62 Miles!

Today we had a great ride out in Fountain Hills.  It was climbing and rollers all the way.  Jake, Geoff, Kate, Ron and Joe took off hard!  We met Joe on a ride last week and he joined us this week.  Luckily he was doing heart rate monitoring today.  He had to be in low zones for his work out.  Joe's low heart rate is my high!  Good match.  Joe is training for Half Ironman Singapore in March 2011.  We will be seeing a lot of Joe over the next several months!

I was really excited to have Jake take this ride.  He loves rollers and this ride was full of them. Unfortunately, Jake's knee was still having problems. About 8 miles into the ride I see Jake in the distance.  It isn't like him to be slow.  It REALLY isn't like him to get passed by me!  His knee was acting up again from his bike fit.  Poor guy.  I know he was really looking forward to this ride. 

At the turnaround for the first 20 miles we regrouped and started back.  I was really looking forward to it.  It was down hill 10 miles back to Fountain Hills.  We make the turn and I start following Geoff.  I was going about 28 miles per hour when I feel my tire going flat!  UGH!  Ron comes to my rescue and fixes it up.  Within 5 miles, Jake's tire blows.  UGH! 

When we get back into town Jake takes off to rest his knee and the rest of us take off for the next 40. 

I felt so much better this ride of Fountain Hills than last time.  I really worked on my hydration this time.  Last time I didn't dirink much water.  This time I drained a whole water bottle within the first 20 miles.  Much better.  Nutrition is key for these long rides! 

Today was the first day we went up the famous 9 mile hill!  They just put in bike lines!  We went up 5 of the 9 miles so we could hit 60.  10 mph up and about 23 mph going down.  I managed to get some shots going down b/c the bike lane was so smoothe.  Loved it! 

I am really enjoying this break in training but my Ironman plan will start in a couple of weeks.  I have been totally neglecting my swimming and running.  I've been trying to lose weight too but no luck.  I've got to get on the ball!

Great day overall!  I feel very fortunate to be out in a beautiful place with my loving husband beside me! Awesome!

Biking

I've been biking more than anything lately.  I really enjoy it and I'm trying to have fun with all of this.  Wednesday, Ron and I woke up at 4:15a.m. to go ride up South Mountain.  Crazy i know but biking is so awesome it is worth it. 

This weekend we are going to bike around South Mountain.  That should be pretty cool.  We have never gone that way and we've been wanting to.  I'm hpping to see some of the wild horses out at Gila River.  It is pretty early and quiet so we might have a shot. 

Hopefully I can get a few pictures. 

Rough Ride . . .

Ron, Geoff, and I went on the Fountain Hills ride yesterday.  The Rosier were sporting the Big R jerseys.  The best parts of the ride were the jerseys and the views.  It was BRUTAL!  I forgot how hilly it was.  I also forgot to drink enough water.  Not my best day.  We completed 52 miles.  It was ugly but I did it.

I decided I need to go on more mid week rides.  Yes, time to start increasing my mileage. I also think we should also start a little earlier.  We were riding at 6:00 a.m. but it got hot pretty quickly.  I think we need to start at 5 or 5:30 if we are going to increase the mileage.  It is getting hot out. 

I hit a spin class today.  I hope every little bit helps.  

Silent Sunday at South Mountain

We had a great day of riding today.  Me and my boys tackled South Mountain.  It was Silent Sunday so the roads were closed to traffic.  AWESOME.  This is  a tough ride though b/c it is a 7 mile climb straight up.  I did it though!  The cutest part was that my friend Darlene hiked up the back side of the mountain to cheer us on.  I missed her going up and saw her as she was about to leave.  I almost cuased a crash but I had to get the photo!  Too cute.  I consider this a great training day! 

El Tour de Phoenix

My race today was AWESOME! Ron and I were very proud of how we did. We took about 20 minutes off our time from the 66 mile ride in November. I'm so happy to see my training pay off! I'm also very happy Ron and I found something we can do together. I love riding with him.  We finished the race in 4:46:00. We would have been faster but Ron got a flat. That added about 11 minutes to our time. Ron said he could really see my training paying off when we hit a 4 mile climb at mile 60. He usually leads up the hill but this time I lead and he was wiped out. Ron and I finished side by side. I loved it.  Look how cute we are in our matching bike jerseys!  Here are some photos from the day.   

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70 Miles! Wow! I did that?

Today me and my buddies rode 70 mile on our road bikes.  I'm so excited.  I can't believe I did it.  I got my bike in April of last year.  I could not go over 16 miles an hour, I was spent after 13 miles, and I was scared to ride down hills.  Today we averaged 16.5 miles per hour, traveled 70 miles, and my fastest time was 40.5 miles per hour going down hill.

