Structured Workouts or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Rollers

For you folks out it Facebook land  - Alex again (this blog automagically shows up in my notes). Just so you know, while I can suck wheels with the best of them, I'm not THE Wheelsucker. That nom de plume belongs to Ali Meller, who also contributes to this blog.

Now that we've had so much snow, the prospects for riding on the road are dim dispite Chris Harshman's planned ride in Washington Co. tomorrow (I thought he we joking). So I've had to start thinking about indoor (stationary) riding again. Sure, trainers and rollers are excellent for well structured workouts. There's only one problem, I HATE structured workouts because frankly I'm just not that disciplined. However, after no riding this weekend, I got the rollers out, shoveled a spot in the driveway and mounted up. I was having some real trouble keeping upright, weaving all over the place. I was thinking "WTF" my bike handling is not *that* bad. I was riding my CAAD 9, so I thought maybe I'd switch to the Roubaix which has a little more relaxed geometry. No better. I was puzzled. What was going on? I checked the level and looked under them to make sure that I was not hitting anything. I suddenly realized, DOH, I was on them backwards (with the double drums in the front. Not good. I guess it's been *that* long since I've ridden them. I got things turned around and voila, I was off and riding.

I was all decked out in winter gear as it was 30 degrees, but the sun was so bright and warm, I was quickly down to my summer gear. It felt really good and I actually worked on redefining my faded tan lines...

What the heck, if I'm going to spend time on the rollers, I might as well make the best of it. Since the whole structured workout thing is foreign to me, I'm groping in the dark as to what is both the best time spent on them and what is bearable. I warmed up and decided to do 2x20 intervals, which gave me about 1:15 with warmup/down.

I listened to Car Talk - one of my favorite podcasts, light and funny. When that was over, on to some music. One really nice thing about the iPhone 3GS is the voice dialing/control. "Play artist Edie Brickell" and it starts playing; excellent. I love The album "Picture Perfect Morning" especially because it reminds me of the first ABRT Spain trip in 2008. Perfect for getting through this. To me, these two images are synonymous:

 

When I got done, I felt great.; tired, but refreshed and upbeat. Almost like I was riding outside on a nice sunny day! So maybe that's the key, get the contraption outside in the sun instead of cooped up in a dark, damp garage. Maybe, I can actually learn to like, and maybe even love the rollers. We'll see.

A Good Idea? Not So Much.

Last night I was really hoping that the snow would melt and the roads would be clear today for the Ellicott City ride. Given that desire, I was predisposed to optimism this morning when I saw the temperature hit 32 degrees and the roads in West Annapolis clear of any snow, ice or moisture. I saw Mike Wagner's Facebook post "Michael Wagner is braving the cold and icy weather" so I knew I wouldn't be alone. And of course Steve Owens is always there if it is not raining. So it was the three of us that set off at 10:15. The roads looked good and the BWI path (at least the parts I saw on the drive in) were clear. So far so good. A little ways down the path, there were a few slippery spots and I'm thinking, hmm, maybe this isn't such a good idea, but we press on. Lawyers hill was wet but not slippery, certainly not anywhere near what High Rock was like last spring. All was good into Ellicott City, although we were taking the descents very carefully. All was good going up Oella, until about half way up we came around one of the left hairpins and like three dominoes down we went, floop, floop, floop. Luckily it was a pretty slow speed fall, so pretty much no harm, no foul. I'm sure there will be a few sore hips tomorrow though. There were a couple more icy spots on the way up and we went REALLY slow down Westchester back to the coffee stop.

We decided to go down River Road and see how that was (quite dry) and thought we'd go up Thistle road for the hill and then come back down it because we knew S. Hilltop would be treacherous. Thistle looked good at the bottom, but just after the first turn and out of the sun, not so good, so we skipped it and continued up Illchester and back to BWI. In retrospect, probably not the smartest thing in the world, but we did get in a nice 2:15 ride (only 4 miles shorter by cutting off Thistle/Hilltop). And at least it was a little more sane than Ali who, according to a text he sent me, was sitting at the Davidsonville Road park and ride yesterday, wondering why no one was there...

Dodged the bullet...

Now that fixed gear season is upon us, I've been wondering when others will get their fixies on. For our turkey day ride, I propsed a fixie friendly ride and made sure I explicitly told the other potential fixie riders that I was going fixed so I would have some company and not have to play Russian Roulette and if for no other reason it's a lot less bike to clean, give that it promised to be wet. Well Iain commented:

"That's the thing about russian roulette......it starts by not knowing if you will be the only one!"

How true that is. Turns out he got a flat on the way to the park and ride, so I was the only one... Uh oh, click, nothing, whew. However, it was a nice social ride so, the "Russian Roulette" fixed gear game got shelved and we had a nice sane 40+ miler, setting a very appropriate tone for the day.

