Got one over on ...

Since moving away from Chi-town as a kid we haven't really had more than one or two of what I would consider to be "winters". This year I had a plan though. I thought that maybe just maybe if I were to leave all of the Christmas decorations and lights up around the outside of the house, good ole Mother Nature would get confused as to what time of the year it actually is and bring us some of the powdery white stuff. I think it may have worked as the last two weekends (including this one) we have been dumped on with a little wintry mix thrown in in the middle of the week just for kicks.

This storm had Jenn going in to work snow duty once again last night. Not wanting to be overly bored with her not around, I decided I would take a stab at riding the rollers two nights in a row. Both nights, I followed along with Spinervals Vol 7 The Uphill Grind. A 45 minute interval set designed to put your heart into your throat.

I have been fighting a on again off again head cold for the past couple of months as if it were a crazy ex-girlfriend who would not leave me alone despite me moving on. And in true crazy ex form, once she found out she could no longer get to me, she went after my wife. Jenn is not happy to have caught one of my colds again because they always hit her harder than me. Last night I decided to wear the heart rate strap while on the rollers for the first time this year. In the 45 minutes my heart rate averaged 164 and I saw a maximum rate of 193. I am not sure if it is a good thing or a bad thing to be able to get my rate up that high. I am not sure I have ever gotten it that high before. Does this mean my heart is getting bigger and stronger or the opposite? The exciting news for me though was despite my breathing being a bit out of control, the lactic acid in my legs was borderline ridiculous but bearable for at least 4 seconds more.

Tonight, looks to be a wash as I will probably be conducting inventory at the shop and then tomorrow I will be back at work and then home to catch some of the Super Bowl.

Fairy Stone State Park

This past weekend, Jenn and I met up with Mikey and Pantea for our second annual MLK JR weekend of fun. Last year we rented a cabin at Douthat State Park. This year we decided to take the festivities to a new location, Fairy Stone State Park. It is located in SW VA just past Danville.

We were able to get in a GREAT hike on Saturday. As you can tell from the elevation profile, there weren't very many long ups or downs but we were constantly doing one or the other.

The downs really did a number on my left knee. At one point near the end I was pretty worried I had done something serious to it as I could hardly put pressure on it with out my face completely tightening up. Today, 3 days removed it still hurts but not as much. It really only bothers me when I am going down a set of stairs or walking on unlevel ground. Hopefully, it will stop bothering me all together so I can feel better about getting back on the bike later this week without doing more harm to it.

I put pictures up here. Check them out if you are completely bored at work and need something to make you wish you weren't there.

Not frozen anymore

I have hit the rollers twice in one week which was enough to make me look forward to the plans I had made at the beginning of the week with the Masta of Spin, to hit up the fire roads at PSP on Friday. That was until the MAN handed out a Mandatory Training Memo which was to take place on Friday, forcing me to go by myself.

Swift Creek still partially frozen near the boat ramp

Once I started my ride I was hoping the half inch of snow we received over night would help keep the ground frozen. Instead, despite the 32 degree temps with a wind chill of 22 degree the snow turned the fire roads into a goo topped frozen yogurt. It was nearly impossible to keep any momentum going unless I kept the throttle open. Even then I didn't go anywhere fast. The creek is still very high as the totals of the water table remain at the highest levels since before I was born. I had planned on fording the creek near the damn but the cold cold water had seemed to have no trouble keeping its momentum as it rushed down and away from the damn.

It is deeper than you think and very COLD!

I ended up getting in an estimated exact 24.6 miles in a few minutes short of 2 hours. It was great to be riding outside again but I know I have a lot of work to do to get my fitness back close to a shadow of what it once was.

Roller time ...

The other day I received a message from the master of spin, Nate which had a link to what I call "the Facebook of workouts". The message said he was going to start using it as a way to track his workouts this year and hopefully it would also serve as a tool to keep him motivated. After checking it out, I too created an account and I have to say it has so far ignited the smelly gas under my ass.

