Longest Ride of the Season

Well, it's hard to believe that I did my longest ride of the season last saturday, and it was only 70 miles. So much for training hard early in the season to be strong for Fitchburg.

All in all, last weekend was the best training weekend so far. Did a nice hill climb on Friday - climbing up East Mountain Road in Killington to Killington Peak and then back down the access road and up Killington Pass. It was hard at points (my cadence was probably at 20 for too much of the ride), but once we got to Killington, my thoughts were: gee, that wasn't that bad.

On Saturday, it was a leisurly ride from Pittsfield to the Warren Country Store, where we promptly pigged out on all the awesome food there. The way back is fairly flat to downhill, but there was a fierce headwind (I think there are only headwinds in VT) and I managed to TT with Jamie from Rochester back to Pittsfield - dying out on the slight hill right before Pittsfield (damn hills, need to work on those still!). So awesome to draft behind someone going fast - so much easier than going fast alone.

Sunday was my team's mountain bike race out in Dalton, MA. I was registered to race beginner, but didn't really plan to race. I'm really glad I did! Sol and Jamie convinced me to do it, and the course was not nearly as bad as everyone made it out to be last year (of course they did eliminate one crazy hill). I expected the rocky, rooty, gnarly trails of the Fells, Lynn Woods, Hinesburg State Forest, but it was not at all like that! I managed to bike over ALL of the bridges, save two (one had two planks and the other came up after I had broken my chain). I never bike over the bridges - and there was one with big mud puddles on either side that made it look impossible - good thing I had some people to follow - helped me realize what was bikable and what was not. I broke my chain at around mile 5 and had to walk out the last 3 and only finished 30 minutes after the leader in my age category - all in all, an incredibly successful race for me. I did awesome on the uphills - managed to pass most of the girls, but then got crushed in the technical and downhill sections (still can't make left turns). So, I may actually consider doing another mountain bike race. I was really surprised that the other girls weren't all that fast - I'm so used to riding with Sol, Jamie, Nicole, Bradley and all the other super fast people that can bike over anything - I get so discouraged. Now I'm encouraged and am looking forward to a weekend of biking up at East Burke on the finely groomed Kingdom Trails.