May Training

May was a hell of a month (in a good way), so let's get to the details

Training

Training for May was fantastic. The weather started warming up. Weekend rides got longer. Charity rides were coming up making for the perfect short term goals to shoot for while doing the long term goal training for the Big Ride this summer.

I also have to give a quick shout out to Jay my new riding buddy. Up until the Easter Ride in April I was doing all my training by myself which is fine, but hard to push the pace while on those 60, 70, and 80 mile rides. Jay and I have been riding together for most of May and the company is very welcome. It definitely helps miles fly by when you have someone to talk to, take a pull into the head winds, or just vent to about how much it hurts to sit in the saddle for another hour. Many thanks to Jay for the company and bearing with my craziness when I suggest sprinting out the next half mile or picking up the pace to drop a random rider on the lake front.

Bike Fitting

A HUGE highlight from May is the bike fitting I got done by Kevin at Get a Grip Cycles at their Fulton Fit Studio. I'll have a longer posting about the fitting and minor tweaks/fittings in a soon to follow post, but for now let me just say it has made a world of difference in my performance. My "aggressive" seat position that I thought would make me faster was all wrong and the new "relaxed", or rather correct, position has me averaging easily 1-2 miles per hour faster. To all my fellow cyclists out there, take it from a self proclaimed know-it-all: you can NOT fit a bike yourself. Once you come to terms with that go visit Kevin and the crew at Get a Grip!

Health

Apparently May in Chicago means full blown allergy season, which also means I'm semi-sick all the time (yeah I know, what else is new). The good part of this is I can test out training strategies at some of my sickest points. What I learned:

• Always carry a peak flow meter to measure my asthma/lung capacity
• Always carry my inhaler in case the above numbers drop
• Biking and snot rockets are better for me than laying on a couch with kleenex
• Drink lots of fluids; even more than usual

Nutrition

The plus side of getting sick is I get to talk to the doctors about my weight and nutrition plan. In November/December I weighed around 151-153lbs. I'm happy to say with all the training I'm actually up to 153-155lbs. I did the math again recently (end of May) and I'm easily eating 3000 to 3500 calories, depending what day and what mileage I did the day before, and upwards of 5000 calories for after the 80-100 mile rides. I've never loved food so much in my entire life.

Fundraising

Donate now to the American Lung Association! So apparently I don't have as long to raise my money as I thought. I've raised close to $2,200 but still have a long way to go to the $5,500 mark which I need by August, or the difference will come out of my credit card.

The Stats

I've been tracking all my training at MyCyclingLog.com so why not show off some stats for the month of May?

Total Ride Time:

31:39:03

Total Miles:

532.25

Average Speed:

16.45

Total Rides:

19

Hello? Is this thing on?

"Hey, are you still doing that ride this summer?" "What's going on with your blog?" "Have you done any training since February?" "Are you going to be ready by June?"

Those are just a few of the questions I've gotten over the past few months since I haven't made time for blogging about my training. I apologize for keeping you all in the dark, but know it was for good reason. What reason would that be? Well, I've been kicking my butt on the bike and really didn't set aside the energy to write about it.

So let's catch everyone up:

Training

Training is going great! If you notice, I now post my weekly goals to the right side of this site. I've been pushing 150-170 miles for the past two weeks, and am looking towards the 200 mark this week.

The Rides

While some of my stories of doing rides around town might only appeal to those that are into cycling, I have some good ones including a great charity ride, meeting some new cycling friends to ride with, chasing a dog with sunglasses through down town Chicago, getting chased by a ~80-100 lb farm dog (yeah, that's probably karma right there), and a weekend of fighting wind gusts of up to 35 mph.

Don't worry though, that's just a tease. I'll be posting more complete stories later.

Health

Remarkably, cycling seems to cures what ails me. Although I appear starving all the time (ask my coworkers/lunch crew) I'm actually feeling really well. Even the one or two times when I felt a cold coming on I was able to bike through it. The result was only having to take one extra day off the training week I wasn't feeling well.

Nutrition

I eat A LOT now. I did the math once and usually hit 2500-3000 calories, sometimes nearing 3500 calories on days after doing 60+ mile days. I really haven't checked my weight, but don't seem to be losing any pounds. I look a lot leaner in my upper body, but my legs are becoming tree trunks. I figure it all evens out.

