What's that smell?

So I pussed out on another ride outdoors last night. Was planning on getting in about an hour's worth of easy spinning with the TNT crew but with the temperature quickly dropping we decided to cancel the ride. Jenn and I did pick up a trainer for her to use here at the house on the cold nights and days when we don't want to be outdoors. In the process I also picked up a copy of the Spinerval's 5.0 Mental Toughness.

This episode is geared towards developing the mental toughness to maintain a steady hard effort over a period of time. The video is about 1.5 hours long and uses sets of steady state intervals the entire time. It started out fairly easy and I was just spinning along on the rollers. Then I started to sweat.

The problem wasn't that I was starting to sweat but I wasn't wearing a shirt and my armpits were starting to reek. I had a running dialouge in my head on which smelled worse, the dead fish from Saturday's ride or me. That is were the "mental toughness" training began. The intervals began to get longer and longer and I began to stink more and more. It was now mentally tough to just breath the stench. Then the jerk "Coach Troy" of the video asked us to get off our bikes and do isometric squats for a minute and a half. This required us to squat to a sitting position and put our hands up behind our heads. I haven't felt that kind of burn in my legs in a long time. It f-in hurt! I was only about to hold the first one for about a minute ten. The second one I was able to fight through and hold for the entire minute and a half. Then it was back on the bike for more steady state stuff.

The workout was a good one. Not a lot of power was required from my legs but it definitely was tough at times to keep the cadence soooo high and not slowing down because I felt that my heart was beating too rapidly. Might do the same workout Thursday night since it will be colder then than last night. But for now, I am off to take another shower as I feel dirty just remembering how stank I was last night.

Beautiful Day and now my legs hurt

The morning started off with Jenn and I going out to meet the Team out at Osborne Park. I was a it weary of the weather conditions as I have begun to be a big ole puss when it comes to being cold. Thursday night we went out to Westcreek where it seems to always be about 10 degrees colder there than any other place in Richmond. We had planned on doing 3 quick laps (18 miles) but it soon turned into 2 quick laps as my fingernails had started to feel like I had slammed each and every one with a BFH. I had Friday off and had been looking forward to a couple hour ride all week. But with being cold on Thursday night and being a being pile of lazy I stayed at home and played with the pups all day.
Back to Saturday. I was hoping it would warm up like the weatherpersons said it was going to but weary all the same as they don't always predict it right. The group ride had gone really well with everyone keeping a very good pace the whole 33 miles. As always when we ride out there we were blessed with a few laughs and WTH looks on our faces. The WTH looks usually stemmed from a dead animal carcass. The final count was

• 3 deer
• 3 fish
  
• 2 house cats and
  
• 1 red fox hanging from a barb wire fence

Once we got back to the parking lot I had made the decision to continue on ride back to the house. Between the high 40 degree day and my clothing selection I had warmed up real nice like. Just before I was about to leave the parking lot, a customer of mine Ed McNelis of Team Nature's Path had rolled up to the park to use the restroom. Seems he was out on a solo trip in search of the ever elusive base mile. After a brief conversation, I had a partner to ride back through the city with and off we went.

My legs felt pretty good despite not eating breakfast or lunch or anything other than a Fruit Smoothie Powerbar just before the start of the first 33 miles. By the time the road turned upwards to begin the accent from the riverbed my legs started to remind me, my diet routine stinks. I couldn't take on Gelblasts fast enough, I had hit the wall.

With the dark clouds rolling in for the afternoon rain showers they had been predicting I knew I couldn't just sit up and coast back. Well that and I knew I was still about 15 miles out and I had told Jenn it would only take me about 1.5ish hours to get home so I pressed on. Downing drink, gel blast, drink, gel blast for the next 52 minutes. My legs started to come back to me a little along the flatter/rolling parts of Huguenot. I hadn't been paying attention to the time really but I knew it had been 1.5 hours since I left when I heard the phone ringing. I stopped to call Jenn back and let her know I was only about 4-5 miles out and I would be home as quick as my two dead legs would get me there.

All in all it was a great ride. Ended up with my first metric century under my belt for 2009 and it has me thirsting for the next one. Look out there is blood in the water!

First Post of 2009

So it's seven days into the new year and I thought it was about time for me to make my first post of the year. Hope everyone had a nice fun filled time with their families over the holidays. I know Jenn and I did!

I have never been one to make resolutions for New Year's and I am not going to start this year. I have however been known to set a few goals I would like to accomplish each year and this year is no different.

With having to save money so Jenn and I can afford to get out to my sister's wedding this summer and also having to pay for our own wedding and honeymoon, I told Jenn I had made up my mind not race once again this year. She tried to talk me into doing a few of the bigger races but I told her I would have to respectfully decline as I had already come up with my next big list of stupid s*** I would like to attempt this year. She got nervous when I explained the list. And probably rightfully so. Here's the list for 2009:

• Marry Jenn on Oct 3rd
• Get myself into respectable endurance riding shape by start of summer
• Attempt to break the VA North to South record as governed by the Ultra Marathon Cycling Association
• And if time allows I would like to be the first to set a record for the W-E of VA

Jenn is a bit weary of the amount of time I will have to be on the bike training to get myself back into shape but is being very supportive. I will be getting in most of my harder rides on Fridays (usually my day off) and my easier rides with our Team in Training group. Which by the way you all should donate!

