I never did post about my Santos ride from last weekend. I will keep this part short:
I went to Santos to ride the 23 or so miles of landbridge out and back. I was feeling awesome and keeping a nice pace of around 9.5 mph. At about the 15 mile point I was coming down a whooptie-doo and at the bottom of the whooptie do was a pool of sand. Of course my front wheel came to a halt, and tossed me off the bike. The front wheel was bent so bad it was hitting each side of the fork when spenning. So, using man-muscle, I bent the rim back into semi-ridable shape and made it back to the car. 20 Bucks and 40 minutes later my rim was truer than when I got the bike in the first place. Big ol' bummer though, since that really wrecked my rhythm and I didnt get back out for another lap of Nayls. The new shoes worked great, however I wasnt wearing the proper socks, and they seemed to bunch up at the toes and bug me a little.
Every Wednesday a local meetup group does what they call the 10 lap challenge out at the 1.4 mile loop at Soldier Field near the Environmental center off 419 in the Longwood area. This last Wednesday was my first time out there to give it a try. It doesnt sound very difficult, but it is alot harder than it sounds. The terrain is pretty fast and flowing with numerous little bridges over the creek(s). I started off really slow and worked my way up to a pretty good rhythm and completed 10 laps in an hour and 19 minutes. Unfortunately, I did not set my lap timer correctly and I didnt get my lap times down. My feet felt great, but I know for a fact now that the garmin 500 without the speed sensor is absolutely not measuring distance correctly.
For example: The Greenway map shows the ride from landbridge to 484 and back to the landbridge trailhead is right around 22.3 miles. My ride over the weekend displayed it as only being 19 miles. The 10 laps out at the E-center showed up as being 12.2 miles, when a guy out there who was using the 705 was coming up with 13.5 miles. That kinda screws my average speed/etc up. Lets calculate this.
According to the Edge 500 I did 19.5 miles in 2:08 moving time with an average speed of 9.1 mph. When in actuality I did 22.3 miles (according to the OMBA epic map) in 2:08 which would be 10.4 mph. That is an enormous difference, and considering the last 8 miles were ridden on a rim that looked similar to a potato chip - I think I could have done a lot better. Im going to keep working on getting my landbridge lap down under two hours and the 10 lap challenge down closer to an hour.
Showing posts with label Group Rides. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Group Rides. Show all posts
Friday, April 2, 2010
Thursday, March 4, 2010
Tour De Cure in Orlando Florida or Tour de Freezing Toes
I completed the Tour de Cure 61 mile ride on Sunday in about 3 hours and 30 minutes of total ride time, averaging 18 mph. I was going to do the century, but I didnt quite make the 250 dollar goal I set for myself, and it was chilly and very windy. With as little road riding as I have done in the last two months - Im glad I rode the 60 miles instead of the 100.
Its easy to forget how much fun an organized ride is when you haven't done one in a while. There were almost a thousand riders this year. I showed up before 7:30, following the flyer's instructions, to register and pick up my packet. Luckily the registration booth was right in the middle of somewhat of a swamp, so my socks got soaked right through my shoes before I started riding. Hurray! The packet contained a map, a very nice Haynes T-shirt, and some diabetes information.
Right at 8:30 the announcer got us revved up by talking about the amount of funds raised (close to 250k), had a young lady sing an excellent rendition of the Star Spangled Banner, and then launched us. There were alot of people surrounding the start gate yelling, screaming, and banging cowbells.
The cowbells thing pretty much happened throughout the ride. We got a police escort for the first 12 miles or so, and didnt have to stop for any stop lights - except for one light, where someone just ignored the police motorcycle and went through the light anyway. The large group quickly broke into pieces and I managed to hitch onto a pretty fast group lead group until a quick bathroom and sandwich break at a rest stop. The rest stops had bananas, sandwiches, cookies, gatorade, and a ton of stuff. One of the rest stops had a DJ. Pretty cool.
Here I am at one of the rest stops:
Note my gorgeous blue shoes. I have had those for like 8 years.