If you really think about it, I shouldn't be able to do this.  I'm an overweight mom of two who is going to turn 40 this year.  I can't swim well and I've had a road bike less then a year.  How did this happen?  Well, anyway, enough about me. 

The ride was great.  Suzanne, Peter, Ron, Denten, and I took the 70 mile challenge.  It was a beautiful day for a ride.  Gary met us in Phoenix and rode the rest of the way with us.  We road to the end of Pecos road on the South Side of South Mountain.  I love being around the mountains.  At mile 56 I was TIRED!  Luckily we stopped and fueled up at a bagel shop.  It was just enough to get me home.  It also helped that  Gary was our pacer the last 10 miles.  He had us going 18-20 miles an hour on my hardest stretch of the ride.  Thanks to him, we kept our average speed up to 16.5 mph. 

I'm proud I did the ride.  It was a great work out.  I hope it helps with the Half Ironman! 

PS - I dedicate this ride to Judi for her 50th birthday! 

Our Weekend Ride - "Eric & the Skins"

My friend Eric does weekend up recaps of our rides. He is so great at them! I am posting here but not taking credit for his work.

I will add a couple things. (1) It was truly 'Eric and the Skins'. We had two Navajos (Ron and Derrick), a Comanche (me), a Laguna (Suzanne), and a Stockbridge Munsey (Jake). (2) It was a beautiful ride and I was so excited b/c the last time we did this ride we saw a Coyote and a Roadrunner. Unfortunately, I did see the coyote again. It was dead on the side of the road. Sad. (3) Derrick really did kick butt on this ride. When Ron and I first started there is no way we could have handled two loops. Derrick did it! He is going to be up to speed in no time.

"Eric & the Skins"
Today at 12:48pm

While riding with the usual weekend group yesterday, I rode alongside Kate for a while and we chatted a bit. She told me she was calling our ride that day 'Eric & the Skins'. I nearly crashed when I heard this name because of how funny it struck me. Turns out the entire group, other than me, were Native Americans. I received permission to use the name. I thought it was pretty catchy.

Yesterdays ride took us around the Usery Pass loop twice again. I hadn't ridden with the group in a few weeks and figured that my first ride back would be this one. This is by far our hardest ride. Lots of hill work, but very scenic. For a little extra torture, I threw in the Las Sendas mountain loop as well. Normally, this ride wouldn't kick my ass as much as it did yesterday. Saturday night, I went out with some friends to watch the UFC fights and had a couple beers. No big deal except that is was a couple more that I normal have the night before our rides. The first half of the ride, I was really feeling sluggish.

We had a couple new participants this weekend. Derrick, who is a 3rd year law student and Jake who is a 1st year. Derrick had just gotten his bike the day before and probably hadn't had time to have it fitted properly. He hunk in there and rode the whole ride. Once he gets his bike fitted to him, he's going to kick butt! Speaking of kicking butt, there's Jake (aka Kid Rocket). This "kid" is built like a cyclist; tall, thin, & lean. I rode with Jake for a while and talked to him and all of a sudden, he was gone. He started pulling away from me and I don't think I ever caught him except when he stopped for me. Oh sure, I could make all kinds of excuses; the beers, the age difference, the bike, this kid is just fast. I felt like I spent the first half of the ride "chasing the rocket".

Once we reached the 1/2 way mark and headed back out, I decided I was going to do my best to keep pace with him. We started up Usery (the easier side) and I suddenly felt pretty good. I cranked! I pulled away from the group and saw Jake trying to catch me (for a change). I told myself that I'd be OK if he didn't catch me until the top. After the top of the hill and as we started the long descent, he caught me. I felt good knowing that I was able to hold him off as long as I did. Once we got to the bottom of the hill we rode together again for a while. Next up came the biggest, steepest hill of the ride (I call it King Kong). Suddenly, the rocket takes off again. WTF? Wasn't this the same kid who was saying after we came down that hill that he'd probably be walking up it? He absolutely flew up this hill. I wish I could hate him for it, but he's a pretty nice guy and that wouldn't be right.

We all finished the ride separately but within minutes of each other. Kate & Ron hung back with Derrick which was cool of them. Suzanne, Jake, & I pulled away from them on the return Usery climb. Since Jake was so far in front of me, he missed the turn to go up Las Sendas but still made the climb once he turned around.

It seems that I have inadvertently recruited Kate & Ron to join me on my century ride. Kate mentioned it while we chatted. It would be great to have some company! I think we are shooting for December sometime. Hopefully before the end of the year!

All in all, a great day to ride. A little chilly to start, but ended with perfect weather. The rest of the day I spent with the kids and massaging my legs from trying to catch "Kid Rocket".

A horse, a goat, a coyote and roadrunner

Here is an overview of our weekend bike ride. Eric wrote this in his blog. (Ron and I decided he is as strong as a horse. He road up all those hills on a Mountain bike. He is tough!)