Now the eating starts! Happy Thanksgiving.

Yet another wet saturday ride!

Ace and Amanda said it all at the Dash-In. Hmm, maybe cross is the thing - just a slight shift in perspective makes all the difference. At least we're all getting good practice cleaning our bikes!

The End of the (Century) Season

The Seagull Century last Saturday marked, at least for me, the end of both the "Century Season" and the season as a whole. I think that is especially true given the very fall like weather we are having this week.

This year I did 4 centuries along with a number of ABRT riders: Rick's Solomon's Island ride, our Bay Country Century, the Civil War Century and the Seagull Century. In reflecting on the season during a chili ride yesterday, I realize one of the reasons I did more centuries that races this year is that I really enjoy the longer, steadier effort rides (including our Saturday Training rides) much more than I do the shorter, intense efforts of our typical summer crit schedule. Not that there is anything wrong with those type of events, it's just that they are not really my thing. For me, especially when there are stronger riders in the group (like almost always), these rides are "races" in the sense that they are physically challenging and they simulate certain aspects of road racing. While the focus of the club is on attending, participating in and winning races, I think there are a lot of riders that have this shared sense of purpose in the Club.

Solomon's Island Century: About 10 of us did the ride straight down Rt 2/4 to Solomon's Island on August 1st. It was a fairly warm day with very little wind. Perfect. The ride is quite flat with just some rolling hills and we kept the speed rolling. From a terrain standpoint it was not all that interesting (although it was my first time to Solomon's Island), but was great from an endurance/pace standpoint. Witness the fact that our own endurance pace junkie Iain Banks pulled the last 20 miles hard. A great start to the "Century Season".

Bay Country Century: The Women/Elite Teams put on another great event and the weather was perfect.



The ABRT train hit the road about 8:30 and stayed together pretty much the entire ride. Other than a little road rash thanks to a very large combine taking up most of the road and my bottom bracket sounding like it had marbles in it, the ride was a lot of fun.

Civil War Century: This was my first time doing this ride, although I did do the southern portion last fall on our training ride. Ace, Tom and I represented ABRT. It was raining for the first hour and was chili for most of the ride, but I really enjoyed it nonetheless. Ace humored us until the second rest stop and then took off to chase down the DC Velo group. Tom and I picked it up for the last 20 miles back from Gettysburg, finally dropping all but one of the "non workers" that hitched on with us.

Seagull Century: I really like this ride because it is soo fast. This year the DC Velo train left a half hour earlier, which was OK with me since my family was in Ocean City and I was hip on minimizing the time away. Again, only Ace, Tom and I were at the 7:30 start although, we did see Arch and Sarah on their gold plated tandem early on. Michel was there but started later and rode with a second DC Velo group. It rained hard for most of the trip to Assateague, although it was quite warm, but as a result the pace was not as fast as past years. My only problem in the whole ride was that I got caught in a split during a nasty crosswind section, when some weaker DC Velo riders started opening gaps. I got back on at the 40 mile rest stop and was much more vigilant about staying upfront after that. As usual, we skipped the first rest stop to get in front of the crowd, but stopped briefly at the 40, 60 and 80 mile stops. You have to love the 80 mile rest stop with the band playing. The pace on the last 20 miles was fast with ACE putting the hurt on everyone. It was mildly annoying that a lot of folks didn't want to take pulls because of the wind or were really unsteady pace-wise and unfortunately, due to the slight change in course at the end and some traffic, the sprint, which ACE most certainly would have won, was spoiled, but c'est la vie. I did a fair amount of work and got in a great ride.

At this point I look forward to the off season Saturday rides, which I hope at some point will slow enough that the fixies will start making an appearance. My goal for this winter is to get all the way around on mine with the group - no Russian Roulette.

ABRT Spain Training Camp - Group 2

Wow, what a difference a week makes! At the risk of gloating about how nice the weather was, the ABRT group two had 8 days of bright sunshine and temperatures in the mid 60s, although we did have to put on arm warmers the last 3 days, which really put a crimp on my tan. It was, like the first group, very windy most days.

Group 2 consisted of 3 ABRTers, Rick Paukstitus, Doug Shapter and Alex Pline along with Heidi von Teitenberg from C3-sollay.com and Nick Baker and David Edmondson both triatheletes from the UK. Heidi, Rick and David were there for a few days until Rick, Doug and Alex showed up on Wednesday. We all flew Air Chance, uh Air France, but luckily all bikes and baggage showed up at the prescribed time and place after paying the requisite $150 fee. After getting to Idlebreaks, we put the bikes together and went for a warm up ride up to Archidona. Alex stayed at Idlebreaks to nurse his sore back in the hot tub; a tweak the day before nearly kept him stateside, but a few pep talks from the peanut gallery made him realize the worst that could happen is that he would have a 7 day vacation in the hot tub in Spain. Luckily, it improved quickly.

