Paris to Ancaster

We had a COLD & WINDY ride. I had on three layers on top and my leg mojo to keep them warm. I ended up getting bumped back 20 (121/1315) places from last year overall, and then remained the same place in my age group which is 33/361. With that I did finish with or ahead of my fellwo M2 category crossers and rodies. Lots of new young bucks I guess. I love cross but I sure rode the mud sections poorly. That being said, I had not ridden off-road since my broken collar bone last fall, and I did not set up the bike for riding the race till Thursday night.

My good training buddy Greg is just behind me there in the blue. We converted his road bike to handle the course, he ended up getting stuck in the mud toward the end; but I think I've convinced him that he should get a cross bike and possibly do some racing this year.

Well, a friend sent me a connection to a video of the 2008 P2A at the Powerline mudslide, I'm at 3:23. It was muddier this year and I had a nice little endo going down.

BTW this morning started off with Cyclo-ZEN 30' Recovery Yoga so I could get some of that stiffness out of my body.

I am Specalized

Last weekend I bought a used '06 S-Works Tarmac (photos to follow), and I raced it in the Good Friday Road Race. My first road race in 23 years, out of 78 riders, I was chasing the 3 in the break in the main pack, I ended up letting myself get boxed in and finished 21 st, 1 min behind the break. I'm ready for more road racing, only one per month, too much time and effort otherwise.

Work is going well, and I've been busy so the blog suffers. I'm hoping for race photos to show up somewhere, lots of people were taking picks, otherwise I'll just post a bike photo.

The "New" Club

The 7 Day training plans have now given me the freedom to do what I've been doing for the last couple of years. I have been faithfully writing out each week of the Intermediate Training plan down and only getting 1/3rd done. So this week I wrote out the 1/3rd of the workouts, with a few indoor options as its still March and cold.

This is good. Tonight with cold weather 1°C with a strong head wind 27 km/hr ave. going out, 45 km/hr ave. coming home. I got in my two 15 minute zone 4 intervals. whew... I'm ready for summer, warmth, and a lot less clothing!

Neuro "break-outs"

Last year I did not always use the Neuro workouts, I thought a good hard workout is way more important. UNTIL my dad was up visiting when I have the Texas Bar-B-Q (Second weekend in September, right before cross), and I have to watch the smoker all day long, so I had a Neuro/Cyclo-CLIMB day. Well, was he impressed about the whole Neuro workout, I did the Warm-up, Climb, then 3 sets of 8' ZEN and then SPEED 4, and finally finihsed with the Gauntlet.

Well, dad was impressed, he is a M.D. and reads a lot, and he read a study done on people who have done "ballancing" tasks during their life and how much mentaly healthier they were, and the had exersize recomendations (not as exahustive) to do. He could not say enough good words about that workout routine.

That said, today when it was cold out, rather than bundiling up and just riding, or doing Spin class #7, I did my week 1 of Build Neuro workout, and used my rollers for the cycling section to make me that much smoother and "more in touch". Good ride, and I can stand out of the saddle on the rollers now for 40"!

First Day of Spring

A fellow Blogger on my follow links Ride Blessed is a bit of a science geek, and she admits it, I love her post as I have an engineering degree and it's right up my alley. But also having a Master in Divinity I've been working on a theological blog on why I ride. In the end all that aside, I've also got three dogs. I came home today from work and they were WIDE EYED AND TOO BUSY TAILED! I took them out for a Long walk! tonight they are laying around the house tired, I love being tired on Saturday nights, when I can just lay down to bed and SLEEP through the night because I'm tired from riding like a mad man in the morning.