Life & other things

I know it's been quite a long time since my last post & I'm sorry. I am up in Atlanta for the summer doing mods on aircraft for work. The only thing bad about that is that I'm on night shift & I'm having a hard time getting a routine set up for training working that shift. Right now I'm on a short vacation visiting family & old friends. I brought the road bike with me to get some rides in, but I haven't gotten to ride as much as I would have liked to. I rode last week in Oklahoma & it was a bit hillier than I thought it was. If the terrain wasn't enough, the wind was worse. I've heard about the wind, but it's worse than the wind back home. My legs were certainly feeling it after riding against that wind. I'm in Arkansas right now visiting some old friends of mine & was able to get out yesterday & today. I'm never going to complain about the back roads in Georgia again after riding some of the farm roads in Missouri yesterday evening. They are the worst roads I have ever ridden on. I felt totally beat up after only about 22 miles on them. I was planning on going farther, but weather was moving in & I really didn't want to get caught out in it with no where to go. Today I went out & rode around on a former Air Force Base near where my friends live. The wind today was about as bad as the wind in Oklahoma, but I rode out into it for about 45 minutes then turned around & headed back. The trip back was much more enjoyable. I gave it a good hard effort for a bit,then just put it in cruise mode for the rest of the ride. I ended up doing about 34 miles today. I'm driving home tomorrow then going to go for easy rides the next two days. I'm hoping to do the Georgia State Championship Road Race this Sunday. I'll let everyone know how things go. Stay tuned for more updates.....

Computer down, that's why no posts lately

I'm sorry for not posting here lately, but my computer is messed up somehow. I can't seem to get it to register my log in when I turn it on. Well, I've been riding as much as possible here lately. I've done the group rides here with the local club the past few weeks. It's been fun. A couple of Mondays ago, I rode down the the Perry Welcome Center to see who was going to show up for an easy ride. I had ridden to & from work, so I was looking foward to taking it kind of easy. I met Steve, his wife, & another couple there. Kim & her husband Jim showed up & said that they weren't going to ride as fast as I was. I told Kim that I was there to do an easy ride, so not to worry. Kim, Jim, Steve, & I headed out on the Perry Parkway towards Hayneville. Kim & Jim were doing over 20 mph at the beginning of the ride. I looked at Steve & asked if I had heard things that they said they weren't going to ride fast. He thought the same thing. I then got to the front & slowed the pace down a bit. I told them that the only time I was going to go hard was climbing up the hill to Hayneville. We kept the pace about 18 mph till the hill. I then proceeded to ride up the hill hard. I never had the speed drop below 17.5 mph up the climb. I'm definately stronger this year. We then just did the B loop. They did the extra horseshoe, but I still had to ride home & told them to have a good time. All in all I did 50 more miles on top of the commute to & from work that day. I did intervals the next day & my legs certainly were feeling it after all was said & done. I was only able to do 5 sets, but they still hurt. That Wednesday was a pyramid workout, & my legs felt even worse than after the interval workout. Thankfully the rest of the week was all easy rides. The following week I decided to do the local group rides. I went on the Tuesday ride & after the first climb, Jesse was with me & told me we had a gap on the other riders. He asked me what I wanted to do & I replied "Make them earn it" & proceeded to keep a steady pace from there on. I caught the earlier group not too long after the silo & was never caught after that. Wednesday was a tempo ride & ended up doing about 2 hours on the bike. I did the Thursday group ride. On the hill into Hayneville I got a gap on the rest of the group & just went with it. I saw them getting closer in Elko, but once I turned on Elko Rd, I had a tailwind & was able to pick the pace up. I saw a rider up ahead of me & it turned out to be Eddie. We hooked up on the horseshoe part of the ride, he pulled me the rest of the way, but we never were caught. My legs were really feeling it after that ride. I took Friday off to recover. This past Saturday, Shane & I drove up to Cumming to pre-ride the race route for May 10th. We got up there & it was raining. We drove the route once to get an idea what it's going to be like. The beginning of the route is going to be tough. It's all up & down. The rest of the route isn't anything I haven't seen before. We drove back to the start & were going to ride the route when it started raining again. We drove the route one more time to familarize ourselves with it. Yesterday I did a tempo ride to Perry & back. My legs felt good the entire route. Today was intervals. I did 6 sets of 5 x 5's & my legs are certainly feeling it. I'm glad I get to take it easy the rest of the week. I'm looking forward to racing this weekend. I'm going to give it my best shot & we'll just let the chips fall where they may. Stay tuned for a race report next week.....