geneman

Went South at 7:15 Saturday morning destined for a small town 17 miles from home. In my way were BIG hills and a 15 MPH breeze directly out of the South. This is actually an ideal setup I think ... as long as you have to suffer into the wind, it might as well be uphill. And uphill it was. It sucked big time ... I hate wind and it was relentless. I resorted to using the granny twice which is a very rare event. The good news is, despite suffering the whole way out, I never reached the point of exhausting where I just wanted to ditch the bike, call up the wife and ride home in shame (we've all been there). I felt pretty good ... not exacly strong, but good. An hour and 15 minutes later I reached my destination, shot some goo, downed half a water bottle, and made the turn North back toward home (using different roads).

The ride home was an absolute BLAST. The route home was generally flat and I was pushing 25 MPH the whole way thanks to the tailwind. That's gotta be one of the better feeling in life ... comfortably crusing at 25 MPH on a flat road. I felt like I actually earned it after the first hour.

I've got a plan to extend this particular route to 50 miles for next Saturday. Should be great.

spazegun2213

sould like you really pulled though! congrats and good luck on you 50 miler!
remember "it never hurts less, you just go faster"

-Ross

RiPHRaPH

my sunday morning ride>>> rode from home with a buddy to join a group ride. we rode 20 miles to reach the ride. a leisurely 18-19mph. we reached the ride and i hung on with the 3 dozen guys till the 36 mile mark. we rode 26.5-28 mph at times, and got dropped while we were going 25mph INTO a 15 mph headwind.

oh yeah. i forgot to mention that 4 USPS riders showed up for the ride, most notably Robbie Ventura (state side USPS team member) and they were just chatting up a storm while i was sucking wind @ 26mph.

ended up finishing 54 miles, and felt pretty good at the end. just need a little (a lot)n more training. i've really worked on the mental aspect of cycling.

astonv0l

Nothing wrong with the granny chain, I have a triple and even though I hardly use it, it has stopped me ditching my bike and calling the wife, well done on sticking it out.

55/Rad

There is a flat, 3.5 mile stretch on my regular route that always has a tailwind and cruising at 27-30 mph is fairly common.

It's also heaven.

Makes you wonder what you could do with aero bars.

55/Rad

tbick

Aw, that precious tailwind. We had a ride a couple of weeks ago...30 miles straight into a 15-20mph headwind, but pumping hard with anticipation of the return with the wind at our back. But of course....a cold front moves in, wind changes direction and just as we turn to head home, a 25-30mph headwind - and cold rain!

Other than thinking how crazy we were, it sure was a good workout!

khuon

I don't have a triple but preemptively take care of this with the Christopher Columbus method (he burnt his ships when he reached the New World) of motivation. I tell my wife, I'm going out for a ride and she gets upset with me for ditching her on a fine weekend day. I thus have no recourse but to push on and continue.

geneman

Oh she wouldn't really leave you stranded now would she? I like the technique regardless, however I avoid the whole weekend time conflict thing by riding early. Even a four hour jaunt gets me back before 11AM.

-mark