Hermes

Every surfer knows that wind ruins waves. The trick is to have storms generate the waves but surf early in the morning before the wind picks up and blows them out. Surfers spend more time driving from beach to beach looking for ideal smooth waves than actual surfing.

globecanvas

Sounds like rock climbing. The time ratio of prep/approach/walk-off to actually performing the sport is ridiculous.

Racer Ex 

Two words:

Moto GP.

45 minute race. 15 hours minimum before. Not including travel or off season sponsor hunting.

happybday29475

Also white water kayaking, and windsurfing/kite surfing. All great sports that I gave up because of the high hassle factor.

Oh yeah, and snow skiing. Nobody goes anymore, it's too crowded.

Heathpack 

Or a spinal tap.

Exam, pre-anesthesia bloodwork, pre-medication, setting up for procedure, anesthesia induction, clipping, prepping, anesthesia recovery: 4 hours
Actual time to collect the spinal fluid sample: 30 seconds

happybday29475

yeah...hours and hours of set-up for only 30 seconds of joy...who would do that?

Hermes

How about things that seem to go on forever that require little preparation?

Root canals

shovelhd

I did about 62 miles and 4800 feet around the Quabbin race course with the club today. This was the longest and most difficult ride I've done so far this year and I felt it. With 5 miles to go, up an 8% grade, my legs said "No Mas" and I dropped off the lead group. It's been a while since my legs were stabbed with knives. Great workout though. Tomorrow I am working the Mystic Velo crit, my first as a Cat B. Watch me screw the whole thing up.

Heathpack 

First experience on the track.

Verdict: That was very very cool.

I'm in the back, I'm supposed to be drafting off these guys but wasn't sure about getting too close to anyone else quite yet. Still trying to wrap my head around the "no brakes" concept.

Amazed I did not fall off the track and that the efforts did not seem that taxing. But mostly it was cool. Wait, did I already say that?!

happybday29475

Awesome. That makes me happy.

Hermes

@Heathpack Looking good and riding at the relief line woohoo.

Heathpack 

I was glad I got to go up to the relief line. Apparently you don't necessarily get to do that on day 1. I was the only total newby. Overall there were just 3 of us, so it was a sweet instructor to student ratio. The guy leading our "paceline" in the video is an experienced track guy just helping out. So there were two instructors, really.

Anyway, I think we got to do more than most beginner sessions. Made it more fun.

Hermes

I think you did terrific. Many new riders do not even get on the banking in the pole lane and must ride on the apron trying to get used to fixed gear no brakes with Andrew riding next to them. So you get an A for your first day at the track on a fixed gear. Bravo. And it is perfectly acceptable to ride off the person in front until you are more comfortable. In time, you will close the gap.

And you will quickly get used to no brakes and soon will prefer riding that way in close formation. You will learn to anticipate moves and modulate your speed by using the banking and the wind as well as letting your legs float or by the use of slight back pressure.

Here is the graduation pic from my certification class showing how steep that track is and how high the relief line is above the deck.

beatlebee 

Wow, I never realized how steep a velodrome is.

Heathpack 

In the curves (where the @Hermes pic was taken), the banking is 47 degrees on this particular track- they are not all this steep. Standing around talking before you get started, you look at that and feel like there's a decent chance you will be the person who does it wrong and slides off the track. Its a good thing that things happen fast when you're out there- you follow your instructor and next thing you know you're doing it. Because this is a situation where thinking about it too much is not a big plus.

Velo Sports Center is one of the top (maybe 15?) tracks in the world (I think that's what they said). That was one of the things that made me decide to try it out. It seems a shame to have access to it and not try it, given the fact that most of humanity could not regularly get to a track of this quality.

Bandera

Agree, you are very fortunate to have such a fine facility with quality instruction at hand.

You'll find that riding the track will give you a definite advantage over those who are one dimensional 'roadie-only'.
The confident bike handling, positioning, re-wired central nervous system and emphasis on real speed are well worth the disciplined effort of riding the track.

Well done.

