Daily Grind

Time to integrate the Moots into daily grind. Much of my ride will be daily grind. Ride, eat, sleep, rinse, repeat.  Hopefully rinse.

Commuting on my Tricross is easy.  Throw everything into panniers, slide the panniers into position on the luggage rack, and go.  I thought of migrating the pannier to the Moots but for now I need to learn the new cargo holds.

First things first, gotta look decent at the office including shower and deodorant.  Pack that into a bag for convenience.  It, a bike lock, and rain hood fit easily into the trunk bag.












Next up the odds and ends that need to be more easily accessible.  These include multitool, first aid kit, tire levers, ear warmers, glasses, head lamp, fingerless riding gloves, and plenty of calories.  All of this fits into the frame bag with room to spare.

The ride in was uneventful. One standout is slower pace. Turning the 29ers takes more work and is currently slower. I have a new appreciation for jeep engines when subjected to oversize tires.  My normal casual 33 minute ride took 37.  There is some real training to happen here.  I still need to migrate a rear facing red blinky for road riding.

Days are getting longer.  I had enough daylight for a quick trip through the Cisco mountain biking trails after work but before commuting home.  The 29er is a lot of tire.  It eats up trail obstacles.  Unlocking only the front fork rolled easily over rooty terrain.  I am still loose on handling so I skipped riding the narrow planks.  Lincoln, the bike builder, did a great job getting a low granny gear as requested.  With a little practice the Moots will be a great trail machine.  I peaked out the trees into the setting sun to start the commute home.  Conveniently I finally found a route home that includes all greenways and bike lanes. It's a bit longer to start with and I made it even longer to get more miles.














This is a wrap on January.  To get 2700 miles before June I need 540 miles per month.  I hit 470 in January.  It could be better but not a bad start at all.

Monday I forwent riding for recovery and for specialized training, namely stairs.   I did around 1400 stairs.  At 5" per stair that is only 500ish feet of climbing but boy was I feeling it.  I need to interleave more stairs into my days, possibly do stairs at duke stadium on the weekend, and really look for more climbing.  Several training tips say "Climb everything you can find. Then climb it again."

Settling In

Saturday was a long day of exciting newness.  New isn't always exciting in a positive way as my sits bones and can attest.  I slept great Saturday night after 63 miles, 4k calories, and some Vitamin A.  Sunday morning was still rough. This is training though. Start learning to press through in the safety of home. I still felt chilled from last evening's late finish. I pushed through the cold to finish up rather than stopping to re-equip.  I'm chasing the proverbial "fast twitch warmth" that many athletes describe.  I see it on the trail - Saturday morning I was bundled up complete with balaclava passing runners in shorts and tank tops.  So far fast twitch warmth is just a farce to me.

I had ambitions of breakfast at Guess Road Starbucks again.  I checked the "local weather" on my iPhone running iOS 4 and it volunteered 54 degrees. I was skeptical.  The last updated time was current. Saturday still appeared at the top of list rather than Sunday.  I flipped through to other cities where I track weather and they showed more correct and believable information.  Even my static Durham entry showed the anomalous information.  I disabled the local weather feature, deleted Durham, saved changes, then added Durham back and got the cold hard truth: 34 degrees. I wimped out and headed downstairs for hot coffee and hot egg white omelet breakfast. I followed that up with more dietary indulgence.  Feasting really fires up my internal furnace.

I finally got out the door and logged some miles before Rebecca finished her 18 mile long run.  After working out the kinks I was looking for short effective training.  I found a couple sources.  First I found a powerline right-of-way in Woodcroft that ascends nearly one hundred feet vertical in 0.3 miles. This will be great training... when it's dry.  Today it was still wet, very wet.  After washing the bike this morning I promptly went mudding again.  It performed well enough but I did spin out while climbing.  Mud + steep + bad pedal stroke = spinning = stuck.  So I did a bit of hike a bike.  At the top I felt bad for tearing up the hill.  Those Nano Rapters dug down and through roots depositing them on the frame and shifters.  I will be back for more climbing practice but only when it's dry.

Then I connected up with the ATT again.  In the absence of hills anything that creates steady resistance is good practice.  Head winds are the first recommendation from most cyclists.  Personally, I have an affinity for soft surfaces.  I learned a great many things about running mechanics in high school running in the sand at General Coffee State Park.  Along the sides of the ATT there is a good two inch deposit of pea gravel.  Riding through that is constant work. The softer surface sucks power and momentum.  It also pitches left and right requiring constant re-balancing.  I rode in this for around three miles.  I got may strange looks but also a great workout.  Ahh, the ATT it just keeps on giving.  Kudos to Durham for the Open Spaces programs.  The only thing missing is more bathroom stops. 

Rebecca and I both had issues with trail rest rooms this morning. I rode the south side on Saturday partially to scope our restrooms for her Sunday long run.  She knew where they were and planned accordingly.  Unfortunately the buildings were all locked.  Bathrooms on the south side and north side of the ATT stayed locked until well after noon.  We owe Durham parks and recreation a communication.

Solite Park along the ATT afforded my first chance at single track on the Moots.  Solite has a very short mountain bike trail and a Pump Track.  The mountain bike trail was long enough to be exciting.  When it dries out a bit more I think I could run loops in it and pack out a very smooth fast flowing trail.  The Moots first run on single track was not unlike doing slalom with a school bus.  I managed to avoid hitting trees and sliding out in muddy corners long enough to work up an ear to ear grin.  I hope to visit this little trail more in the future.  For the time being Rebecca was done with her workout and it was lunch time.

More miles followed lunch and a short nap.  I did visit the northern terminus of the trail only closer to dark than daylight.  Enroute home I felt like the Moots and I finally started integrating.  I was working, it was performing, and together we were headed southbound.  In my mind we were flying along setting record time.  Mark Calaway used to tell me perception is reality.  I perceived I was flying along. Reality unfortunately did not agree. I usually recognize this high feeling the "evil zone 3" that is the bane of any good training program.  Training is generally done best really easy or really hard.  Todd Spain offered quite possibly the simplest explanation: "Zone 3 is hard enough to require Zone 4 recovery time but without Zone 4 fitness benefits".  Zone 2 requires virtually no recovery time.  Translated for my personal endeavors it means if I'm comfortable then I'm doing it wrong. I always have to work at Zone 2.  It's not fast enough to setup a harmonic.  Zone 3 is "comfortable".  Zone 4 is working but with blinding excitement for as long as it lasts.

Anyways, my "flying along" was more the result of heart rate than actual speed.  Garmin stats bear this out:




I don't know what that 200+ at the beginning is all about. 160 = too hard = Z3. Data:
http://connect.garmin.com/activity/145759568

The Z3 did pay off in getting me home before it got really dark.  There is a hill on Juliette that offers beautiful sunset views.  I missed the sunset but caught a beautiful collage of blue, pink, and yellow at dusk.



This weekend is a wrap with:
Count:    4 Activities
Distance:    115.68 mi
Time:    11:02:07 h:m:s
Elevation Gain:    4,127 ft
Avg Speed:    10.5 mph
Avg HR:    133 bpm
Calories:    8,198 C
on the new Moots.  Now I need to reel that into one day.  It's great to have the calorie burn back. Bring on the pizza!