"This past Saturday, Feb 16th, a whopping 37 cyclists and 8 crew members showed up for the first ever NAC Benchmark Training ride. The weather was perfect and the route was a challenging-but-beautiful 43-mile loop that started and ended in tiny little Winters, about 45 minutes west of Sacramento. We're happy to report that everybody completed the ride smiling, with about 25 cyclists doing the entire loop and the rest opting to skip the last hill and putting in about 34 miles for the day."
Here are the first hills (more or less -- I can't get the exact route to come up):
And here's the final hill -- the make or break hill (I had to piece together the graphs because I don't have the complete one):
It was a tough day, but we had great road support (the decadence of a rest stop!), everyone was in good spirits, and we couldn't have asked for better weather. I even rode a few miles with no sleeves (until the wind picked up, and I got annoyed with the wind and cold).
Saturday's ride convinced me I need to work on fixing up my bike a little. The bike is built for speed (big chain rings in the front (only 2) and limited in the back), not climbing. So I'm pursuing ways to make her a little more hill-friendly. In my spinning class last night, I noticed that my legs are still a little tired from Saturday, but we did a lot of hill climbing anyway. This morning's class was only a half hour, and I was just about warmed up when it ended.
Next benchmark ride (same route) is in March -- I'll have to remember to write down my stats to compare.
Also, an update on this nutrition component of training: I spent the weekend in L.A. with my grandparents. I cooked for us all on Sunday night - a good meal of fish (over the exclaims of my grandparents having fish on a day other than Friday), brown rice (Gram asked if brown rice usually doesn't taste like anything, or if it was just the way I prepared it. I offered that adding a half a stick of butter and a bunch of salt to her usual white rice might affect the taste), and a big veggie salad. On Monday, my Gramps chose The Bear Pit for his birthday dinner -- from what I can tell, it's a whole restaurant dedicated to grease and BBQ Sauce. I had a salad of iceberg lettuce, two slices of pickled beets, a hard boiled egg, and some tomatoes. Mmmm. I had coffee yesterday and spent the rest of the day being sick and jittery. I'm happily back to tea today, and glad to be home where I can eat with no [outside] scrutiny.
Here are the first hills (more or less -- I can't get the exact route to come up):
And here's the final hill -- the make or break hill (I had to piece together the graphs because I don't have the complete one):
It was a tough day, but we had great road support (the decadence of a rest stop!), everyone was in good spirits, and we couldn't have asked for better weather. I even rode a few miles with no sleeves (until the wind picked up, and I got annoyed with the wind and cold).Saturday's ride convinced me I need to work on fixing up my bike a little. The bike is built for speed (big chain rings in the front (only 2) and limited in the back), not climbing. So I'm pursuing ways to make her a little more hill-friendly. In my spinning class last night, I noticed that my legs are still a little tired from Saturday, but we did a lot of hill climbing anyway. This morning's class was only a half hour, and I was just about warmed up when it ended.
Next benchmark ride (same route) is in March -- I'll have to remember to write down my stats to compare.
Also, an update on this nutrition component of training: I spent the weekend in L.A. with my grandparents. I cooked for us all on Sunday night - a good meal of fish (over the exclaims of my grandparents having fish on a day other than Friday), brown rice (Gram asked if brown rice usually doesn't taste like anything, or if it was just the way I prepared it. I offered that adding a half a stick of butter and a bunch of salt to her usual white rice might affect the taste), and a big veggie salad. On Monday, my Gramps chose The Bear Pit for his birthday dinner -- from what I can tell, it's a whole restaurant dedicated to grease and BBQ Sauce. I had a salad of iceberg lettuce, two slices of pickled beets, a hard boiled egg, and some tomatoes. Mmmm. I had coffee yesterday and spent the rest of the day being sick and jittery. I'm happily back to tea today, and glad to be home where I can eat with no [outside] scrutiny.
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