I didn't know how my legs would hold up for the scheduled 3.5 hour ride on Saturday. I'd logged 24 miles of running during the week and some pretty hard days in the saddle including speed drills and intervals. As is typical fashion for me, the first few miles of the ride my legs feel tight and weak. The thought always goes through my head, "oh man, I'm not going to be able to finish this. It's going to suck." But, as the ride went on my legs fell into form and I started feeling stronger and ready to roll. This week's route is called the Prison Loop as it takes you past St. Claire County's own Correctional Facility. The route rolls through some really pretty farm land out in some of the more rural areas of town. I know you're probably thinking "Are there areas in Alabama that aren't rural?" There are one or two places, I promise. I was happy to find that my legs held strong throughout the ride. I'm getting a little more confident that I might actually be able to ride 112 miles. Mentally 3.5 hours is tough. What's 6 hours going to feel like?
For this ride, I tried eating 1/2 of a Cliff Bar every thirty minutes instead of a full bar every hour. This enabled me to keep my blood sugar up throughout the ride and at the same time kept me from dumping a bunch of food on my stomach all at once. The only foul up I had nutrition wise was losing an energy gel I'd attached to my saddle bag by a little strap. This would leave me a little lean on calories going into transition, but thankfully I found it had no effect on me. Once I made it back to the car, I downed a gel and headed out for a quick 30 minute run. Again the legs held and I was able to negative split the run. I was pretty pumped to see that my avg HR for the ride was on 135 on only 152 for the run. Given the pace I was holding, it's a sign that I'm gaining endurance. Today I logged a 2 hour and 15 minute run. I kept with the game plan and stayed around a 9:00 per mile pace. It's terribly slow, but I sticking with it. My avg HR for the run was stupid low at 143. Wow. The 2:15 run flew by today despite the rainy conditions. I'm still making my way through the first year of Ironman Talk podcasts. I love those guys. Listening to these guys has been a huge boost for me mentally.
Now this week is where I rebuild and reload. It's my first rest week, so I'm going to try and make the most of it. I'm going to sleep in a bit more and will try and eat breakfast with my wife more. I've really missed that. At the end of the week I find myself going to the beach yet again. I'm really getting spoiled here. Next weekend is Memorial Day, so we're meeting my wife's family at the beach for the weekend. I'll be taking the bike of course, but I'll will also be taking my golf clubs and a lot of balls. My golf game has declined a bit since all my spare time is spent training. That's all for now. Tailwinds.
Mentally 6 hours is tough during training - no doubt. But during the race, it'll fly by (well, not really miles 75-95ish). ;) One trick that helps is to keep mixing up your rides, gives you something new to look forward. For each of your really long rides 4-6 hours, try to find a new route - something you haven't done before.
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Wow good training brick. Don't worry if your training runs are at a slow pace...after all better to go slow in training than in the race were it counts.
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