-Bandera

Heathpack 

Oh and I forgot one of the best parts of the story.

When we got there, the US women's pursuit team was out on the track, the ones who just won the world championship a month ago. They had the track session before ours and I got to watch one of their practice efforts standing on the apron with the instructor explaining to me what was going on. Eventually Sarah Hammer rolls up to say hi to the instructor. So of course he introduced us and got a 'good luck and have fun in your first track session' from a reigning world champion. Auspicious start. Maybe that's why I didn't slide off the track.

Voodoo76

Excellent first day! Jealous, I was supposed to head over to Alkek today but getting rained out. You will find fixed gear becomes second nature pretty quickly.

Heathpack 

Well for having our sail trip ruined by these crazy winds, I wound up having a pretty good weekend on the bike.

Considered scouting the Lake Los Angeles TT course again, but we're having 15-35 mph winds gusting to 45 mph and the TT course is in an area substantially windier than where I live. That did not seem like fun.

So I decided to do the "easy" group ride, which was 50 miles/2500 ft of climbing. "Easy" is in quotation marks though, because the route is 25 miles out at a slight (1%) uphill straight into that headwind. Then 25 miles back along the same route. The return leg, back along that same 25 miles but downhill with a tailwind and a paceline, just sounded a little too delicious to pass up.

I spent most of the outbound leg in the drops hunkered behind one big guy or another. I took a few short pulls every now and then but I never lasted long in the wind and I'm not much to draft off of anyway.

The return leg was totally awesome though- 25 miles at ave 25 mph, including long stretches pacelining at 30 mph. In the end, there were only two of us left in the paceline, we dropped everyone else. I nabbed a QOM on an 11 mile segment, the longest stretch of road to get back into town- 28.8 mph. Sweet. Totally enjoyable ride, its fun to go fast.

valygrl

Just back from 4 days in Grand Junction at my team's training camp/vacation. We missed a huge snowstorm at home, which was pretty much cold and drizzle in GJ, so we didn't get the long rides in that we wanted, but rode some high-quality hard rides in CO National Monument and the Maverick Classic (collegiate) road race course, and went mountain biking in Fruita before driving home yesterday. And we brought a coach with us to work on some skills. Not sure if this picture link will work, lifted from facebook.

revchuck 

My first ride after driving back from sunny Arizona, so of course it rained. Recovery pace, 1:33, TSS 33.7, IF .47, 624 kj.

Heathpack 

Great pic, @valygrl! You guys do some awesome team rides.

Welcome home, @revchuck. Rain builds character? (Or some other positive statement.)

I had some ambitious 10 min 118% intervals to get done today and I missed every one. Still enjoyed it though- I find these mondo workouts to be big fat juicy challenges, I even like them when I can't get em done. It's interesting in the ways you can fail sometimes, it makes me think about my choice of trying to do these uphill for example and how that differs from trying the same effort on the flats.

Ha, it just seems no matter what I'm doing, in the end I just like riding my bikes.

beatlebee 

@valygrl:

I will be a little east of Grand Junction this summer (near the base of the Grand Mesa) for the month of June. I am wondering if you know of group rides (hammer rides) in the GJ area? I remember you sent me a listing a while back to help my Boulder expedition out. Also, any rides that are not to be missed? I will have both road and mtn bikes.

Thanks!

valygrl

Sorry robabeatle, I don't know anything about the group rides there. The obvious do not miss rides are Grand Mesa itself & Colorado National Monument. The less obvious is the 80-ish mile out -and-back on Hwy 141 @hwy50 to Gateway, also known as Unaweep Canyon. NO water on that one until the gas station at the far end. Great ride, no cars.

Here's my GJ resources:
Bicycle Maps
https://sites.google.com/site/grandj...-junction-area
Links below the map. Little Park/DS road and Reeder Mesa are also good.

Fruita is full of MTB'ing that I know next to nothing about, I'm sure local resources are great. MTBProject app is pretty useful on your phone.

have fun, i really like GJ.

Dalai

Grand Mesa is a great ride. Good surface, consistent gradient and beautiful scenery!