Saturday, May 07, 2005

Demonslayer

One year ago I rode my first 200 kilometer brevet, which also happened to be my first century-length ride. It featured climbs around Horsetooth Reservoir as well as another one up Stove Prairie. Last year I ended up walking one of the climbs at Horsetooth as well as stopping several times and ultimately walking up Stove Prairie. This was the ride that finally convinced me I need to work on hill climbing...work on it a lot.

After a year of hard work and a bunch of base miles this year, I returned to that brevet and I was very nervous. I've done all the prep work, fitness is great, I even rode the climbs in reverse a couple of months ago. I knew intellectually I could do it but hadn't internalized that knowledge.

The Horsetooth climbs were much easier than I remember, but they are short and steep. Exactly the kind of thing I've been working on. Stove Prairie was still hard but I made it. No stopping or walking this year!

Another significant difference was my finishing condition. Last year I was a basket case at 80 miles. I hurt all over - each turn of the crank was agony. This year at 80 miles I was humming a tune and having a great time with a friend.

The 300k brevet may not be so far out after all.

Here is the ride profile:

3 comments:

Maarburg said...

Fantastic!
I was thinking about you killing this ride all day on Saturday! Of course, I was sitting on the couch with a bag of pork skins and watching the Giro d'italia Prologue.
300k! Nice..

Anonymous said...

Great Job! See, I told you that you'd slay this ride!

Spots said...

Nicely done! You don't mind if I add you as a friend, do you?
--Spots