Oct 7 rides

[Cassandra_Cain]

Saturday morning. Ride. Of course -oops, wait. Clouds, gloomy, and threatening skies. Hmmmm. A nap.

2 hours later. Ah, there's the sun, let's go!

I wasn't sure how I wanted to approach today's ride. It was the usual 4000 feet of climbing @ 5.2%. Partly I considered doing L4 intervals up with easier periods between as well as a few other options.

Naturally I decided to do it as an all-out time trial.

Felt like I was flying at first, starting out a bit too hard. My pace leveled off and I made it in good shape to the base of the ski area @ 8500 ft. After that though the next 2000+ feet were much harder, like always. From the base of the mountain to the summit, apparently Vo2max drops by about 7-10% even for someone acclimated to altitude like I am - which probably explains why the 2nd half of the climb feels disproportionately hard, that and it is steeper.

It was a grind, but I forced myself to push hard through the less steep sections which is precisely where the body usually wants to take it easy. Very challenging to the mind and body, to keep yourself at the limit nonstop.

Easily broke my own PR from last week, doing it well under 2 hours.

It was pure hoots and grins on the way down zipping along over 40mph and passing a car