Jun 19, 01:55 PM by Steve | Ordered

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May 19, 03:16 PM by Steve | Training 5/12-5/18

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I never felt right after Bakersfield, so I noodled along for most of my rides hoping I would stumble into my groove. Despite my funk, I suprised myself with a new PR on OSM, 30 seconds faster than before, with the pacing help of Marco. Thursday evening I did my old Bella Vista route with John and like an idiot didn’t eat enough, so I was out of energy all day Friday. I tried to do some intervals in the evening and could barely get my HR up to threshold, and it took me nearly 5 minutesfor each one.

I finally recovered Saturday and stayed with Seth and Chester’s constant attacks and went with them and a few other guys on a second small break that stayed away to the end of Glen Annie after we were caught earlier due to traffic lights. Almost immediately after I got home Kim and I went out for our “Pancake ride”, which we cut shorter than usual due to the heat and our need to get back home and deal with out mountain bikes for sunday’s race. I’ve now perfected my order at Beackbreak Cafe: the “Veggie Benedict” without hollandaise sauce or the sautéed (greasy) mushrooms and onions, and instead a tomato, raw onions, and lettuce. I suggested they call it the “Steve Benedict” special.

Sundays mountain bike race went pretty well despite some mechanical issues with Chester’s bike. I think I’m sufficiently hooked that I’ll pick up a mountain bike next year. The...

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May 16, 02:37 PM by Steve | Training 5/5-5/11

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I felt like I had a pretty good training week last week. A lot of volume and intensity. I didn’t bother cutting back before the race in Bakersfield because it wasn’t really a priority to me. I could feel the tired in my legs which, of course, didn’t help at the race. If I was just a little fresher I’m sure I’m could have held on the rest of the climb and saved getting dropped for later in the race.

The best indicator of my training improvement was in my VO2 intervals. When I first started them, I went 5 minutes up OSM and repeated for 5 times to the same location. As I continue to do them, it is taking me less and less time to make it to the same distance (.85 miles). This week, doing them with Marco (note that he was behind me, not pacing me up) I clustered 4 right around 4 minutes (fastest was 3:45), then blew up rather spectacularly, but still managed the final one in 4:45. I’d say I need to pick a new 5 minute distance…

Also notable was on the Tuesday “hammerfest” lunch ride. Some of the real hammerheads weren’t there, but it was still fast. I had made it a goal to be able to make it to the end of Glen Annie, and I did just that. It felt very good. I had to sit out of many of the rotations, but I still made it. Wednesday I finally...

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May 14, 01:01 PM by Steve | New OSM PR

Posted in Cycling & Data

I did Old San Marcos today in 17:26, beating by far my previous PR of 18:03. I wasn’t sure how I felt today and didn’t really start out with the intention of trying for a PR, but Marco paced me up and encouraged me not to back off when I thought I was going to blow 2/3 of the way up. We were on pace for 17 flat, but did ease up a bit in the switchbacks. Nearing the end he said to dip into my anaerobic tanks. I thought I had nothing left but was able to pick it up and finish strong. I didn’t know exactly what my time was until I added up the splits, but it had to be fast. Marco confirmed that he got 17:25 so I figured mine had to be close to that. You can see from the chart I was redlined for most of it…

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May 5, 04:05 PM by Steve | Training 4/28-5/4

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I’ll write a full race report for San Luis Rey later, but I felt really good this week and at the race, so I think I’m finally doing something right. This was a fairly light week, as being a human traffic cone for Nite Moves had me missing out on crit practice, friday I blew off intervals to check out Bill’s new bike, and Saturday I spent all day taking picture of gymnastics and driving to San Diego.

