Saturday, April 21, 2007

Woot for Nice Weather!

Thank the weather god for nice weather returning to DC. I was going stircrazy in general, and especially in wanting to hit some trails on my Sunday/Monday days off. Well the weather was nice, traffic wasn't too bad and so I've officially opened my cycling season (EastCoastStyle) as of Friday April 20.

I got home re-kitted out the bike, my car and myself and drove to my launch point a mile or so away from teh WOD Trail. I bombed the steps down from McAuthur Blvd near the bridge down to the trail only having to walk the 3 worst steps (GRRR!). A few adjustments later I was off down the trail. My pace at first was a nice and solid 17 or so till almost little falls. I let up a bit then and averaged down to 15 slowly by the time I hit George Town. A quick stretch break and I was headed back. I dropped down to the capital cresent and hauled ass back up the trail following some roadies, holding 17-18 for a while. A detour to Little Falls went for about 10-15 minutes of wheelie practice. Some of my better wheelies. Still can't go as far/fast as I want. But it was better. I need to work on my 1/4 crank and balance drills a bit. A quick rest stop and it was back up the rest of the way. 16.5 miles round trip in about an hour 10. Nice ride and felt pretty good.

Soon I will start loading my rides from the GPS data to Motion Based but the basic tool from Garmin isn't bad I just wish it's mapping was better (Overlay onto perhaps googlemaps instead of its own). My heart rate was solidly in zone 4 for most of the ride so I'm pleased again. (Vs when I went spinning for the first time Wednesday and was in oh zone 5 the whole frickin time).
Being able to watch my cadence/hr when riding especially on flats is very good for my training goals currently.

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