Fundraising

Ok, this one is slacking BIG TIME. I've been so focused on riding that I forgot I need to raise 5 grand by end of June. I'll be drafting a fundraising email this week. However, if you are reading this and want to donate now, please visit: www.seejoeride.com/donate

So I think that's it for now. Now that the training routine is down, I can start to schedule time for blogging, fundraising, and maybe even a party or two.

Sat, Dec 8, 2007 - 10.78 mi [Cycling]

Sat, Dec 8, 2007 - 10.78 mi [Cycling]
10.78 mi in 00:45:13 hours at 14.30 mi/h on Trek 2200. [Cycling] What a horrible ride. I couldn't make it through the full "Workout 1." My legs started getting weird pains around 8-9 miles, my heart rate was super high, and my asthma didn't like the exercise either. I think the main problem was lack of eating dinner the previous night, and not enough food today prior to the ride. Staying out late the night before and drinking massive amounts of caffeine probably didn't help either.
Posted from My Cycling Log

My First Century

Biking with Beanzie

Sunday, July 15, 2007

Returning to the wonderful farmland area of DeKalb, IL I was amped to make my second attempt at my first century ride, after my first attempt being rained out last month. This time the weather gods were on my side and gave us a gorgeous day for riding; full of sunshine and temperatures in the mid 70's.

After a quick registration and picture of me and my bike (thanks Pooja), I was on my way. The first miles flew by as I was averaging around 19mph through the rolling hills. I was doing so well I did not stop at a rest stop until around the 30 mile marker. I planned to do a water refill and continue just eating Clif Bars, but to much surprise, what did I find at the food table? Halloween size Sweettart candies. All I could think was how fate wanted me to be on this ride... and high on sugar.

Back on the road I continued making good time. Around the 45 mile marker the paths split for the 100 mile route versus the 64 route. This was when I lost all contact with human kind. Having recently passed a half dozen riders, I looked back to see everyone turn right for the 64 mile route. In continued on my way, focused on the century. After all, I had not come to socialize, but to conquer the elusive century ride in DeKalb.

After what seemed like an eternity of riding alone in the monotony of corn fields, I finally saw two riders up on the horizon. Finally I could break from the routine thoughts of singing the same 2 songs in my head; I could chase and pass more riders. Yes, I'm that competitively driven even during a long charity ride.

A little before mile 70 I stopped at a rest stop to try eating a bagel and refilling my water and Gatorade bottles. I found the men's restroom to be accidentally locked from the inside and was able to help out the folks running the rest stop by picking the lock with one guy's credit card. As happy as the guy was that I could get the door open (apparently they'd be charged to have the park department to come open it) he seemed leery to ask how I learned such a skill. I just smiled and said "a lot of fraternity pranks in college."

The next 10 miles sucked. Apparently, I found my lungs' breaking point with my asthma and couldn't seem to ride faster than 12mph (I was still averaging 17-18mph at this point). It was about this time I also realized I had forgot to put on sunscreen and had just ridden 4+ hours in the morning sun. I took it easy until the next rest stop so I could really relax, stretch, and get some real food in me. Damn you Willy Wonka and lack of cycling nutritious candy. It was also in this stretch that saddle soreness kicked in. The giant tar-filled cracks in the country roads didn't help this ailment either.

Mile 80 I stopped at the allocated rest stop and refueled. I called Pooja to give her a head's up that I would be finishing in about two hours, given my recent drop in pace. I also had a quick text message conversation with Hales, who informed me of all the fun I was missing at the beach. As I ate my PB&J bagel, I fantasized about just laying out in the sand and sun. I shook this image off as it wouldn't help me get through the last 20 miles, which I assumed would feel like the longest part of this ride.

Back on the bike, and on the road, I found that PB&J bagels were God's gift to cycling. I had found my second wind and was back on pace. I finished up the last 20 miles in less than an hour and a half, so I got to just veg out as I waited for Pooja to show up and give a ride back into the city.

All in all it was a great ride. I looked like a candy cane afterwards with my tan but got my first century under my belt and had a great time. On the ride home, after giving a quick summary of the ride, Pooja asked, "So when's your next one?" I'm not sure if she was joking, but I pulled out a pamphlet and asked "What are you doing late September?" I'm hooked.

Final Ride Stats

Mileage:

100.10 miles

Time:

5 hours 54 minutes

Avg Speed:

16.9 mph

Photos