Heart Rate Data
Total time: 14.3 hours
Below 50%: 0:07:55
Zone 1 (50%-55%): 0:32:07
Zone 2 (56%-69%): 4:25:13
Zone 3 (70%-79%): 5:08:53
Zone 4 (80%-89%): 3:18:39
Zone 5 (90%-99%): 0:44:45
Calories burned: 14,484

Summary
Total: 266.62 miles, 14.8 hours, 16,307 feet
Racing: 45.28 miles, 2.1 hours, 3,286 feet
Average (all days): 38.09 miles, 2.1 hours, 2,330 feet
Average (work days): 43.00 miles, 2.4 hours, 2,502 feet

Rides
M: 1.5 hr morning recovery spin
Tu: 0.75 hr morning high tempo, 1 hr lunchtime hammerfest
W: 1 hr morning tempo, 1 hr lunchtime w/ 19:42 OSM, 0.5 hr spin to Nite Moves
Th: 1.3 hr morning moderate/tempo, 2 hr easy/moderate evening
F: 0.75 hr morning easy/moderate, 2 hr easy evening
Sat: nada
Sun: 2 hr road race, 0.5 hr cooldown

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Apr 28, 12:40 PM by Steve | Training 4/21-4/27

Posted in Cycling & Data

I feel like Goldilocks trying out different training porridge. This week’s too much, this week’s not enough, this one’s just right. This week felt just right, and after a nice recovery day after Sea Otter, I jumped back in and hit the tuesday ride hard. I felt really good and got an email from Chester afterwards commenting that I looked strong. I wanted to try the Hope Ranch intervals ride, but apparently everyone else went somewhere else and I went and did OSM with Bill and Jamie. We started out at a fairly moderate pace and I felt comfortable (but clearly working closer to my limit than them), until Jamie rode away from us right before the switchbacks. Crit practice also went very well, and I held onto the main field for nearly half an hour, longer than I think I ever have in the past. Once off, I joined up with Dan and togher we picked up a bunch of others and formed a decent sized group. We were finally lapped with a few laps to go; I was going to get back on but right as I got on, Chester came off and as I accelerated to close the gap he shouted at me “not to mix it up” with them. I slowed down and watched Dan and one other guy jump on, somewhat disappointed that I listened to Chester instead of sticking with Dan—I wasn’t going to “mix it up” with them, I just wanted the tow and see if I could hold on.

I was still undecided about Devil’s Punchbowl late into the week, so I took Thursday easy “just in case”. Friday I had pretty much made up my mind to pass on it, so I went and did some VO2 max intervals in the evening. Since I had skipped out on Punchbowl I figured I had to get some good training in, so I did the ROCO ride instead of the Echelon ride, and went around the lake and back up the coast. I had never been up the coast with that group, but heard stories about the pace and was wondering what I was getting myself into. I was holding on just barely on some stretches of PCH and the 101, and when we hit Bates I just watched them ride away. I caught up with Ben at the top when we hit the 150 and he towed me most of the way back to the group. The pace never really “settled” like worlds does on the way back through Summerland, so when the group charged up Ortega Hill I took the opportunity and shortcut them on the bike path. I thought I would come out just ahead of right in the middle of them, but I hit full gas and manged to get out way ahead, enabling me and one other guy to easily make it past San Ysidro before the group caught up with us.

I had originally planned to do Punchbowl, and then stay in Santa Clarita for the crit on Sunday. Since we had stayed home Saturday, Kim wanted to hit up the Beachbreak Cafe for her favorite, chocolate chip pancakes. My race wasn’t until 2, so we had plenty of time for a nice leisurely ride to breakfast and came back through Hope Ranch. I did some low-gear jumps and sprints on the path on the way home, which must have looked funny to Kim. I would shoot off and spin up around 30 and then coast until she caught me and then do it all over again.

The race… went ok. I had low expectations going in—my main goal was to feel comfortable in the pack, cornering, and not feel like I was about to get snapped off the back at any moment. For the most part I would say that there was never any difficulty holding on, I was very comfortable going into the corners and I was able to maintain my speed well and not have to constantly accelerate back on. There was a crash about halfway through the race that I was caught behind (I actually ran into one of the guys on the ground going about 1mph, fell over and landed on him), but was able to use a free lap to get back in. I didn’t try to move up near the end, I was content to maintain my position and finish solidly in the pack.

