Wednesday night - Annette, Brenda and myself met at the Community Center to ride about 15 miles. We really didn't have a route planned so we just kind of threw one together. It actually worked out pretty good. We crossed over to Bellamy and rode to East Main. Then we went over to East Stagecoach then to Hwy 38. 38 to 321 spur then on to Mt Carmel back to Dietrich and back to the Community Center. Let me tell you, this is a fun route. It is not flat, but has constant rolling hills. Some of the hills are pretty big and Hwy 38 has some really good fast spots in it.
This was suppose to be just a leisurely ride and I tried to comply. But anytime I get on the bike I just want to go fast. I did manage to never get out of zone 3, even on the bigger climbs. I would climb the hills really fast then slow down to let Annette and Brenda catch up. They did great and they said I helped push them a little. I ended up with 17.34 miles with an average heart rate of 137 so I was pretty much taking it easy even though it was super hot. 972 calories burnt.
Thursday Night - Annette and I met Bailey and Michele at Team 1 for a trip to the River Trail. Bailey went by and borrowed Brenda's old bike so Michele could try it out so we ended up getting a little bit of a late start. After we got to the River Trail I adjusted the seat for Michele and aired up the tires. It ended up being an almost perfect fit. It was almost 7pm before we hit the trail.
Leaving from the Sub we headed toward the Big Dam Bridge. I was leading and trying to go slow but thats always hard. Michele was hanging in there really well. As soon as we hit River Road Bailey went on the attack and passed me while I was waiting on the other girls. Well, that wasn't going to work. I let her get ahead a little then I took off. I was doing 24mph as I blew by her, of course I couldn't hold that for long but it felt good. From there it seemed like we played a little cat and mouse. I'd ride ahead for a while and as soon as I would slow here would come Bailey. Michele amazed us all, she was even down in the tri bars. This was her first time on a bike in ages and she was looking like a seasoned pro.
After passing the golf course and doing the downhill by the dog park, I swung in the parking lot to wait on Michele and Annette. Bailey went on. Wasn't but just a few minutes and here they come, passing me up on the road. So, I had to attack again. Another 23-24mph attack and I blew right by them. My legs were feeling really good. We found Bailey at the water fountain refilling her bottle and we went on towards the bridge.
When we hit the bridge, I followed Michele up in case she had trouble. She couldn't downshift and was in a big gear but she pedaled right up that bridge with no problem. After we got to the top I told her what to try to downshift and she did. That girl has some strong legs let me tell you! When we made it to the bottom of the bridge I almot got took out by a kid on a bike with training wheels. He cut right across my path and I barely missed him. That was incident number one.
We regrouped and headed down towards 430. Again Bailey and I would shift positions a few times which made it fun pushing each other. After the turn around it was starting to get dark so I told the girls we better step on it and get back. We formed a pace line and headed back towards the bridge with me doing the pulling at 17-18mph. It was almost effortless and felt great, however we ended up dropping Michele. We stopped at the bottom of the bridge to regroup again. Michele and Annette started going up the bridge while Bailey and I waited on people to clear the way. There was a ton of people out tonight and it made things somewhat tricky. Then came incident number two. About the time I started to take off, I clipped my left foot in then saw someone coming too fast. Dumb me I went to put my foot back down but guess what, I was clipped in! Well, you probably know the rest of the story. Down I went! Somewhat embarrassing but most any biker with clip ins has done this at least once, if not you will. It didn't hurt me but I ended up skinning my knee up. Wow, I felt like one of those Tour de France guys now. Blood running down my leg and still riding.
My Tour de France Injury!The pain from asphalt or concrete is something you never forget so this slowed me down a little going back across the bridge. Then as Bailey and I came down the other side, a couple was on the right at the end where the posts are, so I was going left, then another kid comes shooting out from the parking lot and I had to go to the center of the posts and here is Bailey right there with me. We almost crashed right there but somehow managed to miss the posts and each other. That was incident number three!
The rest of the ride was uneventful other than we got back to our cat and mouse. It made for a fun ride and a very good workout. Michele did great for her first ride.
Friday Night - I met Rock at the Community Center for what we thought might be a 30 minute out and back ride. Then she wanted to run at the track so I figured I would give that a shot too.
We ended up doing the same route that I did Wednesday night other than this time, there was no slowing down. It was actually hotter too.
The rolling hills were great. We would power up then ride em down. I actually tried to up the pace when we hit 38 just to get off the that road as quick as we could. Friday night traffic can sometimes be a bear. It seemed like we stayed anywhere from 19-22mph all the way to 321 spur. When we turned here I slowed down a little so we could relax and talk some. Wasn't as many cars to deal with. There are several small climbs and we pretty much powered up every one of them. Mt Carmel had a lot of traffic on it but has a nice shoulder so it wasn't too bad. Now it has some bigger hills on it and will put you to the test at the end of a hard ride. I was sweating like a dog. As I rode I could see and feel droplets coming off of me. I was hoping these wasn't hitting Rock! Mt Carmel was another one of those roads that you just want to ride hard and get off of it and we did. By the time we turned on to Dietrich around mile 15, we were averaging 17mph. Not bad considering all the hills we dealt with and the heat. From there we slowed some and made it on back to the Community Center. I had almost drank my whole bottle of water!
Then it was time to run. We just drove across the road to the track and took off. Since I hadn't ran in two plus weeks, I had no idea how it would feel. I had taped my foot before I left and that seemed to help my PF a lot. I could still feel it some but it wasn't bad. I think I made it almost a mile at a slow pace before I called walk break. I really didn't want to push my luck with the PF and after the hard effort on the bike, the run felt hard. I think I still had an almost 10 min per mile pace, probably faster than I should have been going. We ran maybe another lap then finished up with about a mile of walking which was good. The foot survived and I didn't fall on the bike so it was a good night!
Overall I ended up with 17 miles on the bike and 2.27 run/walking. My average heart rate on the bike was 160 in comparison to Wednesday nights 137. Kind of tells you the effort we were putting out Friday. Probably counting the run I burnt close to 1200 calories for the night. Another great workout with great friends!
Saturday is bike clean up day then we are off to the Dam Night Run 5k in Arkadelphia. It starts at 8pm so it will be a hot one. Then Sunday morning we are riding again at 9am with a group of Cruisers. That should pretty much finish out my week!
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