No Trey Today
Today's ride home is dedicated to my friend Trey Griffin. Trey is on the PCP Race Team. Last week during the Thursday evening club ride I found myself riding 20-24 MPH right on the back tire of Mr. Griffin as he rode south on 8 Mile Road. At the time I was still running the cyclocross tires which held up pretty fine.
So on my way home I found myself riding really strong with the Gator Skins so I decided to really push myself to ride fast for about one hour. Riding with the PCP race team taught me a few things about how to ride full out. I like to maximize my 25 mile commute by mixing in some training techniques. Some of these training methods do not make sense to most cyclist, but they work for me.
One of the things that I use to do before riding with the race team is I would slow up on the "hills". What I learned is that on these little hills is where I struggled to keep up and I would get dropped. So what do I do to train to get stronger? Well on my bike commutes when I am pushing myself I do not shift to an easy gear when I approach a hill, sometimes I shift down and accelerate up the hill. Tonight I was monitoring my speed and I wanted to maintain at least a 18 MPH pace, even on the hills on 8 Mile Road. I thought about how much faster I could be riding if Trey was in front of me pulling, hence the blog title, "No Trey Today".
Riding around SW Georgia and accelerating up hills instead of slowing down for a hill was a cycling methodology that was strange to me at first. What I learned is that if I was going to keep up with the fast group I would have to get stronger on these little hills. So on my bike commute I ride the hills hard and try to keep the same pace as I have on the flats and wait until I get to the crest of the hill and that is where I catch my breath. Breathing deeper than I use to do is also helping me get stronger to keep up the pace after the hill too.
Now for some fun. I have not found the picture of my old Serotta next to a tractor. I did stop to take a picture of my Seven next to a county tractor. Even though I sometimes like to do "training rides" I always have time to stop and take a photo.
While was getting ready to get back on my bike I noticed a big bolt in the tractor tire.
So on my way home I found myself riding really strong with the Gator Skins so I decided to really push myself to ride fast for about one hour. Riding with the PCP race team taught me a few things about how to ride full out. I like to maximize my 25 mile commute by mixing in some training techniques. Some of these training methods do not make sense to most cyclist, but they work for me.
One of the things that I use to do before riding with the race team is I would slow up on the "hills". What I learned is that on these little hills is where I struggled to keep up and I would get dropped. So what do I do to train to get stronger? Well on my bike commutes when I am pushing myself I do not shift to an easy gear when I approach a hill, sometimes I shift down and accelerate up the hill. Tonight I was monitoring my speed and I wanted to maintain at least a 18 MPH pace, even on the hills on 8 Mile Road. I thought about how much faster I could be riding if Trey was in front of me pulling, hence the blog title, "No Trey Today".
Now for some fun. I have not found the picture of my old Serotta next to a tractor. I did stop to take a picture of my Seven next to a county tractor. Even though I sometimes like to do "training rides" I always have time to stop and take a photo.
While was getting ready to get back on my bike I noticed a big bolt in the tractor tire.
Comments
Post a Comment