ride report wednesday, september 5
i'm covering the team in training hill repeats for coach don while he's on the dl, so i started from the voss avenue park this afternoon. stopped into velotech in palo alto to make a service appointment, then met tc to go uphill. got as far as portola and alpine on our way to old la honda when our phones rang sequentially. mindy was looking for us. back down alpine to find her on arastradero, then back up alpine and across portola to the left turn for old la honda road.
this is one gorgeous climb. shady redwood forest, one lane road, steady 7% - 8% grade, 1375' vertical in 3.3 miles. not too long, not too tough. my best time up that hill (25:08) was the year dave sat on my wheel and i drove myself stupid into the red. i'd been up it in 25:30 a couple times this year, but today i felt just great, so i went for it. kicked the heart rate into the 80%+ range right away and just kept turning the crank. rode most of the way at 83%, backed off a little with just over a half-mile to go, then stomped on it the last four-tenths through that crappy pavement near the top. blew past the mailboxes to the stop sign in 24:52, a new personal best, and not so stupidly anaerobic as the other time. mindy called me a beast. tc asked where that came from. easy. i overate this morning, got properly caffeinated at middday, then took 30 miles to completely warm up. i want to go again.
after that, i was ready to just take the easy route over to skylonda and down 84, but mindy told tc that we'd decided to head south on skyline and descend page mill. so that's what we did. i was tired, and did not descend well. tc pulled away in front, mindy was braking a lot behind me, and i left some rubber in the gate three hairpin. i've done better.
we took the altamont option, since i had to get over to hill repeats. left the two of them at foothill college, and hammered over to voss. caught three totally kitted-out club riders at grant road, then dropped them up the hill under 280. i am waay too ego-involved in that kind of shit. it's a growth area for me.
got back over to voss and took the team out to mt. eden. we chased daylight through three repeats, then called it a day. finished with 68 miles and probably 4000' vertical. over 3500 miles for the year now, it's a good run.
four=and-a-half weeks...
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Here's my new climbing strategy. In aviation, there's a concept called "economy climb". It's the sweet spot of power and pitch that gets you to the top most efficiently. That's what I've been working on on the bike. Patrick, you've already taught me how to make myself blow up going uphill. Now I try to keep the heart at 160-165, nice and easy. Most importantly, I'm standing up a lot less. At the 508, economy climb is the way to go for me.
I'm still smiling thinking about that descent. I wondered as we were flying down if you had time to see my huge grin in the mirror. There is nothing that I don't love about Page Mill.
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