So far I have been able to log two workouts since I created the account on Saturday. The first was from a partial commute to work on Sunday morning. I got about 6 miles into the ride when the 8 degree wind chill factor took its toll on the La Raza. My thinking was the spicy factor of the Salsa would keep both me and the bike warm enough to not freeze but it wasn't the case. On the one bigger climb on Courthouse Rd the rear derailleur cable froze up which left me with the choice of using either the 11 or 12 tooth cog. After a failed attempt to free it on the side of the road, I made the executive decision to ride the final two miles to my parents house and hijack a ride the rest of the way. After seeing the pawl break in Jenn's shifter I didn't want to risk it to mine. Live to ride another day!

After taking Monday night off, Jenn and I decided to pull out the trainer and rollers from under the bed. With nothing on the some 400 channels of television, we dusted off our at home version of Coach Troy volume 5.o. As Jenn said on her dailymile page, "It's one of those things that is really hard and you hate almost every second of it while you are doing it but afterwards you feel great!" With any at home training aid, you get out what you put in. I put everything in and got a great nights sleep, certainly one of the best nights I have had in a long time.

And what post would be complete without a pic of the gorgeous Mozzarella covered chicken and pasta Jenn had enough energy to cook after our workout? Yum!

Happy New Year!

A new year often brings thoughts of change and a higher motivation to get goals or tasks once pushed to the wayside finally accomplished. It is no different here in the 804. Now, most people have heard of "Take you kid to work day" and Wednesday was not that day. Rather it was deemed, "Clean your bike, So you can ride it to work day." In doing so, I installed a new shifter and some pink housing on Jenn's Gunnar. For those of you who don't already know, one of the pawls in the rear shifter broke. Don't worry, although it sounds serious it was nothing SRAM wouldn't warranty faster than one could recover from the swine flu.

I didn't include a picture of my steed as I wanted to keep the mystery alive as to whether or not I still actually own a bike. And if I do own said two wheeled device, do I know how to operate one with any kind of efficiency. The plan was to clean the bike so I could ride it into work on Thursday. That plan changed quickly with the sleet/rain on Thursday morning. New plan! Get a ride in on Saturday morning. I am starting to think Mother Nature is starting to really try and prove that I have a bigger V than she does. Temps in the teens has me chillin' (pun intended) here at the house.

I am starting to put together some goals for the new year however. Without goals, one (I) will not get anything accomplished. The list is still in the compiling stage so you will have to wait but until then let your mouth start to water over the pics of what we had for dinner last night. It was much easier to cook with the bigger grill we received for Xmas. Happy New Year!

Started by experimenting with my salsa recipe. I call it medium, Jenn calls it "F-in ridiculous hot!"

And there isn't a better New Year's Day meal to eat in front of a bowl game than a nice grilled pizza pie!

Let it snow!

It didn't take long for the first snow to come this year. Our new snowman welcome sign may have had something to do with it.

Sage jumping for the Frisbee

Here I come mom!

Playing with Petra and Sage

Photo Op with Sage

New bigger grill on the left. Smaller older one on the right.

Might just use one of the above grills to cook up some snow crab!

Or maybe just some turkey and vegetable soup.

Plans go awry

I had plans to ride into work once again as Jenn had her strength training class at Endorphin again. Threats from the local weathermen made my decision to sleep in rather than ride pretty easy. When I woke up you could imagine my level of annoyed-ness as the sky was clear and the sun was out. All was good though as it didn't take long into the day before the sky turned cloudy and then Mother Nature didn't to open up on us once again.

With it raining, I spent the afternoon watching the Food Network. Seems that is my fall back this time of year when the weather turns nasty or I get too lazy to ride in the cold. So with an afternoon full of inspiration Jenn and I collaborated on dinner. I used the cast iron grill pan to do up some chicken breasts while she whipped up a batch of her homemade mac-n-cheese! Here are some pictures to get you thinking about dinner at 8 o'clock this morning ;-)

Almost looking too good to cover in sauce...

But when you are covering it with 100% pure Idaho love, now that is a different story. Thanks Becky for bringing so many bottles home last time. The mac-n-cheese was to die for. And is what is for lunch today!

I have a couple of rides planned for the next couple of days. Hell I may even ride an unprecedented four days in a row. But lets not get too ahead of ourselves.