nice to bike...

Thursday evening:

I headed out to Elk Grove for the cycling group repeats for the evening a little early last night to get in about 13 miles solo effort before the group showed up to ride to get in my last quality ride in before the serious taper kicks into effect. The temps were quite nice with a strange wind that seemed to be always changing direction but I was up for the extra resistance challenge of it. I noticed the roadway paths were re-paved over the course of the week so now the Tour of Elk Grove is all set to go on smooth roadways. The weekend of August 1st thru 3rd next month and they use this park of the roadway area for the Friday early evening Time Trial and some of the crit races are held here also. http://www.tourofelkgrove.com/

Back to my biking training it was actually a very good ride night for me especially when it came to the repeat portion plus I kept my pace up on the recovery portion to maintain a good overall pace for the ride time. I got in 14 repeats that ranged in distances from ~6/10th of a mile to one mile which my repeat pace range being anywhere from ~23.5mph to 28.1mph. Below I have listed 3 of my top repeats for the night which includes distance covered, time it took, average & max speed, average & max HR values plus average cadence:

.939 of a mile – 2:10 – 25.9mph average – max 30.6mph - AHR 134bpm – MHR 145bpm – 101 rpm
.694 of a mile – 1:29 – 28.1mph average – max 31.9mph - AHR 139bpm – MHR 153bpm – 103 rpm
1.025 of a mile – 2:20 – 26.2mph average – max 30.9mph - AHR 136bpm – MHR 145bpm – 104 rpm

My total ride time out their last night was 1:46:02 as I covered 35.5 miles at an average rate of speed of 20.1mph with a max speed obtained during a repeat at 33.6mph. My average HR for the ride was at 125bpm with a max ride HR of 154bpm during a repeat plus my average cadence was great at 98rpm and a max of 119rpm at one point.

I held back my intensity during the whole ride duration since its really a taper week for me as the half IM is approaching quickly but I still got in a quality workout on the bike. I maintained a good average speed and great cadence to help flushout my running legs from the previous nights mile repeats and to help simulate climbing hills at the Steelhead bike course.

Now I feel prepared especially for the biking portion of the half IM…plus above I have included my techy Polar graph chart from last nights ride :-)

b