| Re: Today's ride - odd experience.
On Sat, 15 Jan 2005 22:55:14 -0500, jj <jet@jetstream.net> wrote:
>Had an odd experience on today's ride. On a whim, I rode over to a 3/4 mile
>hill, after about 20 min warmup - my regular route had been covered in mud
>after the torrential down pours Friday night.
>
>This difficult hill is one I've been dreaming of riding, with significantly
>steeper sections than I'm used to, and I was basically able to sprint up
>it, seated. Just a few months ago I rode -down- this hill and hit speeds
>over 35mph not even pedalling, even braking a couple times.
>
>Going up it a glance at my inclinometer pegged it at 11-12% in the last
>100yds, 7-8% for most of the run-up.
>
>Even when I've been doing a lot of small but modestly steep hills, I've
>been a bit out of breath at the 1/2 mile point. Today, breath was
>completely calm, no pain in the quads -at all-, though they did seem
>pleasantly slightly pumped at the top, for a moment. Very strange. I felt
>like I could just step off the bike, yawn, and stretch and take a nap or
>something, lol. Could the darling wife be slipping me EPO in my geritol?
>;-D
>
>Wonder what could happen that would give an old clydesdale such a jump in
>ability. I was trying to stay 'light on the bike', and be a little more
>aero, as I mentioned early.
>
>I've been averaging only about 70-100 miles/week since Oct, about half my
>normal mileage, very little of it in the foot-hills, and I've be-moaning my
>apparent loss of conditioning. Last week I had been picking up speed, and
>have been doing some modest intervals, but not enough quantity and quality
>of training to justify this insane jump in ability - or so it seemed to me.
>
>I get out every day, rain or shine. Rode ~330 days in 2004, 3200 miles -
>fairly modest mileage, imo.
>
>Anyway, I'm psyched.
Two things. There really are biorhythms we really do have a few biological
cycles going on and some days are simply better than others.
I find improvement comes in leaps that pay off the previous work. Now that may
just be me recovering from having been out of shape - I'm sure that if I were in
great shape any improvement would come in smaller increments.
Here, you've combined an ongoing fitness program with recent improvements in
technique and then put the combination to the test.
Sounds like a formula for success.
Enjoy.
Ron
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