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Wednesday night was our work holiday party, so spin class was… interesting. I was committed to going from the start, so I only had one beer right when we arrived at 4pm. But the party was held at Campo di Bocce, which has great food. So, I ate a lot while playing bocce. I offered to drive a co-worker home because it was more or less on my way to spin class, but it delayed me a bit, so I was about 10 minutes late.

This time, I decided that discretion was the better part of valor, so I started slower and ramped it up slowly. I was still kinda full from dinner and didn’t want to barf. I still ended up getting a good workout, so I’m pleased with my effort.

Tomorrow: 32 mile ride in Los Gatos!

Today’s weather was a bit better than two weeks ago. It wasn’t raining as hard and it was quite a bit warmer, maybe mid-fifties. And we started with fairly dry roads. So, it was a pretty good day to learn how to ride two feet behind the rider in front of you.

We’d already covered the basics, so we just hit the road at a steady 15 MPH to warm up. Team Kristy consisted of our coach, me, Mark and Scott. We had a really good groove going right away and wicked it up to about 18 MPH fairly quickly. Of course, Cañada Road has some gentle hills, so there were times we slowed to 13 and accelerated to 22. But at the end of the ride, my bike computer showed we averaged 15, so that was pretty good.

I’m still getting used to my bike and the jump between the small and big chain ring is significant. So, there were times when I had to shift to the small ring to climb a hill, but as soon as I did, my rear deraileur was on too big a sprocket and I was spinning madly and slowing down. Not good. But as the miles pile up, I’ll get used to that and hopefully the transitions between shifts will be smoother.

On the last lap, Kristi had us chase her down. She’d break away from the paceline and we’d practice catching her as a group… just like you see in the Tour de France. That was fun! Then, at the very end of the lap, there’s a little hill that leads up to where we park. Rick joined the group on the last lap (he was riding solo to take pictures of everyone else). He said, “Okay, everybody click down two gears and finish strong out of the saddle.” So I did. And I found out I was the ONLY ONE who did! Pretty funny, Rick LOL. I didn’t mind, though. I had plenty of “gas” left in the tank and contemplated going out for a fourth lap. But no one else was going, so I decided to save it for another day. Still had a blast though!

Things I learned:

I tried to focus on the water bottles on bike in front of me. That gave me some view of the road and the rear brake caliper of the bike ahead. I managed to stay within five feet of the bike in front of me at all times and when I was following Mark or Kristy, I tried to stay even closer.

I also noticed the benefit of being in the draft. On a day like today, it was noticeably warmer in the draft. There was much less air moving over you, so you warmed up quickly. And once you rotated to the front, you got cold just as quickly. On downhills, I had to feather the brakes to avoid getting sucked into the bike in front of me. This led to people thinking I was slowing when I really wasn’t. So I tried pedaling softly while feathering the brakes, which was a little smoother, but still led people to think I was slowing. I’m going to have to find a way to manage my speed better.

Spin class is getting progressively harder. I mean, I thought I was going to lose it last week. Tonight, I couldn’t keep up the pace I’d set early on. Not sure if I tried too hard, too early, or if I just suck at this. It’s definitely a lot harder than riding a real bike! About halfway through the grueling session, we did 8 minutes of standing climbs. I probably did about 5. Then we did 5 minutes of jumps. I was totally shagged by then and maybe did about half of them… and the ones I did were really clumsy because my legs were toast. But I’m working for and focusing on the goal: the after-century party!

Yesterday was our first “buddy” ride: a non-TnT, totally optional ride that covered 20 to 33 miles depending on which route you took. It started and ended really rainy, but the weather gods took pity on us and gave us a dry spell that conveniently lasted most of the ride. Everyone went out with the notable exception of… OUR COACH! Oh well, I’m sure she’s earned that right.

Since I suck at on-bike navigation, I paired up with TnT mentor Mark who knew to route and the general area and is my paceline teammate. We had a very nice 25-mile ride and picked up Roni on the way back, who took her own route. Roni is new to cycling. I give her and others like her HUGE props for undertaking something like this century with little to no cycling experience! That is a major leap of faith.

Hill repeats—with a twist.

Today was completely different than yesterday: bright and sunny with temps in the low 50s. I toyed with the idea of wearing leg warmers instead of my windstopper tights, but decided that it was better to be too warm on the climbs and just right on the descents than to get a chill on the downhills. So I wore all of my gear, but swapped the rain jacket for the windbreaker since there was no rain in the forecast. It worked out okay. I was a little warmer than I’d expected, but riding with my windbreaker unzipped toward the end of the day solved the problem.