The first full day on Thursday was a very nice 75 mile ride that we had not done last year. It took us through Antequera, up El Torcal, down through Almogia and around the reservoir Embalse Casasola which is about 10k north of Malaga, and back up to Conception. At that point, Rick, Doug and Alex had had enough given that it was just the first day. Nick, David, Jon and Heidi continued the last 10 miles home after Andy (with a straight face) told Heidi there is only a "little hill". As with all things, proper context is very important. Andy fessed up after they left saying it was a "bitch of a climb" which validated the decision to stop after 75. Watching them suffer while we passed them in the van was amusing.

Given that some of the group did a long day on Thursday, on Friday, we did a "semi" recovery day of 45 miles up through Archidona. Those of us who were fresh also added the "Church of Pain" climb. I was happy to get to do this, since last year I was cooked by the time we got around to it. It's about 1 mile at 15-20% with some really cool switchbacks. The surface has deteriorated a bit due to the weather this winter, but going up was not a problem. We just had to go very slowly down.


Rick grunting it up to the finish of the Church of Pain climb.

Saturday we went directly north to the reservoir in Iznajar. You can really see the difference between last year and this year as the reservoir level was up something like 25 feet. The highlight of this ride is the smokin' descent down to the reservoir and the climb back out. Since we decided to do the Pico Veleta climb on Sunday to accommodate David who was leaving Monday, we did not do very much climbing on this ride. Of course we did have a very nice cafe con leche in a small cafe next to the reservoir. On the way to Iznajar, we went by the gas station that was the infamous site of the "Ho Ho Incident" where James was left behind. I felt this strange sense of Deja Vu and quickly whipped out my camera to catch a photo of someone who looked like James standing the doorway.


Funny a guy who looked just like James was standing in the doorway.

Sunday was one of the days we were really anticipating. For Doug and Alex a real objective of the trip was to significantly best last year's times on this climb. Hearing about how horrendous the weather was for group 1 really raised the apprehension level. After setting out on the lower section out of Monachil, the group split pretty quickly with Alex and David opening a pretty wide gap on the switchbacks. They paced themselves up through the quarry, with Alex opening gaps occasionally due to his lighter bike and lower gearing, but David always clawing back. They got out onto A-395 at about 45 minutes in and continued to work together. At about 14k to go Alex got a bottle from Jon at the van and was gaped by David; a gap that would never get closed. In the end both Alex and Doug cut nearly 1/2 hour off last year's time (2:21 and 2:45). David should have come in right about the 2 hour mark, but missed the turn at 7k and took a sightseeing trip into the ski village which cost him official time. Heidi came on strong on the flatter section to make up a lot of time with a time of 2:19. After the ride, we took some pictures and had beer and french fries in the outdoor cafe just below the finish line. It was quite the zoo up there due to the nice weather.


The zoo-like party atmosphere along the last 100m of the course was amusing.


Dave Edmundson, Rick Paukstitus, Heidi von Teitenberg and Alex Pline celebrating at the finish of Pico Veleta.


It is just amazing how different the weather was. For comparison purposes between the two weeks:


The turn at 7k to go.


5k to go.

On Monday we were all quite tired, so we did a ride with the long 17k descent into Loja followed by a few minor climbs, some rolling like D-ville terrain into Salinas (for coffee!) and some flats back home.

Tuesday was Puerto del Sol, which we all had personal record times for - given a nice tailwind all the way up. In general a beautiful day of riding. After stopping for coffee in Alfanarte after Puerto Del Sol, it happened to Doug - he was left getting gloves out of the van as Alex, Rick and Heidi started up Lactate Hill because it was very chilly. Angry Doug made an appearance, rocketing by us and big ringing it up Lactate Hill. I think in the future, we just need to tick him off before he races.

Tuesday was of course St. Paddy's day. We started at Patsy's and then walked around the corner to Manulo's where it felt like we were actually in Ireland. The pictures we took were waaaay tamer than last year, although there were certainly some that are not suitable for this family blog. Before we knew it, the evening was turning into morning and we didn't get back to Andy's until about 3am. Somehow, the Kirkwood Express route we decided on for the last day wasn't seeming like such a hot idea.

