Strava: http://app.strava.com/rides/12398371
I have a confession: I'm not particular fond of riding on days when Shannon and Galen come out together...especially on windy days. Today was one of those days.
It all started out innocently enough as we made our way down to the bike trail on CA. I even led the guys down only to look back and see they weren't following too closely. If only I got the light where I could have broken away for a while so I can ride at my own pace vs. theirs. No such luck.
When we got on the bike trail, the pace picked up pretty fast. I forget who was up front leading in the beginning (Hiroshi and someone else), but then Shannon got up to the front and then I think Jeremy. As we dropped down to Back Bay, Shannon was again up front where from the back, I had some momentum and pushed my way up to the front to relieve him. I think Galen, Vin and Jeremy came around amped it up enough splintering the group a little already where I had to work just to chase them down. Galen broke away at the end of Back Bay as though he wanted a KOM for that segment, but I knew there was just way too much wind where giving chase would be a death sentence.
I did make my way past and led us onto the bike trail over by the mobile homes, but was relieved by Shannon and others as we made our way to Bayside. Once there, we were all caught at the left turn light, but Vin and Shannon got the go ahead of us from having gone to the crosswalk. Once the left turn light turned green, Galen was in chase mode and we all just lined up behind him.
Galen was definitely working to catch Shannon and Vin and appeared to have been making some ground, but not consistently since Shannon seemed to be ratcheting it up as well ahead of us. I thought about relieving Galen, but it was hard enough just staying on his wheel so passing him when he wasn't slowing down seemed futile. No one else behind me seemed too eager either since they, too, stayed in line behind us.
Going through CDM, we finally caught up to Shannon and Vin just before the little kicker hill that leads over to Ocean. Jeremy took off up the hill, so I chased him and sat on his wheel all the way through Poppy. The other guys had fallen off for a bit, but we were all caught behind some cars on Poppy so we regrouped at this point.
Back on PCH, Jeremy had a little head start but we were able to reel him back in and Galen led us over onto NPC. Once there, Jeremy launched a major attack and broke away early on (way to go!). I was hoping to get some off the seat training there and doing so allowed me to get past the others (except Jeremy) but only temporarily. When Shannon and Galen came by, I thought I'd try spinning up with them...big mistake, Indy. I watched the two slowly pulling away from me, and all I could resort to was spinning at a shorter gear that I normally do. It looked like Shannon and Galen ended up catching Jeremy up ahead, but I was too far back to really know for sure. Thankfully, they waited at the San Joaquin light where we were all able to regroup.
On the downhill, Jeremy led the assault and had even gapped the rest of us for a bit, but Galen was able to reel him back in eventually with me in tow. As Galen was starting to make his way by him, I came around and wanted to see just how fast I could spin that compact crank. Hitting a speed of 46.1 mph, I was spinning the hell out of that crank at 129 RPMs (confirmed by Mike Sherman's bicycle gear calculator...ha ha). Boy was I winded at the bottom.
I led for a little after that light, but fell to the back of the pack and stayed there until I could recover more. As we neared the McArthur light, Vin and Galen started to break away and sprinted to make the green light. I stayed on long enough just to be able to make it across, but was gasping after. I was wanting to give the condo a try, so I backed off a lot. Jeremy came around and offered a lead out, but I told him I was still recovering and couldn't hold the pace he wanted to set for the lead out. Shannon came around as well where I went onto Jamboree just behind the 4 of them. I did have to check up a little since Vin was just ahead of me where there was some cross traffic present rendering it unsafe to go wide. Once I got going though, I made my way past the guys early and although they cheered me on, I ran out of steam about 3/4 of the way up and decided it just wasn't going to happen.
I kept going past Bison and down Jamboree and on University, Galen and Jeremy had caught up to me. Galen past me just as I was checking out this hot Asian runner chick on the sidewalk. Galen lead us out after, but I was having a hard time staying on his wheel. Fortunately, I wasn't too far behind when we got on CA.
As we ascended, I didn't have a lot left and still kept hanging onto Galen's rear wheel as we climbed up the hill. I did finally relieve him half way up, and as I was up front, was also working to catch my breath in case anyone wanted to get nutty just before Bison again. I sprinted off on the last rise in case they did, but no one followed.
Vin ended up catching us at the light and in typical Vin fashion, taunted me for a sprint. I didn't mind blowing myself up so I took off but he didn't even go with me. Boo!
Great training ride just before the holiday celebration tomorrow. I hope I have some left for my ride down to San Diego, but if I don't, I'll just look for little Korean church girls to give me bottles of water on the way. Thanks, gents!
No comments:
Post a Comment