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Training Weekend 2009

Tuesday, May 19th, 2009

Training weekend totally beat me up this weekend.

After making the road trip up to Franconia, NH on Friday, I woke up bright and early and headed out with the team for a hard 90 mile ride with a belly full of fruit and pancakes.

Last year I stuck to the 60 mile route, but decided to step it up this year and go for the long route. It was definitely a good decision. There were 4 or 5 different groups that started along the same route. I was able to keep up pace with the “A” group for a while, which was a nice fitness test.

Up through the first climb, descending down the other side at around 49 mph (which was pretty slow because of all the wind) and half way through the climb up the Kangamangus, I was able to hang on to the caboose of the”A Train” led by speed freak Toby Wells. I even felt pretty good hanging on the back as we climbed, but once the climb started to get really steep, my HR got dangerously close to my lactate threshold and I had to drop off. Mile 30 is way too early to blow up on a 90 mile ride.

While I love the company of my teammates for the whole weekend, one of my favorite things about training weekend is the views from the road. Surrounded by snow capped mountains, waterfalls an moose crossing signs every few miles, I couldn’t be happier.

While the route was already hard enough, the wind made it pretty brutal. It was gusting around 30 or 40 mph at some points. And when you are heading up the side of a mountain at 12 mph, and a head wind gusting down your throat drops you down to 7 or 8, you just have to do anything you can to stay upright and keep the rubber side down.

Eventually we did get a few headwinds to take us home. We closed it off with just shy of 6 hours in the saddle. I averaged around 15.5 mph, which seems slow, but it sounded like the A group averaged only around 17 mph, so I didn’t feel so bad.

Views from my 90 mile ride:

The next morning me and hardcore climbing machine Andrea headed out to test the waters for a “swim.” Ther wasn’t much actual swimming involved. It was more of just splashing around until the nerve endings in my face died and stopped screaming in pain. Yeah, the water was somewhere between 50 and 52 degrees. And yes, that is snow on the top of the mountain behind us.

Eventually once my face went numb, I was able to keep pretty normal form. It was less for building my swim fitness and more of just getting used to racing in cold water, but it was definitely a success. This was my first time ever breaking out the booties for a swim. They made a HUGE difference. I love ‘em, but I can’t wait for the water to warm up and I can leave them in the car.

The obligatory super hero flexing pose.

Andrea and I discovered this megaphone on the side of Echo Lake.The sign below it says:

“This megaphone was originally used by guests of the profile house around the turn of the century. Removed after the 1938 hurricane, the only one ever to come inland in N.H., it was discovered and reestablished in 1981. Listen and you shoudl be able to hear two distinct echos.”

Funny how people entertained themselves back in the day, eh? I could actually hear three distinct echos bouncing back from the mountain across from the pond. Fun times.

And remember that brutal head wind that I mentioned? Unfortunately not all of my Wheelworks team mates weren’t so lucky to keep the rubber side down. On the 60 mile ride, a big gust nocked down Natalie, and Sara went right into, and over, her. She ended up taking most of the impact to her face, but thankfully she ended up a lot better than the damage looked.

She had the best attitude throughout the whole thing. All smiles (or as much as she could muster up through the swelling) and jokes. And the whole team rallied around to help her out like a huge family. I love my team.

For the whole story, check out Sara’s blog post here. She is Bad Ass! She even had Natalie shoot some video of her on the backboard ad the hospital.

http://ironwoman.wordpress.com/2009/05/18/i-fought-franconia-notch-and-the-notch-won/

Crash Damage

Tags: bike crash, wheelworks multisport training weekend, white mountains | Posted in Cycling, Training Log, Triathlon, Videos | 7 Comments »

New Hampshire Training Weekend

Monday, May 19th, 2008

Last weekend was my triathlon team’s training weekend. There were about 40 of us that all headed up to Franconia, New Hampshire to do some training in the white mountains, booze up a little, and actually hang out with eachother when not wearing workout gear. Overall: absolutely awesome weekend.