Heart Rate Data
Total time: 17.4 hours
Below 50%: 0:18:15
Zone 1 (50%-55%): 1:08:09
Zone 2 (56%-69%): 6:02:12
Zone 3 (70%-79%): 4:25:00
Zone 4 (80%-89%): 4:05:01
Zone 5 (90%-99%): 1:26:55
Calories burned: 16,609

Summary
Total: 299.40 miles, 17.5 hours, 14,912 feet
Racing: 15.97 miles, 0.6 hours, 224 feet
Average (all days): 42.77 miles, 2.5 hours, 2,130 feet
Average (work days): 31.92 miles, 2.0 hours, 1,841 feet

Rides
M: 1.5 hr morning recovery spin
Tu: 1 hr morning tempo, 1 hr lunchtime hammerfest
W: 0.75 hr morning tempo, 1 hr lunchtime spin w/ 19:15 OSM, 0.75 hr crit practice
Th: 1 hr low/moderate tempo
F: 1 hr easy spin with TT course preview
Sat: 4 hr around lake Casitas, 1 hr spin to dial in race setup
Sun: 2 hr easy ride with Kim, 0.6 hr crit

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Apr 24, 09:13 AM by Steve | Training 4/14-4/20

Posted in Cycling & Data

This week it took me a little longer to put this together, mostly because I’m lazy, but also because I got a new Garmin Edge 705 and started using the HR strap with it instead of my Polar, and it was complicated trying to reconcile the data. Some of the difficulty was that I switched halfway through the week, and the rest was because they don’t report data in the same way. With that out of the way, the over-analysis can begin.

I felt good going into Sea Otter, well rested but not any stronger than usual. True to form, I was dropped on the climbs after a few laps. I thought more people had dropped out of the road race behind me, but that turned out not to be the case and I was nearly DFL. The circuit race again hammered home the point that its the repeated anerobic efforts that do me in. Eventually they wore me out and snapped me off the back.

Note that it looks like I have a lot of hours for this week, but looks can be deceptive. Much of it was either after Sea Otter, or very easy riding with Kim. I got a few good hard efforts in early in the week and then took a bit of a rest before leaving for Sea Otter. The annoying thing about Sea Otter was that I had the long road race early Friday morning, and the shorter circuit race late Saturday evening. I wasn’t exactly sure what to do with myself the rest of the time but I knew sitting around the hotel room all day Saturday would just be asking for trouble. We had been up here before her Vineman a couple of years ago, and rememered a good breakfast cafe, and she wanted to return, so we rode to there and then along the scenic 17 mile drive. We got back just in time to shower, check out and head over to the venue.

Heart Rate Data
Total time: 19.6 hours
Below 50%: 2:00:28
Zone 1 (50%-55%): 2:31:02
Zone 2 (56%-69%): 6:10:32
Zone 3 (70%-79%): 4:19:51
Zone 4 (80%-89%): 3:47:43
Zone 5 (90%-99%): 0:49:16
Calories burned: 17,545

Summary
Total: 325.99 miles, 20.0 hours, 22,389 feet
Racing: 64.67 miles, 3.5 hours, 6,901 feet
Average (all days): 46.57 miles, 2.8 hours, 3,198 feet

Rides
M: .75 hr morning recovery spin, 0.75 hr TT warmup, 27:58 TT
Tu: 1.3 hr morning tempo ride, 1 hr lunchtime hammerfest
W: 0.75 hr crit practice
Th: 0.75 hr morning easy spin with a few “openers”
F: 0.5 hr warmup, 3 hr road race
Sat: 3 hr easy ride with Kim, 0.5 hr warmup, 0.5 hr circuit race
Sun: 3 hr “worlds”, 3 hr easy ride with Kim

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Apr 14, 09:35 AM by Steve | Training 4/7-4/13

Posted in Cycling & Data | Leave a Comment

I felt a little lost this week. Felt good starting and did the same as usual on the tuesday lunchtime hammerfest, but felt more difficult than usual hanging on at crit practice. Thursday I had a good ride with Bill; brisk but not tiring, and then I went to try to go find Kim’s ride but they took a diffrent route than exected. Friday I started to feel like I was getting my “mojo” back and had a nice tempo ride in the morning, but then Saturday and Sunday I got killed in Isla Vista and Ojai crits.

