Lee and I have started training (training ?? what is this word "training??") for the SF Randonneurs 200K brevet in January. I'm not so much concerned about the distance as I am about the climbing. Oh, and the fact that it'll probably be wretchedly cold and raining that day.

We're lucky to have a very scenic paved trail out by the SF bay near our home that circles the Coyote Hills Regional park. It includes a short yet moderately steep hill that I call my Nemesis Hill. It's roughly 1/2 mile with an average gradient of about 8% that kicks briefly up to over 15% in a couple of places, and with a couple of flat bits in between. So, for starters, we're going to do lots of repeats up that hill.

Today we rode out to the bay to warm up, turned back, headed up the Coyote Hills path, did 2 full circuits of that path including the nemesis hill (about 5 miles each circuit), then, after our 3rd time up nemesis, instead of doing the loop around the hills again we turned around at the bottom, and went up and down 2 more times for a total of 5 times up nemesis. Booyah ! It seemed to be getting easier for me, so the last time up I did as much of it as I could standing. Double booyah! It worked out to 28 miles and about 1350 feet of climbing altogether. We'll increase the number & intensity (speed, standing vs. sitting) of these repeats over time.

I'm really glad I did this today because early on in the ride I felt awful, I might be coming down with a cold and I thought that had a bit to do with it. Turns out I probably didn't eat enough beforehand because after I woofed down a Clif Shot I felt fine.

I hope to get in a few repeats of nemesis during the week, and next weekend we'll go for a hillier ride, maybe head out to Calaveras from out home. Who knows, maybe at this rate we'll even make it up that uber-stinker Sierra Road in a few weeks.