Time Trials along Marine Drive

Wednesday evening ride 34 miles - Time Trials along Marine Drive

This ride was pretty non-eventful, which can be a good and a boring thing.
I realized I had highly under estimated the wind chill factor and became cold rather quickly standing around in my Pearl short sleeve jersey with arm warms; waiting to start with the group. Thankfully super Lindsay came to the rescue and let me borrow one of her cycling jackets. I must return the favor with a beer, that jacket saved me the first 20 mins of the ride. I knew starting out, this ride would be challenging. My warm up along Marine Drive on the bike path I was doing an effortless 19-20 mph high cadence spin. This meant heading back I would be facing a great deal of headwind. Oh joy! (Please note this is sarcasm). We reach the part of the ride where the bike path disappears and we hit the road, time to start time trials. Woot! Woot! Bring on the pain. Took me a good 2-4 mins to get my HR up to target 183. I then held 183-186 for 3 mins. Damn this never gets easier. My legs burn trying to push the speed (23-25mph) and keep my HR in the anaerobic zone. It was rather chilly and the cold air (what I could actually process) hurt my lungs. One down....3 more to go. I recovered for 2-4 mins and then hit it again. Ugh, this feels harder then the last! But alas I conquered. The next recovery lasted a little longer since we were starting to approach the airport...I just decided to wait and hit the last two coming in battling the head wind. Not sure how good of an idea this was. Recovery was probably 10 mins and then I pushed forward yet again. Oy! It was hard to get my HR that high again, my legs started feeling fatigued. I was pedal mashing trying to push the power while fighting the wind, now only doing 18mph, I seriously felt like I was trying to ride into a straight wall. Somehow I managed to keep my anaerobic zone for 4 mins. I think the wind might have had me in a time warp or something. Just one more little interval to go. Just one....can I do it? I had a bit of doubt but once I went at it I couldn't allow myself to fail, I just pushed forward. This one was absolutely the worst. I was tired, my legs hurt, my lungs hurt, the wind hurt.....in case I haven't made myself clear I was one hurt kitty. But fail? I think not....maybe muscle failure by the end of the ride but believe you me I triumphed over those damn intervals. Thank GOD Kyle came along for the ride. He stayed with me during the intervals and helped pace line on the recovery home. I'm usually stuck out along Marine Drive alone at the end...it was really nice to have someone to help block the wind and suffer the last bit of pain with. The last might of Marine Drive my HR was a constant 165 and I was only going 14-15mph.

My post recover meal was FANTASTIC. I had my chocolate Endurox shake and a new creation I like to call Black Forrest Delight. It's a 10 grain pancake batter I layer in a bread loaf pan, top with mozzarella, black forest ham, and sugar free jelly, then more ham, mozzarella and batter. Bake it up like bread and eat it as a sandwich, good stuff!

I got home took some magnesium, melatonen (sp?) and rolled my legs. I managed to escape restless leg syndrome. Yay me!