Training Routine

On tap for the weekend: Giro Ride on Saturday and a training ride on the Tour de La road course. Saturday's Giro had a huge group and as typically happens when there's a big group, the pace was fast pretty much the whole time. On the way back, somebody had a flat and a small group decided not to wait. I somehow ended up in no-man's-land between those guys and the group that waited. A couple of us finally got together and we worked the stretch down Hayne Blvd. When we got to the bridge, I turned around and rode back until I met the group. I ended up sprinting up the first bridge rather badly. As we approached the Seabrook bridge I saw Tim getting ready to go and latched onto his wheel. I made it about half-way up in a 53x16 before my screaming quads had enough. Anyway, it was a fast ride and afterward a few of us rode back the long way down Canal to the CBD and up the river along Tchoupitoulas. I think I ended up with nearly 80 miles.

A bit too much wine Saturday night, combined with sore legs and a 6:15 meeting time at the Morning Call made it hard to get out of bed, but of course I finally made it there and we headed across the Causeway to meet the Northshore riders to do a few laps of the Tour course. The plan was to ride the first lap easy so that Robin could paint arrows on the corners, and then ride the next two laps closer to race pace. There was a pretty big group - at least a dozen - that showed up for the ride.

Well, after the first turn Keith and I waited up for Robin but it took so long that we never got back with the group. Even at our slow pace, though, my legs were hurting on the climbs. This course is 16 miles of silky smooth asphalt and hilly winding roads. The terrain will be a challenge for most and it should make the road race stage pretty interesting. There are lots of opportunities for attacks and most of the course allows you to see only a short distance ahead, so it will be easy for a break to get out of sight early. After regrouping at the start of the second lap things started out fairly fast. About halfway through the lap things started to come apart on the climbs and pretty soon it was just Jay, Charlie and me. Jay was attacking all of the climbs and my legs were killing me. When we regrouped again to start the third lap, a lot of people decided they had had enough. When we finally rolled, it was just Keith, Jay, Charlie and me, but Charlie turned back after a couple of miles. We went fairly hard for about half a lap and then eased up for the last half. By the time we got back it was pretty hot and I was pretty toasted.