But for now I am off to install a new heart rate monitor on the bike so I can get an idea of just how bad this training is going to hurt.

Holiday Prep

Final touches and first ride

With the Gunnar just about finished we just had to add a few final touches, waterbottle cages. We knew when we built it up the cage on the downtube would fit fine. The problem lied in trying to get a cage to somehow fit securely on the seattube as the front derailleur clamped right in the middle of the braze-ons. I had the idea to try and find some longer bolts and just space it out so one could mount over the top of the clamp. Alas, we found some longer ones! Found some small washers and alas, two cages! Who knew frame mounted pumps would be good for anything other than swinging at cars that got too close?! (For those who don't know frame pumps come with longer bolts)

Now that the build was complete, nothing left to do really except weigh it and ride it. When I started the build I was thinking we would be in the same 20 lb area as the Scattante build she was riding prior to this due to the frame being steel and all. I was ok with it as the ride quality was going to be much smoother and plush for her. So I through it up on the digital scale at work. It was like watching the weigh ins on the Biggest Loser. Numbers were jumping all around while the bike steadied itself on the hook. I was elated when the numbers stopped jumping and settled on ......

About a 2 lb loss!

While at the store I picked up a new headlight, CygoLite Pace 135, for Jenn's bike as well as a heart rate monitor for myself. I have big plans for the HRM which I will disclose in a later post. I need to read a book and an online article or two first. Arrived home, charged the light and and awaited Jenn's arrival home from work so we could head out on the open road for Jenn's first ride on the Gunnar and her first night ride.

The light performed really well and I was pleased with the output on it. At 135 lumens this 3.5 hour LED was quite bright and illuminated more of the road than my Cateye Doubleshot. It retails for $99 (usually on sale for around $70) and at that I think it is a steal. Jenn had no problems seeing anything that was coming her way.

She really enjoyed the ride quality on the new bike. We will need to make some small tweaks to get a little pressure off of her hands and thus releasing some tension in her shoulders but all in all the ride is just as nice to ride as it is to look at.

Woke up early this morning so Jenn and I could get to the polls before going into work. The church which we were supposed to vote at is literally 3 minutes from the house. We left the house right at 6 when the polls opened only to find 430 exactly ahead of us. I know this because the machine that we stuck our ballots in said I was vote number 432. We only had to wait an hour and half for it but well worth it.

When I got to work I was greeted shortly there after by DeShawn our friendly UPS man. He was carrying the last piece of the puzzle for Jenn's new Gunnar build. He was kind enough to pose for a picture. Maybe because it meant he got to be inside out of the rain for just a moment longer. Any guess what he is dropping off? Spoiler down below.

Here are some pictures that do no justice to the beauty of the complete build. The bling list includes Gunnar Roadie frame, Easton EC70 fork, Easton EA70 bars, 2009 SRAM Rival shifters brakes and dérailleurs, FSA SLK cranks and a build wouldn't be complete without a set of Chris King wheels and headset.

Holiday Season Begins...

Seems like just yesterday Jenn and I were talking about buying a home together on New Years Day. We have had a busy year together including buying our first home together, getting engaged, adopting a puppy and receiving a promotion at work. Now its our first holiday season together.

Most people do not consider Halloween part of the holiday season but this year I do and I will get to that in a moment. Started off by carving some jack-o-lanterns while visiting Aprill and Adam a few weeks ago.

Halloween soon came around and Jenn and I were ready to hand out some candy to all the kids in the neighborhood. Well, Jenn was ready to hand it out. I spent the evening dry fitting some components on Jenn's Xmas present.

A couple of months back, I had made the decision to be the cycling coach for the Richmond chapter of Team in Training. Jenn had made the decision to sign up as a participant and train to do her first century. I then started to put the ole brain into overdrive trying to find a new frame for her to ride on to make the long days of training a little more comfortable than the extremely stiff aluminum frame she is/was riding.

The problem was she really wanted a bike with some pink in it and I couldn't find but a few choices of carbon frames in which she would really like and they all would require me to buy a complete bike just so I could use the frame. Solution? I got in touch with Richard and Waterford Cycles and ordered a custom Gunnar Roadie frame. Once the frame was done with the manufacturing Richard gave me a call to make sure their understanding of what I wanted the paint to be like was the same as mine. They were able to recreate my thoughts perfectly; black glossy frame with Gunnar written in pink down the downtube and he also agreed to leave all other decals and markings off the frame. Man does it look clean!


The second picture is a bit blurry because I get excited when I am around it but not anything like Jenn does. We are still waiting on the fork (Easton EC70) and wheels (Chris King Pretty in Pink edition) to arrive. Fork should be today and the wheels hopefully by Thursday or Friday. If they arrive on either of those days Jenn will be riding it for the first time at our first Team in Training session on Saturday as I will stay up all night to get it built if I have to! Meanwhile I have a couple boxes full of new sexy parts waiting to be put to good use and a stand in the house that is driving Jenn bonkers. For some reason I think it would bother her more if it were one of my frames just chillin there lookin pretty, ha!