Climbing Club - August

[Veronica]

You rock!

Scott still has my check. He's convinced that I'll finish it some day. Maybe in my next life...

V.

[maillotpois]

yeah, I'm a dork. but it's important to be dressed appropriately to make annie's pasta for an 11 year old....who thinks I am Queen of the Dorks.

V - he can cash in your check next year. it'll be fun!

[Veronica]

yeah, I'm a dork. but it's important to be dressed appropriately to make annie's pasta for an 11 year old....who thinks I am Queen of the Dorks.

V - he can cash in your check next year. it'll be fun!

Yummy Annie's!

Yeah... it's still my dream/nightmare to do the stage races.

V.

[maillotpois]

it's sort of in the back of my mind. the way back. behind some expired milk and a mostly empty bottle of hot sauce.

[Starfish]

You're not slow, you're tenacious.

My new rallying cry.

Actually, this winter, I need a new mantra...I need to program myself for speed if I'm going to do the Super Century in Shasta next year!

Jo, we need a battle cry!

[Starfish]

OK, I know you all know this from experience, but this is my first experience like this.

Well, you all know this year has been all about long, slow, steady, climbing training for me. And I skipped doing a certain short, flat route I did a lot a couple years ago.

But, a couple times now in the past 2 weeks I have done this ride...almost all flat with just one very short steep hill. It has some high-pedestrian path links, and a couple traffic lights, as well as one slow bumpy section through a paper mill to get out to the spit.

Two years ago I used to average maybe 12 to 13 mph for this little 12-14 mile flat ride. I'm a slowpoke.

In the last two weeks, I averaged 14 mph once and 15 mph once, just relaxed and for fun. Also, the spit is always windy. I noticed riding into the headwind there last year I typically went about 9 mph. This year, same headwind, I was going about 12.

Guess climbing works!

I'm pretty excited to lose some weight and workout for speed and strength this winter and see where I am next year.

[jobob]

Excellent.

[RolliePollie]

Starfish - I think I'm already noticing this phenomena as well! When I first started riding, I was mostly doing the flat bike trail in Sacramento. I stayed in my middle ring and the one noticeable hill was not very fun. But when I was down there riding a couple of weekends ago, I stayed in my big ring the entire ride and I hardly noticed the "hill". My average wasn't very fast though...I was riding with a friend and we were too busy talking to pay much attention to speed. But I know I could go a heck of a lot faster on that trail than I could've a few months ago.

BTW, I'm at 422 miles and approx. 25,600' of climbing for the month so far. This is a lot for little old me!

[Starfish]

BTW, I'm at 422 miles and approx. 25,600' of climbing for the month so far. This is a lot for little old me!

That's awesome!

Since Shasta, I think I have climbed all of 300 feet.

I am quite curious sometime to take my bike when I go to Seattle, and do the extremely flat 58 mile trail over there that I used to do. Curious to see how my extended flat riding time has increased in the past couple years. Nowhere to test that here!

[jobob]

I hope to hit 200,000 ft by the end of the month, which would mean 40,000 ft of climbing this month. Probably a big stretch, but we'll see what happens.

Well, I only (only, hee hee) did 35,000 feet this month, which is still the most I've done in any month so I'm pretty pleased.

And I'm about to break 4400 miles, which was my goal for the entire year. Booyah.

I've decided not to try for a double century this year. My climbing speed still leaves a lot to be desired, and I need to get in a few more hilly century-plus and double metrics, to build my confidence more than anything.

So I'm going to restart my quest for a RUSA R12 on Sept. 15. The R12 involves riding a RUSA (Randonneurs USA)-sanctioned brevet or permanent of 200K or more each month for 12 consecutive months. Fredwina's been doing that (see http://forums.teamestrogen.com/showthread.php?t=16726), and I'm trying to sucker, er, lure others into too.

[maillotpois]

I have no goal. Get through Tam with my friend and then maybe take some time off, or at least with fewer miles.

I made my goal!!

16,551 for the month. I thought it was my lowest climbing month of the year, but it turns out I had fewer than 10,000 in February, so I did not set a new record!

Total for the year is 229,186, almost 3300 miles. Jo could stop riding right now and I wouldn't catch her before the end of the year!! How cool is that?? Truly!

It was a quiet month. I needed that. Wacky year, though. I think you can see my overuse injury coming on right about March - April.... , bearing in mind that July - December of 2006 was zero miles or feet.

Jan - 317 miles, 17,040 feet
Feb - 173 miles, 9,645 feet
March - 580 miles, 31,889 feet
April - 673 miles, 48,609 feet
May - 569 miles, 33,650 feet
June - 420 miles, 39,691 feet
July - 346 miles, 32,111 feet
Aug - 208 miles, 16,551 feet

[Trekhawk]

Did not make my goal this month I only got in just over 19000 and was aiming at 22000. Oh well maybe next month.

[Starfish]

MP & Jo, you mileages and climbing are truly amazing to me. Really impressive, month in and month out.

I have really taken a month of rest and easy workouts...maybe just 3 easy workouts a week, no ride longer than 16 miles...just kind of letting down and getting some maintenance workouts in this month since Shasta.

Tuesday morning, a new training phase begins!!

[RolliePollie]

My August just ended with a very hot and unusually HUMID ride! I am very sweaty. I got a new rear tire yesterday and I swear, it feels like a new bike. It's wonderful!

So, August for me = 511.3 miles and approximately 30,050' of climbing.

I really wanted to break 500 miles for the month. Otherwise there is no way I would've been out there just now riding in this hot and sticky weather. Ugh!