Our weekend ride group decided to tackle the Usery Pass loop this past weekend. You can check the route here if you like. The hills are not too shabby, a 1,660 ft climb/decent. We decided to go clockwise and atthe end of 18ish miles turn around and go back. In the group was Kate & Ron (this is Kate's idea) and a girl from Oregon named Suzanne (one of Katre's students).

We all started out together fairly strong (19-20mph), and then a big down hill (hit 39.7mph). Cool! I decided to ride my mountain bike since it has gears and my road bike doesn't. I planned to put the slicks on so I could hang with the road bikes, but Saturday when I grabbel the wheel, it had no tube. Bummer. I would have to work that much harder to hang in with them. On the first hill, I started to put a little distance between me and the pack. It wasn't long before Ron caught me.

Next hill, 4-1/2% grade for a couple miles, no biggie. We started out and Suzanne's bike decided that it liked the big chain ring better than the small. That wasn't going to work. We all stopped to get this fixed and were back on our way. We made it to the top and down the hill to our turn around/starting point. What I found interesting about the return climb is that Suzanne flew up this hill. I swear she's part mountain goat!

I didn't realize how long that big hill was until we went screaming down it (32mph max) for over 3 miles. We crouched down as to get better aerodynamics and more speed. I was crouched so long that my back started cramping. The hill that I hit 39mph coming down absolutely sucked going back up. In cycling, what goes down almost alway comes back up. We were 35 miles into the ride and it was in the upper 90's. Luckily we were near the end and could call it a successful ride. All in all, it was a great day to ride. Great group, great route, great work out.

One of the neatest parts of the ride was being out in the desert. During the ride we saw a coyote and a roadrunner. Beautiful. I think the bike rides are my favorite part of this training. We are already planning the next ride!!

Our "30 mile" bike ride

So today was supposed to be a 30 mile ride. We miss calculated. It was actually 38.5. I made a mistake by looking at the mileage on my bike speedometer before we were done with the ride. When I saw we hit 30 and still had a long way to go I totally shut down. I was SOOO tired.

We rode down Pecos road and did two loops. The normal loop is about 13 miles. The first loop we added distance by starting further out and taking some additional hills. The second loop was the 13 miler. This ride is nice b/c it has a wide bike lane, few stop lights, little traffic and very scenic. There is something cool about being out in the Arizona desert at 5:30 a.m. working up a sweat that is very refreshing.

Each week I try to send out a large invite email to friends to try to get them to join us for the bike rides. I really want to peer pressure folks into doing races with me!! It usually works quite well. I have a lot of people thinking about doing races! I love it!! Today's ride was our largest group ride to date. We had 5 riders at the beginning and 6 at the end. We usually only have 3 during our normal rides - me, Ron and Peter.

Let me tell you about my riding pack. Five of us started the ride at 5:30 (wake up at 4:30). We were all excited to get in some good training. The sixth rider (the Pro - See below) started from his house 5 minutes after we left our meeting spot and 10 miles away from us and ended up catching us before we finished the first loop. He is fast like lightening!

It is interesting for me as a girl to ride with all of these guys. I like seeing all of their personalities come out. As a self-described people watcher, I really took note of who was with us today. It was pretty easy to "name" the boys. I described my fellow riders below.

1. The Gentleman Rider - Ron (my husband) - Ron always waits for me and doesn't leave me to race the other guys. It is too cute. He never wants me to feel alone at the end of the pack. I really like that he is always looking out for me.


2. The Rabbit - Peter (Brother-in-law/training buddy) - Peter is fast and likes to take off. He then circles back and takes off again. We usually end up chasing "the rabbit" the whole way.


3. The Pro - Gary (My friends husband) - He is a cyclist. He rides to be fast and loves bikes. We really slow him down and ask him a lot of questions. He knows it all and gives us lots of tips. (Ex. After our last 20 mile ride, he rode additional miles b/c we didn't push him enough)


4. The Social Guy - Kyle (Our friend who is thinking about doing the Half IronMan with us. He just needs to sign up) - He is the social rider. Kyle is the guy who makes sure he rides and chats with every single biker on the ride. Just cute. He is a fun addition.


5. The Cool/Unique Rider - Eric (My book club friend/neighbor's husband) - He is a strong rider like Gary. Eric is training for a 100 mile ride. What makes him cool/unique is that he rode a bike with only 1 gear. He is a minimalist! The crazy think is he kept right up with all of our multi-gear bikes. There are very few bikers who can do what he did today!


6. Then there is me. I think others would describe me as - The Girl. I am the only girl trying to keep up with the guys. I am really hoping other girls will start riding with me.

Although today's ride was tough, I'm so proud of myself for doing it! I can see myself improving everyday.