Saturday Riding

Well as the race season is now at hand I'm trying to ensure I round out my fitness and get a lot of time on the mountain bike. This morning I got up early to ride at White Ranch. The early riding is good for multiple reasons; cool weather, little trail usage, and home early. I like riding White Ranch as it has a great climb that can be done multiple times and multiple options for the downhills. Considering all the climbing I did early this week I was feeling pretty good. When I rode on Thursday and Friday I was feeling dead, so was not expecting a lot on the climbs today. At the beginning of the ride I was having a hard time finding my rhythm, but about 1/2 way up the climb I started to get going and elevate the heart rate. The descent back to the base was quick (after about 35 minutes of climbing) making the second climb hard with little recovery. I stayed fairly strong but couldn't ride as much of the climb in the middle ring. Oh well the ride was good and I felt good on both the climb and the DH.

Here is a view from the top of the climb looking out over the northern suburbs. You can see North Table Mountain in the right of the picture.

Here is the Yeti with its training wheels on. I have a set of race wheels this year that drop the race weight by almost two pounds. Hopefully the training on the heavy wheels will help make me fast on race days.

I'm not sure if all the climbing training I've been doing is going to help that much in the next race. Nathrop is a pretty flat course more suited to time trials than climbing. I figure power is power though and the rest of the season is about big mountain courses so the climbing will pay off at those. Nathrop is next weekend and is the first double of the season. The cross country is Saturday and Sunday is short track, both of which count towards the season standings in the MSC. I'm hoping to do good there, finished 3rd in 2004 and 2nd in 2005; hopefully this year I can finish off the podium.