BIG week

It seems like so much has happened since the race in New York City, and yet I have some how put off writing, or at least forgot to when I had the time. There has been a lot of riding since that race.

I took the day after the race off to rest, then Tuesday I would have normally done a moderately paced recovery ride. Instead, I was somehow convinced to take part in the Tuesday night Sleeping Giant ride. It is the so called 'race without an entry fee.' I can't describe it any better than that. Guys from all sorts of categories show up (read as, guys who are a lot lot lot faster than me show up). Anyways, I think this was the third time ever that I tried this ride. It is a bit sketchy to start, the roads are littered with potholes for the first 2 miles and the ride is fast, and if you've ever ridden in a large group of cyclists, there is next to no ability to see what is coming your way on the road. Well, in short, my goal was to simply survive with the pack to the end of the ride, which I had yet to accomplish in my previous attempts. That night things went just right, and I managed to finish up with the big guns. Wow, the legs hurt.

I put in some recover miles on Wednesday, took Thursday off, then went riding with Jake on Friday. We ended up killing a few short, steep, punchy climbs. With as strong as Jake has been this year, I was hurting. I hadn't really recovered from Sunday and Tuesday's efforts. Quite likely not the greatest move on my part since I intended to race the next morning in the Nutmeg Criterium.

Note to self, don't ride with Jake the night before a race if you hope to do well.

I showed up at the crit, with few ambitions to place, but plenty of hope to stay in the pack to the finish and get a good work out in. Goals accomplished. I was wishing I'd had legs at the end of the race though, tactically it was the best I'd ever been able to read a race. It may have helped that a majority of the field was comprised of squirrely, inexperienced, junior riders that thought they could walk away from the peleton into the head winds. I was near the front with 1/3 lap to go at the top of the small rise and decided to try for a sprint, but I didn't have it, realized it, sat up and let the peleton pursue the sprint to the finish. I proceeded to pack up, drive 30 minutes home, and put an extra 28 miles in for the day.

Sunday was the annual Tour de Cure, which members of the Sikorsky Cycling club participate in. What is exceptionally nice is that it starts just a couple miles from my residence. I didn't actually sign up this year, but decided to ride the route with some friends that had signed up. I just went self supported, while the helped themselves at rest stops. Despite some significant issues with a flat and a tire that was far too worn out at the start of the ride, we ended up having a good ride. We all agreed that we were just warming up when the tire issues started and never really felt like our legs were quite there after sitting around playing with the tire. I ended up with 67 miles out of that ride at an average speed of 18.2 mph.

I started the week off with another Monday rest day. My legs were a bit sore all day from the high mileage, and heavy efforts of the course of the week. Then came Tuesday again. Feeling ambitious I went for the Sleeping Giant ride again, but put in some miles before the ride. This time, I was struggling to hold pace at times but managed to stay in the peleton. At one point I was feeling really pretty good. Then made a turn, into a slight rise, and the usual accelerations out of the turn happened. Well I got caught up behind the wrong guy and had to brake check a bit killing all of my momentum. I tried to accelerate back up to speed up the small rise, but my legs just filled to the brim with lactic acid and pretty much shut down. I watched the group pull away. I took a small shortcut and managed to get just ahead of the speeding peleton. The shortcut allowed me enough rest to jump back into the draft for the remainder of the ride down the smooth and straight asphalt.

My legs now hurt so good.