Labor Day Weekend Rides

[Catrin]

I will start

I've been having some slight right hip pain after riding my Gunnar, but not my Jamis. While it is hard to compare the two, at the advice of my fitter I took them both in. He made two teensy tweeks - removed an unneeded washer from my Frog cleats in a very minor tweak to my Q-factor, and raised my saddle 3mm.

Tiny changes...frankly I wasn't hopeful and I do not think he really was either. However...I rode 40 HARD miles this morning and even had a PB in my average speed. No numbness in my hip, no pain. Period. Nothing. Nada. Zip. Nyet.

I did my usual stretches, and there is a hip stretch that has been consistently painful after riding the Gunnar lately - and even THAT was perfectly pain free. I will take it

[redrhodie]

Good news, Catrin! Hope that's that.

I heart my Sat morning shop ride. I parked at my friend's house and rode to the start from there, so 39 miles. It was especially fun for some reason. Not sure, I think I just felt good.

Maybe it's because I've reset my internal clock so I now wake up early everyday just so I won't be tired on Sat morning. How crazy is that? The weird thing is, I've never slept better in my life. I've been getting like 9 hours a night, which for a borderline insomniac, is heavenly. I'm thinking all these years of not sleeping well were because I was forcing myself to stay awake hoping I'd sleep better if I were really tired. It seems like my body likes to go to bed at 9 pm. I hit the pillow and I'm out. It's awesome.

I wouldn't have figured this out if not for the early ride. I pray it lasts.

[jusdooit]

Did the "usual" Sat. morn group ride. We had so very strong head/cross winds which caused the group to split initially, but we regrouped and stuck together well for the rest of the 38 mile ride. Had some light rain on the return trip which made a few folks decide to push the pace, but overall it was good. Had to get the ride done today as a little storm named Lee will probably make it impossible for the rest of the weekend.

[nscrbug]

80 miles for me today. It was unusually hot and muggy for a Sept morning here today...mid 70's when we started at 6:15am, and got up to 87 (as shown on my Garmin) near the end of the ride. Tomorrow's ride might be a big one (100?) since we are supposed to have a good amount of wind from the NW, and that generally means we do our "northerly" route which often ends up being over 100 miles. Not really looking forward to doing another century, since I just did one 2 weekends ago...but I don't really want to complain about it since I know that in a few short months the snow, ice, and sub-zero temps will end my riding season until next spring. So I'll keep the whining to a minimum and tough out the 100 miles tomorrow.

[azfiddle]

My DH and I did an organized ride in southeastern Arizona, from the town of Willcox to the base of the Chiracahua Mountains. 65 miles, a little more than 2000 feet of climbing. The start time was pleasantly cool but on the ride back the big climb was miserably hot and the last 8 miles were mostly flat, but windy, hot and humid. We were both really happy to get off the bikes.

Don't know if it from the recent fit changes, but my b*tt was really not happy in the saddle after the middle of the ride and I was squirming a lot.

Still, it was rewarding and I have a shiny medal to show i did it

[Kathi]

Yesterday we did our annual ride up Boreas Pass outside of Breckenridge, Co. The road is an old RR bed, with a hard packed, dirt surface. Cars are allowed on the road but the tourists had not yet arrived so we had the road pretty much to ourselves. Temps were in the mid 60's. We started at approximately 10,000 ft and rode to the top, 11,481 ft. The climb was 3-4% for 6 miles. It took about an hour to reach the top. On the ride down we had beautiful views of Aspen forests and the Breckenridge Ski area. There is still snow at the top of the mountain!

At the top there is an old RR car and several buildings left over from the RR days. The buildings have been restored and are part of the Summit Hut system. Several years ago our ski club rented the hut and we snowshoed the 6 miles to it and spent 3 days there. It was quite an experience.