Rick and Heidi were up and raring to go at 8am (Doug and Alex were still bleary eyed)



so we eventually got rolling figuring we'd ride until we didn't feel like riding. It was very, very windy that morning, so we decided to start the ride away from Andy's just after the highway on the way to Archidona since the wind was most severe around Idlebreaks. The Kirkwood Express route goes north in a large clockwise circle which culminates with the long slog up the 17km hill from Loja. The night before we were all looking forward to this long ascent - evidently the source of some Ali humor in group 1 - but as were underway, the week's riding was certainly taking it's toll, not to mention 5 hours of sleep and, eh hem, some fuzziness from the night before not to mention leaving the compound without our lunches. Ouch. El Jefe bore the brunt of the previous evening's Guinness and kept Jon entertained riding shotgun in the van. Heidi was the first to say enough as her achilles tendon was bothering her, going only 1.5 miles after our coffee stop to the base of the last climb as she wanted to hit 450 miles for the trip. After the last climb, Rick had enough and Alex, determined not to be Mr. Sag Wagon like last year continued on to Salinas where he finally called it quits.

Tired and sunburned we returned to Idlebreaks to pack up the bikes, relax in the hot tub and have our final dinner. Once again, this was a fabulous trip. While we certainly lucked out with very nice weather, Andy, Tracy and Jon still worked their tails off to give us the best possible experience. Debbie's massages everyday were awesome! My experience two years in a row is that there is no better trip for a training camp that I could ever imagine. Our dynamic was a little different because the group was smaller, but that in and of itself was interesting because it gave us a lot of flexibility as we could travel easily in the van without the trailer. I encourage anyone who is even mildly interested to really try and attend next year. Thanks again to Doug Miliken for putting it together. A full slideshow is below.

-- Alex Pline

You know you live in the Mid-Atlantic when...

Only in the Mid-Atlantic area can you go from having possibly the coldest ride of the winter (for me anyway - I know two weeks ago was actually MUCH colder) to the warmest (I had 65 degrees on my computer today) in the space of 24 hours. And, to boot it will probably snow tomorrow!

About 15 people showed up for yesterday's Saturday ride, including new member Darren, an Australian who we gave grief for not knowing it was SUMMER there. At start time, it was about 28 degrees with the northwest wind starting to blow. The first half was a nice tempo ride and since it was with the wind, it actually didn't feel too bad. We all rolled into the Dash-in roughly the same time and after taking a correct head count by the alpha male, we rolled on to the beach. I could see the white caps on the bay as we rode up the boardwalk. This was a bad omen. Things split up a bit going up the hill but rejoined for the trip through Fairhaven. Over the wall, it split again but regrouped at 258. After 258, Ali (who was not feeling well) and I hung back a bit to see if anyone else was coming from the split over the wall, but not seeing anyone else coming we decided to try and get back on. Ali dropped me pretty quickly as the cold was taking its toll on me; he never quite got back on but joined up with a few others who came off the main group. The wind was really starting to blow and it was soooo much colder (especially on the left side!) as I continued alone through the rollers to Rt 2. I stopped to wait for the group behind. I only had to wait a minute or two, but it was worth it as the company really rejuvenated my rapidly chilling spirit and we rode fairly easily back to the park and ride. The chit-chat in the parking lot was short lived as we all were eager to get warmed up.

What a difference 24 hours makes! I did the Penzel Saturday loop, plus the River Road section with just a vest, knee warmers and summer gloves - and that is not much clothing for this whimp. Since I was feeling beat up from yesterday, I just had a nice recovery ride and enjoyed the warm sunshine. I love these 60+ degree days in the middle of winter, they are such a gimme.

Oh well, back to rain, snow and 30 degree temperatures this week. But, looks to be warm(er) for the pre-party Saturday ride if you have any faith in the 7 day forecast.

This Week's "The Other Saturday Ride"

Not sure who was at the Davidsonville Park n Ride yesterday, but Peter P, Doug Shapter and Alex Pline did the "other Saturday Ride" from the B&A Trail Park n Ride. I had been watching the radar map which showed a brief shower at 9:30 being the last of the rain. Regardless, I was going to ride my new Surley fixed gear bike. I had been doing a few shorter rides just to get acquainted with the fixie and was really looking forward to a group ride, so I was riding, rain or shine. At least it was pretty warm! I got there at 9:55 and after doing a few laps around the parking lot figured I'd be riding alone, but in rolled Doug and a bit after 10, Peter. The three of us rolled out and did the same loop as last week (see the full course on bikely.com), cutting it short a hair (to ~37 mi) by turning on Chesterfield Rd and then going south on Crownsville back to Md 450.

Towards the end of the ride, I was feeling the effect of the fixie. Going downhill was increasingly becoming difficult so I was feathering the brake more. On Sunday morning, I was definitely feeling a little beat up, way more tired than almost double the mileage for the regular Saturday ride. Better workout for less time?? I think I still have a ways to go before I attempt the regular Saturday ride on the fixie...

The other Saturday ride has worked well for me when I (like Peter and others) am a little constrained by family obligations, especially now that the rides are all starting at 10. I encourage others to attend if this works for you! Very fixie friendly.