After pulling in to the Inn where everyone was staying on Friday night, hanging out and tossing back a few beers, I headed to bed to rest up for the 9:00 ride on Saturday morning. We split up into a half dozen different groups based on speed and distance of the routes we wanted to take. I jumped in with the 60-ish mile B group.

After a few miles, It was pretty clear why we headed up here. Northern New Hampshire is HILLY. About 10 miles in, and after one long steady bitch of a climb, it was all down hill from there. Nice smooth pavement, no big turns, it was beautiful. I just kept picking up speed, tucking down as aero as I could get in my drops and VERY cautiously passing a few other riders.

I was 100% focused on the road ahead of me and keeping a nice smooth line through some gentle sloping turns. I only looked down at my bike computer once and it said 54 mph. HOLY FUCK! I started screaming with excitement, but with all the wind blaring past me, I could barely even hear own voice. It wasn’t until a few miles later, when I was actually going slow enough where I could start pedaling again, when I looked to see what my max was. 57 mph!

I know that the pic is fuzzy, but trust me. It was Ca RAAZY. It was the fastest I had ever been on a bike by at least 15 mph, and I’m still absolutely terrified/excited thinking about it 2 days later. I’m SO not telling my mom about this one. She’ll flip.

I do feel the need to give a shout out to ROL Wheels. While I’ve admitted several times to the high crap factor of my Fuji Ace, I did upgrade to some nice few wheels that I won from a Simply Stu TdF contest a few years back. I can’t imagine the stock wheels would have handled so smoothly at a 57 mph decent, but those things were amazing and (for whatever ungodly reason) I felt pretty damn confident on them. If a high speed decent isn’t a good test of a set of wheels, I’m not sure what is. I ride the SL 28′s, which are discontinued, but all there stuff is made for the “cost conscious” rider and I’m a real big fan after really pushing their limits this weekend even after I’ve been riding them for two seasons now.

And as with any downhill, it is inevitable that you have to start heading uphill again and we headed to the top of the Kancamagus Highway. For reference, the Inn we left from was at 800 feet and the top of the Kank is 2855. That is 2000 feet of climbing (not counting the first hill we did. DAAAAAAMN. After training like this I better bust through the bike course at Mooseman in a few weeks like I’m racing in Florida.

In the end the ride was about 67 miles with 4:25 in the saddle. The ride took much longer, but we had to stop a few times to refuel, rest up, take some lunch, etc. After we got back, a few of us headed out for a 20 minute run, which actually felt pretty good. Now I’ve actually been doing a lot more running in training (since I slacked on my running so bad last year) I’m super psyched to see it is actually having an impact. Sure, my HR was in the high 160′s the whole time, but it still felt great.

And now, more pictures:

More mountains.

Cruising along the bike path past Echo Lake (i think).

More bike path. While these pictures don’t really do it justice, this was by far the hilliest bike path ever. It is like a mountain bike trail that was paved. I was switching gears constantly. Not cool.

Taking a quick look at directions to make sure we weren’t lost.

Sunday:

After boozing it up at the Inn’s bar and pulling the late night party crew into the hot tub until they ended up turning the lights out on us the night before, we packed up our wetsuits on our backs and headed to Echo Lake for a nice chilly swim.

Bike ride? You guessed it, more hills. 4 miles, straight up. It was like trying to ride my bike up the side of a building and I kept tapping my shifters hoping that I had one more magic gear that would help relieve my quads. I don’t think there was a single one of us that wasn’t blurting out expletives at some point in the climb.

Thankfully, once we got there, it was gorgeous. Cold, but gorgeous. The water was about 55 degrees, and wasn’t so bad once I got my feet and hands in the water, but it made me want to tear my face off. I had to “man up” and get at least about 600 meters in, but it was a really nice swim and totally made the ride up there worth it.

Here is the view from the beach.

Jane taking a swim after a run around the lake. She was an absolute machine. She forced a few brave souls to take a different look and go on a 90 mile ride with her on Saturday and never let up all weekend. She is turning 50 this year and I can only hope that I’m that bad-ass when I’m older.