transition time?

This is the time of year as the grapes are in the final stages of ripening that I've got to put cycling on the back burner. My new status as homeowner and landlord has been sucking up a lot of time and physical energy as well. Two and three day breaks without getting on the bike become more common, and the motivation to ride had is certainly in decline. Last night I summoned the energy to hop on the bike after work and I'm glad I did. I rode for about two hours and had a good time once my legs woke up. I'm trying to decide if it's worth dragging my ass up to San Juan Batista next Saturday for the Freemont Peak Hillclimb. It could be the race that takes me from my current ranking of 12th in California for my catagory into 10th or better. This has been my goal this year so I'm guessing I will. It means at least a couple more hard hill workouts - tonight included. That's the hard part.

San Ardo

San Ardo is the road race closest to my home town San Luis Obispo. It is an easy hour's drive north. The course is a twenty plus mile loop with some rollers. It's flat enough that it is considered a sprinter's course and normally the weaker categories stay together. The one other time I did this race two or three years ago there was little or no attacking and the one serious attack that went off in the last five mile of the forty five was brought back pretty quickly. This year was a different story for my category. There were five or so guys out of the twenty that were interested in establishing a breakaway to launch one attack after the other. There were at least a dozen major attacks in the first lap. Many of them in the first five miles. I got shed just past the start finish line after one of these attacks. I believe there were eleven guys or about half the field left at this point. I saw at least two more guys shed on the next roller. I briefly considered turning around and cruising back to the car, but then said to myself, "Don't be a pussy! Ride it out and finish". Which is what I did. I rode with another guy for about half the lap and then dropped him on a roller and soloed in the final ten. I was dead tired afterwards, but due to familial pressure ended up laying bricks the rest of the day and the entire day following. So much for day of rest. I ended up getting 11th which wasn't bad, and this result moved me up from 16th to 12th in the state rankings for my catagory.

bike vacation III

This was a single ride done from the Steamboat conference so technically I was no longer on vacation, but why quibble. I retraced our route of a couple days before up 38 to Windy Hill Rd and climbed most of the long gravel roads we'd descended. I spend an hour and a half climbing steadily - the last half hour climbing hard, but still didn't manage to get to the top. That is one really long climb. About 20 minutes of high speed descending and ten minutes rolling after back to the car. Andrew helped me true my rear wheel after I replaced the broken spoke, but it looks like I should replace the entire rim.
All in all a great bike based vacation with almost 20 hours of saddle time in a seven day period.