M: .75 hr morning recovery spin
Tu: 1 hr lunchtime hammerfest, .5 hr spin to downtown
W: 1 hr morning ride, 20 m OSM at conversational pace, 1 hr crit practice
Th: 1 hr morning ride, 2.5 hr moderate evening ride
F: 1.5 hrs morning tempo
Sat: 0.5 hr crit, 0.75 hr evening “cooldown” ride
Sun: 0.7 hr crit, 2.5 hr moderate pace ride home with Ben

Polar Data
Total time: 14.9 hours
Below 50%: 0:35:16
Zone 1 (50%-55%): 0:44:27
Zone 2 (56%-69%): 4:58:24
Zone 3 (70%-79%): 4:21:48
Zone 4 (80%-89%): 3:01:44
Zone 5 (90%-99%): 1:14:13
Calories burned: 11,537

Edge Data
Total: 287.32 miles, 16.2 hours, 12,028 feet
Racing: 30.93 miles, 1.3 hours, 1,135 feet
Average (all days): 41.05 miles, 2.3 hours, 1,718 feet
Average (work days): 38.74 miles, 2.2 hours, 1,689 feet

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Apr 7, 03:27 PM by Steve | Training 3/31-4/6

Posted in Cycling & Data

Straight away I’ll admit I rode too much last week. I’m so used to it sometimes I don’t even realize it, but when you ride everywhere instead of drive, a silly errand like going downtown to pick up a new chain tacks on another hour to the totals. After finishing my ride on Saturday I looked at my totals and realized to keep it under 20 hours I couldn’t do more than 3 hours on Sunday. That’s just the amount of time Worlds takes…

But after I get back from Worlds, Kim wants to go riding, so a few hours later I’m off again. I mention during lunch at Beachbreak Cafe (her favorite) that she should challenge herself, so now we are going up Gibraltar. So I’m a few hours over, but I got a nice recovery ride in and I feel good today, so we will just have to see how it goes.

Where’s the Wisdom?
Monday I had my wisdom teeth pulled. 3 of them anyway. The knocked me out and an hour later Kim was driving me home. I got to watch movies all day, and when the pain started to flood in I popped some Hydrocodone (generic Vicodin). I’ve had a constant dull headache since then, for which I’ve been taking mostly Tylenol… At least I didn’t get a dry socket, so hopefully this will be over with soon enough. I was warned that the operation, pain, drugs, etc. would pretty much knock me out for the week but I didn’t believe it. And I was right, because by the end of Tuesday I went out for an easy spin, and on Wednesday I was back at work all systems normal, except for that damn headache. Oh well, can’t win em all.

Bridge to Nowhere
Friday after making sure I was sufficiently rested and recovered from all things, Marco took me up to Via Chaparral for some punishment training. He wanted to assess my anerobic capacity and see “how far above threshold effort I can go”. We rode up once at a brisk but aerobic pace so I could get a feel for the road—the distance, grade, surface, etc. Back down and up again at a harder but not maximum effort. Whoops I went too hard, maybe 90%. One more time at max. I felt like I was going to die well before I was at the top but I pushed through knowing that it was almost done and hearing his shouts of encouragement. 1:30 even to the bridge, 10 seconds faster than the previous run. When I hit the end I stopped pedaling for a moment and almost wasn’t able to start again! Ok, one more time. I didn’t recover enough and my HR was too high at the start. I pushed through too hard at the start and halfway up I just stopped, or nearly came to a stop, but got moving again and continued up to the top at a regular effort. I had always been curious about the bridge so we went across it and I could see that it went… nowhere.

Valley Ride
Skipping out on racing for the weekend, I used the opportunity to hook up for a “fun” ride with the Echelon crowd—a modified Solvang Century route that many of our members enjoyed a few weeks ago. For several reasons (some of them stupid), I decided to challenge myself by riding to it from home, and spending as much time as possible on or near the front. From past rides, I estimated that it would take me 2 hours to get to Solvang. Mondo wanted to leave at 8:30 sharp, so giving myself a little cushion I planned to leave at 6:15. When I woke up in the morning, the wind was howling and I was a little worried and briefly considered driving up instead. I decided just to leave a little earlier to give myself plenty of time. Of course I didn’t make it out early and ended up leaving at my originally scheduled 6:15. The wind was insane riding up OSM and a few times I almost came to a standstill or was nearly blown over. I encountered thick fog at the top of 154 and made my way cautiously down Stagecoach. Fortunately visibility was fine when I popped out on the 154 again, but after a quick mental calculation I realized I was going to have to ride fast to make it on time! Fast I rode, about 19mph avg from Stagecoach to Solvang, finishing just under 2 hours and 15 minutes early.

