Fri and Sat training....can I have some humble pie?

We've been enjoying some awesome weather here in Flagstaff...the snow that is here is melting with these days of warmth and sunshine we've been having.

Friday we brought our bikes to the pool for a swim to bike workout. We went through our normal swim workout, and immediately after the main set hopped out and jumped straight on the bikes for 4 x 5' threshold with 2' ez in between.

The main set in the pool was 3 rounds of (4 x 50 on 50", 100 on 1:25, 200 on 2:50, 400 on 5:40) with 2oo ez in between rounds. Round one was really painful, and forced me to take the drag suit off for round two. We also pulled round two as most of us were suffering in the pool. Round three was back to swim, and then straight onto the bikes for 20 hard minutes of suffering. That was the first transition work of the year, and I could certainly notice.




We finished off the day with a 90' ez spin up towards the snowbowl (44km).

Saturday was a tough one. We rode downtown to join up for the Saturday morning group ride from the Pay N Take. Usually the ride goes out around Mormon Lake, but today we rode north out of town and towards the Wupatki National Monument.

It was 30km to reach the entrance to the park, and then a 35km descent to the bottom, with about a 2500 ft or so elevation change. The pace was high on the way out, mainly due to the fact that we had a 40km/hr tailwind behind us. After refueling at the bottom at the visitor center, it was time to start climbing back to the top. There was a fierce headwind as we started climbing, and the group slowly started to splinter. I hung in to the 30' mark of the climb, where I had to drop back. My HR was at 175, and the legs were screaming. It was at this point where the fun began. I had another hour of climbing left into the headwind, followed by another 70' ride back to the hotel room. After reaching the highway and starting the 30km trek back to the hotel, I was forced to stop for a big Pepsi, otherwise I don't think I would've made it home. The wind definitely kicked my ass today.

Total ride time for me today was 4:26, covering 129km.
Avg HR for the 90' of climbing out of the Park was 153

Hanging into the group would have been much easier, though they got a little feisty towards the end of the climb, as Colin and another local rider broke away with 10km to go or so to the top. They made it back to the hotel about 25 min before I did..

We finished off the day with a 40' trot on the treadmills over at Summit Health Center where we have memberships for the month.

I'd like to end the blog here Sunday morning with a 20 Questions video of the birthday boy Colin Jenkins