Training

It's already April and the kick off date is now less than 3 weeks.  One of the questions that I get is if I'm ready for the upcoming ride which is now less than 3 weeks away with only 2 weekends of training rides left.  Of course the answer is really, "who knows".  The closest event that I've done to riding day after day is the Arthritis Org. event that goes from S.F. to L.A.  They ride about 60 to 70 miles a day and the ride is fully supported with a gear truck and maybe the best part: a fully catered breakfast and dinner.  This is a great ride and experience that I've done in 03, 05 and 08.  So what training will best prepare my legs ready for the day after day pounding of riding 100 miles with a fully loaded and very heavy steel bike.  The answer is; I don't know!!  If anyone has any suggestions, posting a comment would be appreciated.  I did start last week riding at least 1 hour of either hill repeats or cycling class, trying to get the legs used to a hard daily workout without a rest day.  The weekends are reserved for longer, more grueling rides.  Yesterday, Felipe at Break A Way Training invited me to ride with his group climbing Palomar Mountain.  I think that I have pretty much climbed all of the significant mountains in California including Mt. Tamalpais, Mt. Diablo, Mt. Hamilton, Mt. Nacimiento and Mt. Whitney (the last on foot of course).  But living in San Diego and never having climbed Palomar just didnt make sense, so I jumped on the chance to finally take on this challenge.  At 5,600 feet high, Palomar gives you outstanding views of East County.  The climb is around 13 miles and gives you 4,600 feet of elevation gains usually at 6% to 9% with some 11s and 12s mixed in.  The weather was perfect and this turned out to be a great training ride up the South Grade and down the East Grade.  A quick word about breakaway training which is an outstanding training group in San Diego consisting of  some very elite athletes and a broad range of competitors including us weekend warriors; all of whom are very friendly and easy to spend time with.  Out with my pinarello I was hoping to keep up with the faster riders, but no such luck.  A group of 3 or 4 riders dropped me after about 4 miles, never to be seen again!! Coach Felipe is himself an elite athlete who if you are looking to improve your time in biking, swimming or running or just wanting to get in better shape, I would recommend contacting him at http://www.breakaway-training.com/.

After the climb I logged another 60 miles circling around the 76, SR 6, Lake Wohlford, Lake Henshaw, Valley Center Parkway and finally up to Stone Brewery.    The plan was to cycle from Palomar Mt. to Santa Ysable and Ramona and down to Poway and back to La Jolla.  That was the plan but I learned an important lesson along the way.  Equiped with a "tom tom" GPS device set for bicycle routing, I figured this would be a good test of the tom tom's capability to lead me through remote areas across the country if the maps that I have happened to fail me.  Relying on this GPS at times against my better judgment, I ended up riding a figure 8 around Palomar Mountain and Escondido! I did get to see Lakes Henshaw and Wohlford for the first time.  Beautiful countryside. Needless to say, I am now in the market for a better GPS and looking at the Garmin Edge 705.  If anyone has any better suggestions on GPS units, I'd like to hear from you.  Total riding yesterday 74 miles with 6,400 feet of elevation gain.  Next weekend will be the long ride, hopefully putting in 135 to 150 miles on Saturday.