This Week is Like a Pixies Song

Soft...HARD...Soft...HARD..

Tuesday went offroad with friend Lysanne, taking her on the trails for her first MTB experience, and Thursday was out to Sidney with Gillian (who has totally neglected her blog!) for some more Over/Under efforts. Saturday will be an easy-ish spin on a OBB Ride (redux), and Sunday will be a race. Not sure which yet, if it's sunny, out to Caleb Pike on the road. If it's rainy, i'm hoping to get out to Port Alberni for the Island Cup XC #2 race.

The PA terrain is....interesting. I heard two years ago the mud was INSANE. Last year i raced, first race of the year, and it was a hilarious exercise..unfortunately i didn't blog about it, but it was pretty muddy too. We went for a pre-lap ride. Had well over an hour, someone told us laps would be ~40mins.. 55ins into the pre-ride and i was getting very nervous...no idea how close to the end we were, and the race would start soon! We made it back to the startline just in time to start!! I pulled into my section, the race started, and i pulled off to the right where the cars were parked - put on my racing gear, grabbed some food, and bolted!! Somewhat luckily, the race bottlenecked right away, so 2mins in i was already passing the people at the tail-end... Unfortunately that meant waiting a lot to get around others.. Finally got into an open spot and powered away...somehow finished 3rd in Intermediate, i think the lap times were nearly 50min and did 2x...owwie.

So we'll see what happens this year.. Apparently on the course, you have to literally cross a section of the trail, and downhillers are expected to give way to climbers...that'll be interesting..haha..

Tuesday - MTB

It was a pretty relaxed ride, i decided that i could go easy today with the race on Sunday. Don't want to elevate my TSS too much and burn out again.l

Lysanne took to the trails well, was quite intuitive, and able to both climb and descend technical terrain very quickly! If someone were to take her out 2-3 more times, she'd be pretty much ready to race! *hint hint* *nudge nudge*

We first spent some time in the TTA at Hartland, then did the XC race course, then went up Switchbacks (she broke a chain!), and back down WYDaddy, Nightshift and Skull. Pretty impressive for a first time effort.

Garmin map data here: http://connect.garmin.com/activity/27214582

And WKO+ 3.0 data here: http://docs.google.com/View?id=dgdbj3nx_29gmcw3q9s

I imported my Garmin Edge500 power data into WKO for the first time, and for some reason each lap was 'cut off' at the end, excluding a lot of data per lap - anyone have any idea why it would do this? Not a big deal as i can create my own ranges if it really mattered...but it kind of eliminates some of the usefulness of the lap feature!

Thursday - 4x O/U in Sidney

Headed out to Sidney with Gillan and Emile. Emile ended up taking off to maintain his own pace, and we headed out to Sidney. As always, nice to have company, and also to catch up, chat about music, etc..

Intervals weren't quite up to spec, especially the latter two...but in my defense it's always harder to do these efforts on 'flats', not to mention the terrain is constantly shifting..and there were several distractions such as corners, etc.. I'm happy with them overall, but need to try and keep more pressure on the pedals.

Legs felt pretty good tho, and i did manage to keep the cadence up, here's a brief summary, each is 8mins (2min Under (265w), 1min Over(350w), 2min U, 1min O, 1min U, 1min 0):

#1

Ave Wts: 292

Ave HR: 176

Max HR: 187

Ave Cad: 100

Ave Spd: 34.6

#2

Ave Wts: 290

Ave HR: 177

Max HR: 188

Ave Cad: 100

Ave Spd: 36.2

#3

Ave Wts: 276 (YUCK!)

Ave HR: 175

Max HR: 185

Ave Cad: 100

Ave Spd: 36.7

#4

Ave Wts: 284

Ave HR: 175

Max HR: 187

Ave Cad: 100

Ave Spd: 37.4

I'm wondering if the speed is throwing me off a bit.. I've done these almost exclusively uphill, so used to much slower speeds..i wonder if i'm easing off mentally because i'm sustaining a good speed..hmm..

Another difference is that i'm maintaining 75-100w during my 'rest' periods (4mins), where-as on the Observatory it was virtually zero, since i was coasting downhill..my HR is getting down to the 120's, so decent recovery. Ahh well, prolly just gotta HTFU. =)

Here's the Garmin map details: http://connect.garmin.com/activity/27372409

And here's what WKO spit out: http://docs.google.com/View?id=dgdbj3nx_30c87r65cv

Climbing

Haven't really mentioned my climbing, took off Mon & Wed this week, hand has been sore, did something to it on the MTB ride, planning to go tonight tho.

I accomplished a couple major goals tho! Last week i finally cleaned the 'big rock' 11a overhang that i've been working on - very happy with that. Also, there's a 10c/d that i cleaned that night as well that had been giving me some grief (tricky section in the middle).

There's a new route that was built, a very long, windy one (actually *loses* altitude in one spot!), very slight handholds..i can climb it, but not in one go..that'll be a fun project. It's currently unranked, but i'd say at least 11a, while others were saying 10d. We'll see tonight. ;)

Should be a fun weekend - i'm hoping to do the road race, i feel like i'm stronger on hills now, so this will be a good test. In the past, i've been able to hang in with the A pack for about half the race, and then end up getting dropped..we'll see how it goes today. It's actually been nearly two years since i've raced this course (i didn't make it out last year.) Fingers crossed to finish with the bunch!

Oh, if you're reading this, lemme know if you're checking out the mapping and power data, etc.. Is it at all interesting??

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