We did four climbs but Patrick threw us a curve; on one of them (I think it was the second or third), we were supposed to do as much of it as possible while standing and using a taller gear. I was only able to do about half that way. Incredibly, it was my arms and hands that got tired, not my legs! I’m just not used to pulling up on the bars. I guess I need to mix in some rowing exercises at the gym. And work on standing climbs next week, too.

Since the road was mostly dry, I also worked on my descending technique. I’m a wuss on downhills, even on my motorcycle, but I had more confidence in my braking so I opened it up a little. I also wanted to work on my footwork—getting my outside foot down on turns. I normally just do downhills with the pedals level, but supposedly getting your outside foot down lowers your center of gravity more. It felt okay, but I can’t tell if it’s any better than keeping the pedals level. Maybe I’d feel the difference if I were carrying more speed. Either way, it was a good day. My legs are really feeling it now!

Did a new drill in spin class tonight: Jumps. First you stand up straight while pedaling, then lean back and hover over the seat, then sit, then jump up into a standing position again. You do all of this every 16 revolutions without breaking cadence or adjusting the resistance. It sucked, but I’m sure it’s supposed to build up something that’s, um, not built up yet. Either that or Coach Patrick was just messing with us 😉

Today was a completely different experience than yesterday. For one thing, I had more time. Our Sunday hill repeats don’t start until 10:30, so I had plenty of time to get ready. But more important, I wore the right gear. I decided I’d rather be too warm today than too cold, so instead of my new jacket, which is not waterproof, I wore my rain jacket. I also wore my new insulated tights. In addition to being warmer than my, um, leg warmers, they have “windstopper” material on the front. That really helped because I think I lost a lot of heat via evaporation yesterday. I even wore toe covers on my shoes! It all worked great and I only got a little chill on the descents.

Speaking of descents, that was the other thing that was different: climbing. I never really worked hard enough to generate much body heat yesterday. I mean, pacelines are all about CONSERVING energy 🙂 Today, I was working hard on the climbs and controlling my speed on the descents due to the wet conditions. So I built up a lot of heat going up and didn’t lose too much due to evaporation on the downhill side.

As for the ride, we met at the parking lot and the rain was coming down. We waited about half an hour and it stopped, so we headed up the road to the staging area at the base of the hill. On the way, it started raining again. People were not looking forward to another day like yesterday—especially on a wet, steep, possibly dirty road—and the ride was called off.

I felt good and warm, so I decided to do it by myself. I’m glad I did. After the first climb/descent, the clouds went away and I was able to do three more sets under bright, blue skies. I felt like I could’ve done at least one more set, but decided that since the original plan was to do four, I’d stick with that. I rode back to the parking lot and stopped along the way to check out the memorial to the two riders who were killed by the asleep-at-the-wheel deputy a while ago. It was a stark reminder that you can be doing everything right and something totally beyond your control can take you out. In this case, it was a sheriff’s patrol car, but it could easily be a disease like leukemia or lymphoma. That’s why we ride… in more ways than one.

This morning, I was in a rush from the get-go, so I was kind of stressed and in a foul mood. Fortunately, the weather cleared up as soon as I hit the freeway. Then, about a mile from the starting location, it started raining again. So we started in the rain.

I got assigned to a pretty fast group. I was the only first-timer in it. This was probably a good thing because I never got going fast or hard enough to really warm up, and would’ve been colder if I were in a slower group. But it didn’t do much for my paceline skills. I was pretty much at my mental limit trying to remember everything I’m supposed to do. And since this was the first time I’d ever ridden in a paceline, that’s not good.

FYI: a paceline is a group of riders who ride single-file and work together as a team. The rider in the front blocks the wind for the other riders. When he/she gets tired or has been in the lead long enough, he/she shouts “rotate,” slides to the left of the paceline and drops to the back of the line. There are other things you need to do like call out obstacles, give hand signals for slowing and stopping, and maintain your spacing, but it all takes experience. It also takes trust because you’re supposed to ride just 2-5 feet behind the rider in front of you.

