Today, the team held a ride to Centralia via the Steam Plant. I’d never tried this ride before, so I thought it would be a great day to do it given the time available for the holiday. I’ve also been very excited about getting my training plan started for the year.
My goal was to stay low in my heart rate zones (Zones 1 & 2) for the entire ride. And all went well for the first half of the ride, but I really started feeling tiredness in my legs when I stopped in Centralia to get something to drink. I went through two large bottles during the first 30 miles of the ride.
On the way back out of Centralia and heading for home, I started to feel my legs a lot and it felt very much like my road racing experience. The feeling of hanging with the peloton followed by rapid fizzling of the legs and then a long lonely ride by myself. This happened today, after discussion with the group, and I shooed them along. I’d ultimately make my way home, but not after a lot of pain in my legs. Guess I should have ridden about half the mileage I did today, in retrospect.
There is a P.S. to the story: I had a flat right after being dropped and broke my pump in the process of pumping up the tire… “Epic” is all that comes to mind, but not in a good way!
Cheers! Andy
