I originally wrote this on Friday while I still had oxygen going to my brain, but have not updated it Saturday evening. Today I went on a long and fast paced bike ride. We did nearly 140 miles with 9,000 ft. of climbing, averaging 17 mph. There was a large turnout for the ride, but myself and two others went off the front and we never say any of the other riders again, not even when we stopped for lunch for 30 minutes.

Overall this week I ran 44 miles, road biked 330 miles and mountain biked 14 miles, with total climbing of 24,000 ft. Included in that was a new PR cycling up Metcalf, a 8 mile tempo run and the 140 mile bike ride. I have run much further in a week and I have biked further in a week, not together. So I feel it really is the most miles in my memory. I have developed a simple formula to equate everything in terms of running miles and this week comes in at the equivalent of 134 miles and the second week in a row over 100. This is all because I am dual training, for both a double century and a marathon that occur only two weeks apart. So far I am holding up and walking the fine line to keep from getting injured and still trying to get my speed up. Okay, I know you don’t want to see another chart, but here are two anyway (click the images to enlarge them).

Categories: Training
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One of the weekly club rides I like doing is the Metcalf Mauler. With the advent of Daylight Savings time the ride has moved to 5 pm, so we get a lot faster riders through the summer. Today was the first such fast paced group. After running 20 miles yesterday I was not sure how well I would do and started making excuses before we even hit the hill. Maybe it was the new bike, but I set a new PR going up the hill, at 13:28, beating my best time set last fall of 13:35.

I won’t bore yo with yet another heart rate graph but my average heart rate during the climb was 168, with a max of 173. Okay, I can’t resist, here is the graph. The numbers 1 and 2 on the horizontal axis shows the start and end of the marked climb. By graphing based on time, instead of distance, it looks like the hill incline is consistent, but that is only because I was holding the elevation gain per minute nearly even. See how my heart rate went up towards then end of the climb, because I knew I was close to setting a new PR. That might have been a mistake to do so early in the year.

Now the fun part of the ride is going down San Felipe. I pulled par of the way down the hill, with a train of about 10 riders right behind me. Notice on the following graph the speed we reached. I am glad I didn’t have a compact crankset or I would have spun out trying to pedal at that speed.

Categories: Cycling Group Rides
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I went on my first 20 mile run today training for the Boston Marathon. I took my iPod and listened to the top 20 hits (actually the top 20 hits of prior decades). I also ran in warmer weather than I expected. I only took two 7 oz . water bottles because that is all I have needed, so I ended up rationing water. That is not a good way to train unless you are training for the Foreign Legion. I only averaged a 8:48 pace, but I was happy with that coming off an injury and not running that many miles the last two weeks while I was ramping up my biking miles. You can see from the graph below that during the last 6 miles of the run I had to take my heart rate up from the relatively easy 145 range to the high 150′s and even 160′s to keep the pace. That shows I need more training, especially speed workout, before I run the marathon.

Click image to enlarge.

Categories: Boston Marathon
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On Saturday, I took my new road bike out for a ride and the first hill we did was Quimby. I was a bit worried about making it up such a steep hill with just a double, but it was okay. Here is a graph of the data during the climb. You can see my heat rate was going a bit into my defined red zone during some parts of the climb, but I was not pushing the pace. When I do push, my heart rate goes above 170.

Categories: Cycling Group Rides
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I picked up my new bike tonight. They did a fitting and decided they needed to go with a shorter stem, so they put on a lower quality 70 mm stem they had in stock while they order one, replacing the 90 mm that came with the bike. They are going this time with a 70 mm stem vs. the 80 mm I have on my existing bike, maybe my arms are getting shorter as I age. The crank length is 170mm which is probably more appropriate for my height than the 175mm I have been using. I think when I bought my last bike they did a switch on the crank arm to accomodate another customer and I was too new to cycling to know any difference.

I couldn’t get home to weight by bike and found it is on the lighter side, coming in a tad over 15 lbs, but less than 15.5 lbs, without the pedals. Of course after that I started to add water bottle cages, my speed sensor and mount and my bag with spare tubes, tire tool and pump. I am therefore not going to weigh it further
I was able to get it all ready and plan to ride it tomorrow, even though we are climbing up Quimby and I would normally take my older bike, which has a triple crankshaft, up that steep of a hill. I guess I will have to grind it out and hope that my body is also on the lighter side. I shouldn’t have had Mexican food for dinner.

Categories: Cycling Equipment
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There is always the discussion if cycling is friendly to the environment. I suppose on the surface it would appear so but as a sport we often get in our cars and drive it to the start of a club ride, which is not friendly the environment. Well today I decided to ride from home. Problem is most club rides start in the major city that is 30 miles from where we live. I did the Metcalf Mauler club ride and got in a total of 75 miles on the bike, but only 20 of that was on the official club ride. So at least for today, call me Mr. Green.

Categories: Cycling Group Rides
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Okay, I know it is “Go West Young Man” and I also know I am no longer a young man, but we are headed East to Boston. I ran 6 miles easy this morning and didn’t notice the running injury so I have now booked flights to Boston to run the marathon. I may not get a PR but I now feel confident I can train enough to finish the race and still train for the double century cycling event in Solvang two weeks before the marathon. I will resume speed works next week and run 20 miles on Monday.

Categories: Boston Marathon
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I ran 8 miles today, after taking yesterday off from running. The running injury is still there but I was managing. I got an email from Donny that he was climbing up Henry Coe at 2 pm, on road bikes, so I replied I would join. We all met at the bike patch trail head in Morgan Hill. On the way to Dunne Ave. I saw a large group of road cyclists and forgot that I was dealing with an injury and chased them down (I just can’t resist myself). After I started to climb, I noticed the injury a lot. I had to take it slow going up. I got back just in time to join the Night Riders weekly Wednesday ride up Henry Coe so I repeated the same climb. It is a riot descending down the mountain in the dark, but we have good headlights so we can see the road. This same group of guys also does Mountain Biking in the dark, but I am not ready for that yet.

Categories: Cycling Group Rides
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They say that the only two certain things in life are Death and Taxes. Regarding Taxes, I need to get going with the dealing approach in a bit over a month. Regarding Death, I got into the Death Ride. They have so many people apply that they hold a lottery. The graphic below says it all about this bike ride.

Categories: Ultra Cycling Events
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Previously I wrote I was considering bailing out of doing the Boston Marathon due to the running injury I am dealing with, the cost of the trip and my desire to buy a new bike. Well I bought the new bike yesterday so I have removed that from the decision process

I did an 8 mile run this morning. It hurt somewhat where I was injured but taking the day off yesterday really helped. I am now inclined to stick with my plan to run the Boston Marathon and will make the final decision tonight. I found a real good fare on American Airlines for non-stop flights.

So I am on a roll. The last two posts have four “B” words in the title. So what other word starts with a “B”?

Categories: Boston Marathon
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