Friday, May 30, 2008

Moving up on event day.

Ahh yes, only 2 days away from that 50 miler early/mid season goal. For some reason I've got just a touch of jitters about it.

Last weekend was the last "stretch it out" of the early season in preparation for this goal. 35 miles and 2400 vertical feet (I'll point out that the climbing on the route for Sunday is not nearly as tough as what we encountered on the 35 mile training ride - max grades of 20% in some places, although it was beautiful terrain) were an easy enough final ramp up. This week has been a case of taking it nice and easy, just running through my weight routine a little bit to keep everything in shape, and keeping the riding very mellow on the trainer. I think tonight I'll head out on the trail for a shorter more difficult effort to wake up the legs, spend Saturday recovering and then hit it good on Sunday.

Sunday's climbs are looking to be more the extended type: 8-10% grades over 3-4 miles. Just to be sure I've swapped my standard cranks for compact rings, and swapped my aero rear wheel for a conventional, lighter box section type rear wheel. Still running Michelin Pro 3 Race tires, still sticking with the 11-25 cluster on the rear. It should be a pretty easy run up the climbs, so I'm a little bit stoked on that.

After this? Maybe I'll spend more time on the mountain bike for a while. I know there's a 6 hour race in August to train for and a metric (or maybe a full) century in September. Ah hell, let's take this one day at a time: Sunday first, then I'll figure life out.

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