The route was great this year, literally starting 10 minutes from my house, and riding within a block of my front door. Im thinking I will do this every year. The crowd was great, the sheer number of riders was pretty impressive as well. I finished the ride around 12:30 or so - after riding in a ridiculous headwind for well over an hour and a half. The wind was absolutely terrible. I cant tell you how many people I passed that looked like they were really struggling to keep upright. I was actually struggling at around the 50 mile mark, as I wasnt quite keeping up with my nutrition as well as I should have and I was getting seriously hungry. I downed a clif bar and a couple shots of gel and felt better within a few minutes. For the entire ride I ate
At the finish line I was cheered and I think someone took my picture. I was really beat after riding those stiff headwinds and tried to eat a little bit of Woody's bbq. The chicken was yummy, but I just cant eat a meal only a few minutes after a ride. I went out for a big lunch with wifey, did a little shopping, then on the way home around 3:30 there were still riders on the road! We passed one guy that looked absolutely beat. Im thinking those were the century riders.
Im looking forward to another big group ride, this one was a blast! I really have forgotten how much fun it is to ride on the road with a group. Ive also come to realize that I need a new road bike. I have a 2002 Giant TCR 0 with bullhorns. I set it up this way when i was doing some triathlons in 2004 and my right 'brifter' stopped working. I got handlebars, bar-end shifters, and brake levers all for the price of one single brake/shift lever. This bike is quite light at around 17 and a half pounds - it was top of the line uh, 8 years ago. I'm thinking of getting a bike that has less of a racey stretched out geometry and getting one a little more comfortable like a Giant Defy, Specialized Roubaix, or Scott CR1. It might be a while before I can do that though.
Its easy to forget how much fun an organized ride is when you haven't done one in a while. There were almost a thousand riders this year. I showed up before 7:30, following the flyer's instructions, to register and pick up my packet. Luckily the registration booth was right in the middle of somewhat of a swamp, so my socks got soaked right through my shoes before I started riding. Hurray! The packet contained a map, a very nice Haynes T-shirt, and some diabetes information.
Right at 8:30 the announcer got us revved up by talking about the amount of funds raised (close to 250k), had a young lady sing an excellent rendition of the Star Spangled Banner, and then launched us. There were alot of people surrounding the start gate yelling, screaming, and banging cowbells.
The cowbells thing pretty much happened throughout the ride. We got a police escort for the first 12 miles or so, and didnt have to stop for any stop lights - except for one light, where someone just ignored the police motorcycle and went through the light anyway. The large group quickly broke into pieces and I managed to hitch onto a pretty fast group lead group until a quick bathroom and sandwich break at a rest stop. The rest stops had bananas, sandwiches, cookies, gatorade, and a ton of stuff. One of the rest stops had a DJ. Pretty cool.
Here I am at one of the rest stops:
Note my gorgeous blue shoes. I have had those for like 8 years.
The route was great this year, literally starting 10 minutes from my house, and riding within a block of my front door. Im thinking I will do this every year. The crowd was great, the sheer number of riders was pretty impressive as well. I finished the ride around 12:30 or so - after riding in a ridiculous headwind for well over an hour and a half. The wind was absolutely terrible. I cant tell you how many people I passed that looked like they were really struggling to keep upright. I was actually struggling at around the 50 mile mark, as I wasnt quite keeping up with my nutrition as well as I should have and I was getting seriously hungry. I downed a clif bar and a couple shots of gel and felt better within a few minutes. For the entire ride I ate
At the finish line I was cheered and I think someone took my picture. I was really beat after riding those stiff headwinds and tried to eat a little bit of Woody's bbq. The chicken was yummy, but I just cant eat a meal only a few minutes after a ride. I went out for a big lunch with wifey, did a little shopping, then on the way home around 3:30 there were still riders on the road! We passed one guy that looked absolutely beat. Im thinking those were the century riders.
Im looking forward to another big group ride, this one was a blast! I really have forgotten how much fun it is to ride on the road with a group. Ive also come to realize that I need a new road bike. I have a 2002 Giant TCR 0 with bullhorns. I set it up this way when i was doing some triathlons in 2004 and my right 'brifter' stopped working. I got handlebars, bar-end shifters, and brake levers all for the price of one single brake/shift lever. This bike is quite light at around 17 and a half pounds - it was top of the line uh, 8 years ago. I'm thinking of getting a bike that has less of a racey stretched out geometry and getting one a little more comfortable like a Giant Defy, Specialized Roubaix, or Scott CR1. It might be a while before I can do that though.
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