all coming to a head. I decided to stick it out and finish the stage race (barring any serious crash or getting yanked).

Guess what? I actually got in a decent warm-up for the Crit! After Cezanne and I had some food, I hopped on the trainer for about 25 minutes. So, I got my worst result in the one race I got to warm-up for! It wasn’t that, I just think it was the cumulative effect of the past 2 stages, my sluggish legs going into the weekend and my extremely poor position at the back of the group during the Crit.

The Crit course was actually pretty nice. It was wide except for turn 2, which was the only turn which was a little bit tricky. There was a nice downhill to an uphill before the turn, then a little more of an uphill crest after the turn. This was the first race of the season where I got dropped from the lead group for lack of fitness. I know my positioning had a lot to do with it, but that’s how I usually ride, so that kind of cancels itself out.

Above photo credited to Jim Wilson. Thank you again! The photo shows the stragglers and dropped riders.

I think about half-way through is when I popped. On the heart rate tab of that file you can see the difference in the first and 2nd half of the crit. We eventually established a group of about 10-15 (I think) dropped riders. I was spent and I did zero work to keep us from getting lapped, so I did absolutely nothing to try to gain any spots when we came to the finish line. Wound up 40th out of 43. Not good.

Over the course of the Tour de Ephrata, there was some attrition, probably a little bit due to crashes and a little bit from people not wanting to continue. Our 4/5 field went from 59 in the Road Race, to 49 in the TT, to 43 in the Crit.

Garmin race files below, complete with maps of the stages. The Road Race and Crit have laps, so you can click the "splits" button in the upper right of the page to see that data. Halfway down on the page are the tabs for the heart rate, elevation and speed data. Most interesting is probably the elevation data for the TT.

Road Race: http://connect.garmin.com/activity/4340573

Time Trial: http://connect.garmin.com/activity/4340564

Crit: http://connect.garmin.com/activity/4340552

Tour de Ephrata Results

My first time racing more than once in a weekend. I had one of my strongest interval workouts this past Tuesday, but my legs felt awful on my Thursday ride, nothing in them. So I knew this weekend was going to be interesting.

Road Race: 19th (of 59) Toughest race on my legs so far. Made the selection down to the last 22, but I got stuck behind a crash of 3 guys at 1km and after coming to a stop, I couldn't bridge back up. Realistically may have been able to finish just a few spots higher.

Pain Mountain TT: 18th (of 49) That hill is no joke. Definitely my fault, but got ZERO warm-up for this (and the Road Race too), so I'm halfway happy with that. I should have gotten up at 4am instead of 4:40am. BTW, line to register at the Road Race took 40 minutes. That = no warmup.

Criterium: 40th (of 43, ouch!) First race of the year where I got dropped, sucked, but I didn't quit.

More detailed race report coming in the next post, I'm beat and have to get some sleep.

Note to self: don't make sleeping arrangements so that making it to a bike race involves getting up at 4:30am on Saturday and 4:40am on Sunday.

Tan lines trying to make a comeback

First off, one of JW's recent posts with a pic of his food reminded me that I've been delinquent in posting pics of my meals. So, here is last night's dinner. I/we usually have brown rice with this meal, but I just wasn't too hungry last night. Cezanne was working the late shift, so I was left to fend for myself... (Important note on this is that JW doesn't normally post pictures of his food, he did it because I do. I don't want anyone to start to think that JW is lame like me).

The sun and racing and hanging out after the race this past Saturday had the above result on my left leg (more so than my right). I took this pic on Saturday, so it's not that red still.

Since we left San Diego last year in mid-October the tan lines have been fighting a losing battle, but despite months of not experiencing the sun's rays, they never totally went away. I guess they held on to the hope of their return this summer in the 99 degree, 99% humidity summer that is the east coast.

So far I haven't experienced the pleasure of riding in weather like that...it's been Monterey and San Diego, California for the most part. Actually, the 100-mile LiveStrong Rides in Costa Mesa, CA, San Jose, CA, and Austin, TX weren't a picnic weather wise.

I'll get a little taste of it this weekend at the Tour de Ephrata where the temps are supposed to be mid 80s, whoa! :) I'm not looking forward to getting up before 5am on Saturday to make the drive up and then getting up on Sunday in time to make the 70-mile drive (from Philly) for the 7am time trial, but oh well, it should be fun.

I got in a good interval workout on the trainer on Tuesday. I followed the "train right" criterium training DVD. I initially got dressed for a ride outside despite the dark clouds and impending thunderstorms, got outside and felt it had quickly gotten a lot cooler and started to sprinkle, then went back in and threw on some arm warmers. I came back outside, determined to ride hills in Rock Creek Park, got halfway down our street and the pounding rain and lightning begrudgingly turned me around.

Last comment is that blogger isn't putting spaces between some of my paragraphs, even though I put a space in originally, than edit it and put 2 spaces between each paragraph...still doesn't work.