Mondo and several others were late getting there & ready, and it was 8:45 when we rolled out. The ride itself was fun—the group pretty much blew apart on all the climbs but we regrouped several times at the end of Santa Rosa Road, the bottom of Harris Grade, Los Alamos, and Foxen. Most of us went for lunch at El Rancho Market in Santa Ynez. The best part was going all out up Alisos Canyon with Carlos on my wheel complaining about all the crap on the road I was pulling him through. Of course the road was all crap so there wasn’t much else I could do. We had a good laugh about that later… good times.

Tu: 2 hr moderate pace group ride to carp
W: 1 hr morning ride, < 19:30 OSM at medium effort
Th: .75 hr easy morning ride, 1.5 hr moderate evening group
F: 1 hr easy morning ride, anerobic intervals on Via Chaparral with Marco
Sat: 2 hrs to Solvang, 4 hrs modified “Solvang Century” route with Echelon
Sun: 3 hrs “Worlds”, 3 hrs easy with Kim

Polar Data
Total time: 22.2 hours
Below 50%: 1:37:12
Zone 1 (50%-55%): 2:40:01
Zone 2 (56%-69%): 6:41:30
Zone 3 (70%-79%): 5:44:03
Zone 4 (80%-89%): 4:44:16
Zone 5 (90%-99%): 0:47:27
Calories burned: 15,996

Edge Data
Total: 361.53 miles, 22.7 hours, 21,092 feet
Racing: none
Average (all days): 51.65 miles, 3.2 hours, 3,013 feet
Average (work days): 35.56 miles, 2.1 hours, 1,870 feet

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Apr 2, 02:30 PM by Steve | Training 3/24-3/30

Posted in Cycling & Data

I was sick Thursday with a 100+ fever. I must have been fighting it off wednesday and thats why I felt so off. I cruised up OSM and thought I could muddle through crit practice, but when I was dropped a few laps in and wasn’t able to catch back on I knew something was wrong. Rather than fight it, I just pulled out, watched, and kept time for them. It was carnage with the wind and small field size, and nearly everyone pulled out, leaving only Ken, Bill, Jason, and Cookie at the end. Remarkably they all came back together, but not surprisingly, Ken walked away with the win.

After I got home I pretty much crawled into bed and slept for 12 hours. I woke up sore and still tired, took my temp and it was just cracking 98. That may not seem high, but I run cool, usually very low 97. By mid-day sometime, I was over 100. Kim also got a fever, which is interesting because we are almost never both sick at the same time. By the evening, my temp was going back down below 98, but Kim’s was still going up. Friday morning I did an easy-effort spin around Mountain Drive to test myself for the weekend, and satisfied in my recovery I decided to go up to Orosi & Hanford as planned. Its hard to say if my fever played a part in my performance over the weekend—I don’t think it did, but I will (over?) analyze all that in a separate post.

M: 1 hr Recovery ride to work
Tu: 1 hr morning Riviera loop, lunchtime hammerfest & sprints with Marco
W: < 20 min OSM at medium effort, 0.25 hrs crit practice—had no gas and pulled out
Th: sick
F: 1.5 hr morning Mountain Drive loop
Sat: Orosi Road Race flat tire & DNF, 1 hr easy spin around Visalia
Sun: Hanford Crit pack finish

Polar Data
Total time: 12.4 hours
Below 50%: 0:23:46
Zone 1 (50%-55%): 0:53:55
Zone 2 (56%-69%): 4:09:36
Zone 3 (70%-79%): 3:34:58
Zone 4 (80%-89%): 2:24:59
Zone 5 (90%-99%): 0:53:59
Calories burned: 9,458

Edge Data
Total: 218.43 miles, 12.7 hours, 10,283 feet
Racing: 55.08 miles, 2.7 hours, 2,953 feet
Average (all days): 31.20 miles, 1.8 hours, 1,469 feet
Average (work days): 26.21 miles, 1.6 hours, 1,407 feet

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