Sunday is Funday

This past Sunday ROCKED.

I was excited to wake up to the gentle hum of cars driving by my apartment window on dry streets, instead of the dreaded "shwooosssssssh" of said cars in sloppy winter road conditions. I had gotten a great 9 hours of sleep that previous night, and woke up with both a fresh mind, and fresh legs.

On top of it all, I had cleaned my coffee maker the previous night and knew I could look forward to a delicious (and fast) pot of my favorite sanity-inducing elixir.

What did all of these circumstances mean? What was the celestial prophecy that I was being handed on this fair February morning?

I was going to ride my bike - Ride it fast, and ride it hard.

After breakfast, and my prodigiously prepared cup of java, I met up with some bad actors at the Arboretum for an 11:00 group ride. The roads were a little bit damp near the arb (and throughout), but our spirits were all high. It was good to see some familiar faces - Julio Jacabo and Kevin Berger were there. Steve "Sparky" Knurr decided to make an appearance too, which was cool since I've heard so many references to the guy, but never gotten to ride with him. David Ziehr, Yvonne, Jordan, Rachel, and Kenny completed the core of the group who I knew. A couple of other strong guys showed up for the ride too - Seth and Dan, whom I hadn't met but enjoyed riding with.

Our route took us out of Madison to Belleville, and on towards New Glarus before looping home. We hoped to get in a steady 4 hours of riding - Not bad for February. I was pleased that after a jaunt through the Arb, my legs warmed up and were kicking pretty well. I spent some time hanging out in the middle of the group, chatting with people and getting used to riding in a sizable mass of cyclists once again.

Once we got to the outskirts of Belleville, Kevin and I took the reigns. Well... Actually, Kevin plowed up a hill and I tagged on thinking I might have an opportunity to shoot the breeze with him. I was wrong. We basically pulled at tempo until Belleville, whereupon Kevin shot off with 1K to go. Thank goodness he throws a good draft, because it was all I could do to hold on and save enough juice to make a go coming around him when we came into town.

Once out of Belleville, the pace started out innocuously enough. But then somebody had to make a joke about Steve... And he responded by upping the tempo up a steep little power climb. My lungs were getting a nice warm up amidst the chilly air, but the legs felt great. We made a turn on to Hwy W, and again motored up a westward incline. Kevin and I set the pace up the next brief hill, and we wrapped around into New Glarus for some coffee and food. Ziehr pulled a wonderful acrobatic maneuver and somehow caught his fender in his spokes as we took off from the Fat Cat Cafe after refueling. Classic - But I'd probably do the same thing, so I have to cut the guy some slack.

The way out of New Glarus is where the real rubber met the road. It wasn't too long before we faced a stiff head wind, and the big guys up front (Kevin and Dan) chose to keep warm by igniting their diesel engines and pulling us all along in echelon formation. The smaller guys seemed to jostle a bit for slipstreams, and I was reminded of the impending race season. Felt great! Each hill on the way back offered an opportunity to duke it out. First, I targeted Kevin as a challenge. I'd let him rocket up the climb, and then try to close the gap before settling into a solid pace beside him. Julio decided to play ninja games with us, and sneak-attacked us near the top of a steep road. If it hadn't have been for Steve's cheer from behind, I wouldn't have known what hit me. The move caught me by surprise, but I managed to accelerate just in time. I went to shift and put in a counter attack, but my heavy winter glove missed the lever, and I only managed to hold with Julio to the top. Next time, I'll be ready.

The next series of hills offered a chance for Ziehr to strut his stuff, as he came breezing past on the lower exposure of a medium-length power-climb. Realizing that he went a bit early, I steadily upped my pace before making a move. I chose to test my limits here, and go much earlier than ideal. My acceleration felt incredible (I love my bike), and I popped through three successive gears on the way up. Unfortunately, Julio must have known my limits more than I did, and played my move to his advantage. He waited until my cadence started to drop, and then lunged from behind me, just squeezing by to take the hilltop.

This ignited a bit of competitive nature that I hadn't felt in a while, and I dug deep into my reserves to mount a counter attack. I figured that if I jumped past him over the crest of the hill, that the downhill would buy me a bit of recovery before the next slightly uphill section. My legs on fire, I made four or five hard pumps past Julio, and tucked into the quick descent. As soon as the road pointed upward again, I took to the drops and attacked a-la-Pananti up a quick rise. Once my move was done, I looked back to ascertain the damage. I saw Julio coming down the previous hill, and thought that my move had worked.

I missed Kevin in the periphery.

In Ullrich-fashion, he barreled past me and never looked back. Not far behind him, Dan provided my only hope of catching on to Kevin's wheel. Once Dan was within a bike length of me, I jumped forward to catch his wheel as he passed. A quick moment of recovery on Dan's wheel allowed me to take stock of the situation. About 30 meters ahead of us was Kevin, plugging up a ~4% incline. I figured I'd let Dan pull me up to within 5-10 meters and then make another move to attack Kevin.

I slipped by Dan's right side, in the saddle, and then lunged forward and popped up a cog to pass by Kevin. Bad move. After getting a solid gap, I totally popped. I sat up, and Kevin cruised by, closely followed by Dan. I ended up giving chase over the next few rollers, and managed to catch back on to their wheels once, before Kevin shot away from the group at the base of a descent.

A few breaths, and kind words from Kevin later, and the whole group was back together.

We got one more opportunity to duke it out, and Kevin took the prize on a quick hill into Verona.

Sparky won the Tree sprint on Seminole as we came into Madison. I think he also referred to me as "Thomas the Tank Engine," at some point. Eh... Maybe he was talking about Kevin or Dan, I'm not sure. Whatever, it was a cool reminder of my childhood.

So... What did I learn on this ride?
1) Don't attack too early... And now I know what "early" means for my maximum intensity attacks.

2) Julio is going to be a great guy to race with, and a silent torpedo to launch for points.
3) Kevin makes my legs hurt.

4) I've got a lot more confidence about my own fitness heading into next week's first collegiate race.

Time to bring it to Murray, KY.

Regards,

Thanks for reading.