After a slow start to go over all of the instructions, we hit our stride—15-22 MPH according to my bike computer. Things went well, but the rain continued to come down pretty heavy, so our head coach called the ride. A few of us wanted to keep going and so we went out for another lap. It was good practice for me, plus I really wanted to get a good workout and one 7.5-mile lap wasn’t enough.

The sun decided to join us and we laughed about how the ride got called too early. But cold is cold and the sunshine wasn’t strong enough to warm me. I got soaked right away and now was starting to get really cold. So we just did the one extra lap and packed up.

While I was getting everything in my car, I started to REALLY get cold. I guess I underestimated how low my body temperature was. Even with the car heater going full blast, I was still shivering. Of course, I still had my wet bike clothes on and what does good bike gear do? Wick moisture away from your body where it can evaporate. So, the heater just accelerated that, which is why I wasn’t getting any warmer. I was 2/3 of the way home before I finally started to warm up. The first thing I did when I got home (after stowing my stuff) was take a 30-minute hot shower. Man did that feel good!

It’s probably going to rain tomorrow, but I’ve already washed my stuff in case we still do our hill repeats. Hopefully it will dry in time.

Damn, spin class is HARD! Well, it’s as hard as you want to make it and I may have overdone it. Fortunately, I dialed it back at the end and didn’t puke, have a stroke or do anything embarrassing.

The problem was eating too close to class time. I should’ve left the office at 5:30 and grabbed a bite. But I left around 6:15 and even though I ate pretty light, I didn’t give it enough time to digest. Oh well, live and learn. Next week will be better.

Wanted to go to the gym today, but work got in the way. Oh well, there’s spin class tomorrow.

So today we did our hill repeats. I’ve never been in this area, and certainly never on the roads, so I didn’t know how steep it was or what else to expect. It turned out to be okay.

We met at a park about 3 miles away from the base of the hill. From there, we rode to a smaller parking lot near the base of the hill and regrouped.

The drill was easy: ride up a 3/4-mile hill in a line as far as you can go. You can pass each other, so the hill naturally spaces people out according to their ability. As soon as the leader gets to the top of the hill, he or she turns around and races down. When the person in front of you passes you going downhill, you turn around and follow. Then we all meet back at the small parking lot, regroup again, then head back up. Sounds simple enough — and it was.

We did Mt. Eden three times. The first time, I kept it mellow. I didn’t want to burn my legs out early and struggle, or cramp up, later. There were some steep parts and some not-so-steep parts, but the closest you get to resting are some short, flat sections. The second time, I went harder and passed some people. On the way down, I hit a bump and my brand new cycling computer when flying across the road. I made a mental note of where I lost it so I could look for it on the next run. On the last run, the coaches had a little surprise in store for us: everyone would ride to the top where we would take a picture before heading back to the first parking lot. This time, I let it all hang out (except for the section where I found my computer!). It was hard, but definitely not the worst climb I’ve ever done. And I didn’t have to get out of the saddle once! I think they choose this route just for that reason. It’s hard enough to give you a good workout, but not so hard that you have to stop spinning and start mashing the pedals.

While I did really well on the climbs, the downhills were a different story. I’m just not comfortable flying down hills. Never have, (probably) never will be. Fortunately, that’s not a big deal with this group. They’re more interested in safety than speed.

On the way back to the starting parking lot, I saw an all-white bike by the side of the road. It looked like it was propped up by a red bag or something like that. When I got closer, I saw that the red bag was really a bouquet. In front of the bicycle were two memorial plaques. I can only assume that that was the spot where a sleepy sheriff’s deputy killed two innocent cyclists. I’ll probably check it out closer next week.

Once back where we started, I got several kind words from the coaches. I guess I’m one of the stronger riders… and their praise only makes me want to get stronger!

Honestly, I gave credit where credit was due: the bike! It was amazing how smooth and easy it is to ride. Coming off of a mountain bike with ultra-low gearing, I was a little concerned about how I’d handle the limited gear selection of having ten sprockets, but only two chain rings. I think my mtn. bike’s smallest chain ring is 28 teeth and it’s biggest sprocket is 32 teeth. That means the rear wheel turns less than once for every rotation of the cranks. Doing a little math (32/28), that means it has a mechanical advantage of 1.143. The small chain ring on the road bike is 34 teeth and the biggest sprocket is 28 teeth. So, the maximum mechanical advantage I can get is 28/34=0.824. But it was enough for Mt. Eden, and I hope it’ll be enough for the century. I’ll just have to lose weight and gain strength!