Last night was my third night in a row at work where I was up all night. The two hours or so of nap that I get there and then the two to three hours I get of fitful sleep when I get home is hardly what I'd term rest. The fatigue is cumulative, and it shows up everywhere, especially on the bike. My body just doesn't want to go. Although, I have been able to hit the power marks on efforts in my training plan. The bike is also very therapeutic. Getting on it doesn't really wake me up, but it surely puts a dent in my frustrations. I'm looking forward to my next race so I can really let it out.

Heathie, congrats on the 10K!

Lack of sleep wrecks havoc. Try to catch up when you can. Lol, when I am sleep-deprived, I always get confused and mess up my intervals. Annoying.

Yesterday some V02 intervals, did them up a local hill and got some PRs.

Today was a recovery ride. I figured that would be a good opportunity to spend some quality time with the TT bike. Which BTW is starting to seem very insect like to me. This am, I referred to it as Grasshoppa and I wouldn't be surprised if this name sticks.

Anyway, I was thinking I'd do something like 10 min in aero, 5 min break. But after 5 min, I settled onto the aerobars and then just stayed there the rest of the ride, barring the few moments where I needed to brake for a stop sign or something similar. Around 50 min in aero and it felt pretty comfortable. Sweet. :)

Sweet indeed! What kind of saddle do you have on Grasshoppa, per chance?

BTW, I named my TT bike TJ....

Saddle is Oval Concepts R500T, what came on the bike. Just a fairly traditionally shaped saddle with a extra-padded nose. I am just sitting way off to the left side. But that's working surprisingly well. :)

If you can sit on it for 50 minutes, that's a good sign! I'm using an Adamo TT on TJ, and it's the only saddle I've found that I can actually "not notice". Very happy girl, me!

5 1/2 miles of ru**i*g at dinner time then 2 hrs Z2 (IF .7) on the bike this evening.

I rode the Look to work last night, and I'll reverse the course (with some add-ons) this morning. It was a decent ride with some sustained hard efforts. The route is basically up a long 3% hill (like eight miles), and then down, for a total of just under 20 miles. I TT'ed my way up, and held a fairly constant number, not too bad for not having warmed up. On the way down, I just uncorked it and flew. I had to stop briefly because I picked up some sort of wire in my back wheel and I had to get it out before it did damage. For a moment I thought I'd broken a spoke! There is a short segment where I had to get out on the freeway (!) to cross the Salinas River. There is no shoulder on the bridge, either, so I just buried myself (at 27 MPH), trying to minimize the speed differential from the cars coming up behind me. HR hit 161 on that stretch, and I felt like I had a little more to go. TSS was likely around 140, but I haven't imported it to GC to have a look, yet. Good, hard ride!

I really feel the need for a race. I do have a crit the weekend after next.

2 hour ride with my Nightcrawler friends this morning, with what was supposed to be 40 min of over/under intervals but I mistakenly did 50 min. One of my favorite routes, my favorite people and a pre-birthday muffin at coffee afterwards, this is my last Nightcrawler ride before my birthday later this week. TSS 143, IF 0.87, I'm sure it was supposed to be less.

Felt pretty mighty on the bike this am. :)

http://i771.photobucket.com/albums/x...5CDD0BD052.jpg

It's so rare to actually be able to use this in context...

:bday:

:)

And a Mardi Gras candle, no less! :)

Pretty good ride...for an old broad. :D

Hey now.

Just picking at a woman who could probably drop me at will without raising raising her heart rate. :)

Along those lines. I went to my doctor last week for my annual check up. He is awesome, an old guy though, maybe 70? Very old school, will actually badger you to take care of your health and not take "no" for an answer.

He was going on and on about my birthday coming up and all the things I need to do health-wise once I turned 50.

Um, thanks, doc. But you realize I'm not turning 50, right? Lol, its for future reference, he says.

He's a runner BTW and thinks cycling is dangerous. He likes that I've taken up cycling from a fitness perspective but would rather I switch to running. He also tried to warn me off being competitive, thinks that will just lead to injury. I tell you all this to prove he doesn't know everything. ;)

:bday: :speedy:

Happy B-Day heathpack!

I did my annual Trail Ridge Road from Loveland epic ride, a group ride with some guys who know each other from another bike forum. It was cut short by strong & gusty winds above tree line. For once I wasn't the one calling for a wind bail, but it was a good call, it was a blowing-off-the-road kind of a scene. I had a no-chain day, 97 miles, 7K' climbing up to about 10,500', stayed with the faster guys for a lot of it. I was the only chick. Best I've ever felt on that ride.

Happy Birthday!

8 miles of ru**i*g this morning and then 28 miles of hills - just for @revchuck. TSS 141

Love the no chain ride @valygrl.

Track workout this AM with a @Heathpack moment. I did my warmup and my Vector PM was working perfectly. I started my first motor paced effort and I was getting crap data from the Garmin. I tried to recalibrate but no dice. I did the effort without data other than I knew the speed of the motor.

During my rest period, I took the batteries out of the peddle pods and reinstalled them. This triggers a requirement to calibrate the pod angles which I did. The static Vector calibration worked and all was good. Battery and battery compartments on these devices are crap. I could be a simple as it was a hot morning and expansion of the battery compartment caused loss of contact or reduced voltage.

Did my second motor effort and finished off with a 4 lap pursuit style effort where I died after a kilo lap 3.

Nice one. :)

Did another VO2 max workout, actually Z6, pretty much the same as last Thursday's. My HR was about 8-10 bpm higher than usual at the start of the ride and stayed a bit higher than usual throughout the ride. The goal was to keep them over 120%, and that part went okay, but these felt harder than the first time. Planned RBI was two minutes, but I had to add a minute after the fifth and sixth intervals. I was pretty whupped afterwards; I'm usually back up to speed in 5-10 minutes, but it was more like 20 minutes at just above recovery pace this time. I was surprised how easy it was to stay above 100 rpm in Z6, which was one of the parameters of the workout.

I emailed my coach about the difference in what I thought I was going to be doing and the power level she wanted me to maintain, and she told me that that level helps increase raw power as well as aerobic capacity. Since I need both, it's all good.

This was my shortest build to date - eight days, with a five day recovery period starting today, then back at it Sunday.

She could, too. Trust me on that!

VG, that's pretty darned awesome!!

Heathie, I was going to wait until the actual date, but I'll jump on the bandwagon...

Happy Birthday!!!!:bday::speedy:

Day off today - from work and from the bike. I actually slept until 0800 this morning, that's a new record! Work starts tomorrow for another ten day/night stretch. Yuck...

*** yesterday, 1.8 miles, 23 minutes, at a PITIFUL 12:15 pace. Coach said "easy ***". It looked easy, but it hurt a lot.

Ru**i*g is for criminals... but I have to do it :(