Saturday, May 8, 2010

I hate getting dropped.

I know most of my posts have not had anything to do with any sort of athletic endeavours and have focused more on sociological rants. I hope to change that but actually have to do some athletic endeavors to make that happen. I've officially changed my entry to Eagleman from the 70.3 to the AquaVelo (more commonly known as the swim, bike, and cheer flavor of triathlon) so need to start ramping up training duration and intensity.

This morning's ride had all the makings of a disaster. The weather report was craptastic with thunderstorms predicted. I was going to go with the slower LITC group that had 46 miles on the menu. They were planning on leaving at 6AM and were vowing to go unless there was a downpour. I woke up at 5am and there was only drizzle in the air. The ground was wet but the rain wasn't hard. I decided to chance it but was expecting the ride would actually be more of a have breakfast at the diner event. I realized that when you are driving in the car to meet people for a ride and the windshield wipers are on, it normally is not a good sign.

The drizzle stopped along the way but I now had to decide to wear rain gear or not. I figured that if I didn't wear the rain gear, it would definitely pour. If I did, it probably wouldn't. I wore the rain gear.

The summary of the ride is that I got tired. 46 miles at a decent pace was a little much for me at this state of fitness (given that my training has been mostly pain experiments with a very little intensity thrown in). Yes, the route was not flat (poison to fat guys) but I'm still disappointed. My power was overall OK but it tailed off. There was probably a bit of nutrition fail going on too as I felt a little crampy at the end. I got dropped near the end.

On the good side of things, it is clear that I have some work to do and what I need to focus on. The best part was that, since I wore the rain gear (and sweated like a pig), it didn't rain until the moment that I put my bike back in the car. Thunder, lightening, wrath of god, flash flood, nasty rain. Most of us were laughing because our ride was done and we didn't get rained on! Everything has a silver lining and that is the silver lining for this morning.

Lesson learned: Get to work. Race day is approaching fast.

9 comments:

Carly said...

Nice job getting out there. I am glad the rain held off until you were done.

I am taking your advice too about getting to work.

KC (my 140 point 6 mile journey) said...

Lucky you! Glad you were able to get your ride in before the deluge. Let the training begin!!

Julie said...

Thank goodness you were able to snag a little riding time before it started to rain:) You actually had a nice ride with decent distance.

Very funny about Sandra and the Gladiator:) Your comment made me laugh:) Is that your favorite guy flick?

Anonymous said...

You missed the rain - aren't you glad you manned up and got out there? Because you never know. In my mind you've earned that beer or whatever it is you enjoy this weekend.

Big Clyde said...

I experienced the same thing about two weeks ago in a race (only half of your distance!). I totally got dropped due to nutrition (and yes, some lack of training).

But you are in a recovery mode. Good for you for getting out there with a respectable distance and tempermental weather.

Looking forward to hearing more about your upcoming training. Please be careful on your injury. Remember, I think your wife made some good points regarding this (from a post a few months back).

Unknown said...

Wise call switching to the aqua bike! Glad you wore the rain gear on the ride -- that always offsets the chance of it actually raining.

Unknown said...

great that it didn't rain until you were done with the ride.

and it sounds like a good plan to switch to swim, bike.

valen said...

hi!, nice blog. and nice of you going out there to do the 46 miles besides the rain and nutrition and so on.

Tri Mommy said...

I'm glad the rain held off until after you were done. Hang in there! I can't wait to hear how the AquaVelo goes...