Wednesday, July 05, 2006

Cycling is one tough sport

Just wanted to point out the essay on that topic by James Raia. Well said. "The [Tour de France] field has ridden nearly 20 hours in five days and it's averaging nearly 27 mph."

It felt tough to me today! It was threatening rain all morning, but I still got in 2000 yards at the community pool for starters. I was surprised that the pool didn't close. It feels weird to be swimming along and all of a sudden start feeling rain on your back.

But then the clouds lightened. I headed out on the bike, on my usual marathon-length round-trip ride to Knapps Narrows. 26.3 miles at a 16.3-mile average. I kept riding hard in the 18-to-20 range with the wind at my back on the return leg, watching the average speed on the bike computer, and trying to crank it up, but I just couldn't get it to tick over any higher than that. It's funny how trying to push that number just one teensy tenth higher will get a person to ride hard for several miles, though.

1 comment:

:) said...

Your training is going great. I am proud of you for your consistency!