the long route...

Sunday morning:

Ok so Kristen & I needed to get in a long biking training ride of a minimum of 3 hours especially since last Sundays ride was a thunderstorm washout day for that. So during the end of last week I found this organized 1 day Bike Tour in Porter County Indiana that starts in a town named Chesterton which is not that far from Lake Michigan and a lot of rolling 2 lane farm roads…so below is the link to the event:

http://www.vnaportercounty.org/LoriesRide%20online%20brochure.pdf

So were drove down early Sunday morning to register for the ride as we pre-determined to ride the 63 mile loop since it was the closest distance wise to the half IM bike ride portion of 56 miles. To this date the farthest distance we have ridden is 42 miles 3 weeks ago so this was the next step in biking endurance building. Also we were both testing out fluid and nutrition plans for the biking portion of the half IM to fine tune those needs. So we headed out on our bikes from the middle school that was kind enough to host the ride event around 7:20am and hooked up with another local rider that was riding the 63 mile loop for training to the Louisville Ironman event whom just happened to race the Steelhead 70.3 last year.

As always I planned to ride with Kristen the whole distance as she held a fantastic pace for herself especially with the rolling hills in the region. The 63 mile loop took us west for a couple miles then northward to the roadway that turns and runs eastward parallel to the beaches of Lake Michigan where the first of three food/drink stops were located at mile 15 for a nutrition pit-stop. After a 5 minute quick break (we could hear thunder in the clouds out & over the lake) we headed back eastward for several more miles before turning southward on the rolling roadways. Here is where we experience the rain storm for the day for about a 5 mile section before it stopped a couple miles till the next food/drink stop. We stopped here for about 10 minutes this time because the warm sunlight felt really good after the rain chilliness plus the food was a good bonus too! As we then got back on the road southward the three of us were warming up quickly as the humid sunshine was on us with force since this region of Indiana is really all crop farmland with a lack of trees for shading.

After a few more miles of heading south we then turned right to head back westward into a decent wind out of the northwest. I helped out at that point with the pacing as K needed a break from leading into the wind but her energy returned quickly and she was back at the front within a couple miles. Then after a few more miles we turned northward towards Valparaiso, IN where the final food/drink stop was located at mile 50. We stopped for about 10 minutes again as we refueled with foods and a little extra water but by this point I was more than ready to get rolling again as the temperatures were quite warm at this point. Heading thru and northward out of Valpo’ this is where the hills were the most obvious but K pushed on with a very solid pacing effort. From about mile 54 thru 60 this is where I kinda went thru a "funk" feeling which is not at all similar to a bonk but you just feel tired. Even with all the proper electrolyte/carbo-load, water and food I ate I drank more & ate more then that feeling went away.

Kristen led us into the middle school parking lot with a very solid ride time of 4:12:03 which is a pace of 15mph for the 63 mile ride…great job…woohoo!!! My average HR was at 89bpm with a max HR in a hilly section of 121bpm. My average cadence was quite low at 76rpm which is much too low of a cadence but it didn’t feel that low at all and my max cadence as at 114rpm at some point. The ride was a very low level one if that for myself but it still tired me out completely until I ate some more food at the post-event stop in the school and Kristen said she felt the same way also. Plus riders were able to take showers in the school which definitely made you feel better and more recovered also.

Now were feeling much better knowing that we have ridden the distance of a half IM bike portion and then some via this great training ride

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