The 4th of July...

.. has come and gone. Hope everyone had a happy & safe holiday. Ken took last week off - a much needed break from constantly checking his blackberry. It was really nice to walk into a room and not crash into him because he was standing in the doorway reading email. It appeared to have been good for him as well :-)

We did some biking last week - a group ride Wednesday morning at 6 a.m., and we did a 35 mile ride on Thursday (they weren't kidding with air quality alert) and a 40 mile ride on Sunday.

Thursday's ride was hard. It wasn't long, there weren't any big hills, but the air was thick, there was an ozone alert, and it was hot (there was a breeze). We didn't get started until late morning, and it was just draining. We started in Acton, and wove our way through Concord & Carlisle. Almost got killed in Carlisle. I have named that ride on MapMyRide.com as "Carlisle drivers are awful". Please, people, when you pass good cyclists obeying traffic laws, share the road, will you? for the love of god... we have as much of a right to ride single file on the road as the other people who drive on the road. A legal right.

Anyway, after the Thursdays ride, we went out to Lunch at Savory Lane in West Acton. We could have easily eaten, oh, I dunno, the entire menu. But we didn't. We had nice normal sized sandwiches and a lemonade. And then just kind of stared at each other. We were zonked. We ended up just kind of be lazy around the house the rest of the day and going for an early dinner at Olive Garden and ate everything in sight. Felt good enough after that to stay up and watch the town fireworks from our back deck.

Friday we went to Wachusett Mtn. to watch part of the Longsjo Classic stage race- this stage on the 4th was around and then up Wachusett Mtn. I am very happy we went. It was kind of a miserable coll & dreary day, but it was really intense to see the men's elite racers come down mountain road in front of the ski area at some 70 MPH or so. That's what I heard their speed was, anyway - the main field when screaming by at some ridiculous speed & it was incredibly loud. I've decided that on some levels, bike racing is much easier to watch on TV than in person. I got literally dizzy watching all those bikes scream by. The Stage finish was at the top of the auto road up Wachusett - and it was really cool. The women's elite group was decided by a sprint right to the line - conveniently, exactly where I was standing.

Another great thing I noticed at the race was that the women's elite (pro-level) racers came in all shapes & sizes. With men's racing, most of the guys are these skeleton looking super-lean guys - the kind you want to feed before the waste away completely. But the women were normal sized. They weren't super tall or super short or super skinny. Most of them were healthy normal weights - and there was a wide range. If I have a daughter, she's going to have to go watch these types of events just to help reinforce the accurate body image idea. It was really refreshing. Even as an adult, I found this really uplifting.

One bummer about the race: I found out afterward that since the women & men's groups shared the course, the race referees would STOP the women's race. Litteraly STOP them where they were - so that the men's race could pass. Not once, but several times. So anyone lagging behind could potentially catch up with the group. Or, they would be stopped before a big climb and have to climb it from a dead stop, with no momentum. Or someone in difficulty could get a chance to recover a bit. I'm not sure how that can be acceptable, and it really made me mad. Equality in sports my butt.

Anyway - back to our rides... Sunday's ride went much better. We had good legs, weren't sore afterward, and had plenty of energy after our ride. Amazing what a difference a little clean air and a little rest will make. We also had to build in some stretching for me, as my shoulder problem had progressed into a neck problem, and it was becoming a REAL problem (I've now started a new round of chiropractic treatment - I should be "done" around next February or so). It's really hard to manage this shoulder issue of mine without resorting to the muscle relaxants. But I didn't (on the off chance that I could be pregnant). During one of these stretching breaks, we saw a guy pass us on a Harley - with a pair of crutches strapped to the side. That's not something you see everyday.

In total, we road just over 100 miles last week. I'm up to a total of 510 miles on the season, and it should go up rapidly from here. I have a ride planned on Friday morning which will likely be about 25 miles, and then a 60-65 mile ride planned for Saturday (I also road 20 miles on Monday) - so this week should total about a 100 miles as well. That will probably be our average over the coming weeks, although I may increase it a little bit in a couple of weeks. Its a fine line between adequately training and over-training. I'm hoping we'll be in the "adequate" category.

Totals to date:

Hours in the saddle: almost 39 hours. Almost a whole "work week" (yea, right)
Calories burned: 22,005 kcals (equivalent to 60 peanut butter & jelly sandwiches)
Vertical feet climbed: 7,878 feet. (mapmyride has changed their mapping software, and it's not nearly as accurate, so I'm not sure how long I'll be able to keep that tally going - any new routes will be off by several hundred feet, which is just annoying).


Nutrition continues to be tricky. I'm trying to closely monitor my caffeine intake - and most of the sport gels & supplements have caffeine in them - I can eat two flavors of Gu, one of which actually tastes ok. It's too hot at the moment to bake anything, so homemade protein bars are out. I'm trying to avoid lunch meat, which makes getting enough protein during the day tricky. I'm seriously considering fishsticks and chicken nuggets for lunch everyday. On Sunday we brought chunks of cooked (microwaved) potatoes with us - lightly salted w/ herbs. They were good (way more potassium than a banana, and much more earth friendly), but a little tricky to eat while breathing hard. I got potato on my shoe at one point. I imagine if I got potato in my drivetrain that could be bad.