The Training Hits Hard

My log book has been jam packed with miles since my last post, because the crew and I have been restless, and glued to our saddles. We have begun deep training for the century ride coming up in just under a month, and since this serious cycling training is new to me, it seems like all I've been doing lately is pedaling! the crew has been putting on so many miles that we pedal in our sleep now, and it's scary to say; but we would rather be sitting on a rock hard saddle than our sofa. Why? because the count down has begun, and I'm confident that I will be riding that century ride with out crying for my momma or stopping to hold my blankey. So the only way to ensure I am prepared for this gig is by putting plenty of miles on my speedometer and taking less vacations from the asphalt.

Now of course being The Rolling Resistor I am, I'm proud to say that I've finally completed a 50 mile ride! This is my longest ride to date, and it sure was confident boosting to know that I can at least survive half of a century ride. The past Saturday just me and dad headed north for a solo ride. It was certainly an interesting ride where I got to see some new territory, and experience a new definition of tiredness. The rain at the last 15 miles of the ride didn't help either, it was cold and windy, yet I was able to pull through. Of course I did not have my nose in the wind much as dad did pretty much all the pacemaking as I was trying to return from the ride with the ability to keep on walking for the rest of the day. After all this was the day of my birthday party and I needed to entertain my friends. My actual birthday is next Sunday and I'm sure dad will be pulling me out of the bed at 6 am even then for the 60 miler, well I guess we don't need to worry about that yet.....

Any how going back to the 50 miler, saying your going to ride such a distance isn't easy for a noob like me, so I had to keep reminding myself that I was completely capable of doing this while I pedaled farther and farther away from my cozy warm bed; so its as much pushing the envelope mentally as its physical if not even more.

  I took the rest of the Saturday easy and relaxed with my friends. I even skipped out on Sunday ride to recover, but soon enough the days marched on, and we began carry on our usual routine rides with the crew. Monday's 26 miles to Linton Blvd was graciously easy the first half, but predictably brutal on the way back home due to Florida's bipolar wind patterns. The gang and I were still able to average a decent speed and dad gave us younger riders of the crew some nice practice on rotating, so everybody had to do pulls in front. 

Next thing I know I'm coming home from school on a Thursday afternoon and cramming in a snack as well as some homework before we are again climbing up the Lake Worth bridge for our night ride. We decided to go 30 miles instead of the usual 26 as we will be skipping Saturday ride for a full day of volunteering at a kids event at church. Nick, Johanna and I were also able to manage pulling the small group of ours, and we got a nice average speed. As we turned around and swirled our pedals to head back, the sun was setting and night time struck soon enough. I was looking forward to darkness because it gave me an opportunity to try out the new front light I had got in the mail today. The 1,000 lumen beam gleamed through A1A and beautifully justified it's price. Night riding is not too bad, because when you look down at your computer you can't see anything, so speed and distance doesn't matter. At my turn I pulled our group at my leisure speed and no one could complain (except of course dad, who has a light in his Garmin and was calling the shots on when to rotate to the back). The rest didn't even know the speed my legs guided them at. I call that blind relaxation; a newbie riders, best friend.

Easy Like Sunday Morning...

Normally we try to keep our four weekly rides lined up something like this. Thursday we leave Lake Worth at about 5:45pm and head down south on A1A, we call this the Boca ride. However, the actual Boca ride heads north and Jari & Alex normally join them, its way too fast for the rest of us stick with for long but we may get a few miles flying with the fast guys. After a lightening warm-up we settle back down to a steady tempo on this 26 mile ride to Linton Blvd and back.

Then Saturday morning at 7 AM we head down the same route normally with about forty to fifty other riders, and again we usually get dropped from the group sooner or later, but thats not really a problem as Saturday is our long ride. We are trying to pump up the milage by about 5 miles every week on this ride, and keep rest of the week pretty much the same constantly.

On our Sunday afternoon ride we usually leave from Mark's house just with our own crew and head to Wellington's Aero Club area for a nice easy 25 mile or so spin.

Monday is officially our recovery day for all the group riders in our area and sometimes we ride the ladies ride leaving from Southern Blvd heading to the north end of the Palm Beach island. That sometimes feels even too easy but its good practice to ride in a big peloton. Or we may ride with a bit of a faster group heading south and forget the recovery.

Well last Saturday morning it rained so we skipped our ride and moved the long ride for Sunday morning, and actually that was one of the best things that could've happened! 

Fridays gym class in school was brutal, and I was sore everywhere so an extra day of rest was very much welcomed! Oh, I don't think I have even mentioned yet that I'm in 10th grade at Oxbridge Academy, and this blog is part of  the curriculum in my english class. I'm really enjoying my first year at this awesome school! Any way, so last Sunday when my dad and I did our long ride for the week, it ended up being a forty three miler, my longest ride yet! It wasn't exactly a tough ride, we had some wind going back so that helped boost our speed; we averaged seventeen miles on our clocks. The ride wasn't easy by any means though, in my mind I like to think of it as double my usual rides, or two and a half hours on a hard saddle. On top of that, on our way back we missed the peloton we were trying to catch, and the storm clouds above us began pouring. We got soaked with freezing cold rain, and since we were moving at a decent speed, the wind roared by my ears while I was shoot by water droplets. The main thing I remember was not being able to see through my sunglasses, and then taking them off and having even worse vision. It some what inspired me though to create mini wind shield wipers for sun glasses, but as of now that’s not working out to well.

 There was some good news though, we were able to out run the storm and reach dry land in a few miles, so I dried up pretty fast. Plus it refreshed me, for the final 15 miles or so. The last of the ride went very smooth, and we kept our steady pace because Jari came to pull us in the end! It was a successful long ride and a goal accomplished for me. Up next is fifty miles, which you will hear about very soon. Until then I'll be cruising our usual rides, and doing homework; but ill be back, real soon!

                                              

The Blog has Landed!

Welcome ladies and gentlemen! I'm Aleksi "The Rolling Resistor" and this is my cycling blog. I will be sharing my life as a newbie roadie with you. You will read stories of my rides and goals, among other things. Over all you will get to know me better and hopefully we learn a thing or two about road bicycling together. So pump your tires, buckle up your lid, and lets get ready to ride!

How it Began

         I first encountered road cycling back in 2006 as a 10 year old when my dad started riding. I was never really interested in it, in fact I thought it was insane that people "enjoyed" riding bikes with skinny tires for long distances. Plus they were perched on top of even skinner saddles; in uncomfortable looking positions, wile wearing goofy, colorful, and skin tight spandex!   

You see I was never an athletic kid, but time passed and I started to train on a rowing machine to whip myself into some kind of shape; I realized that I liked it and got into a routine. Slowly I improved my endurance (no more chubby kid) and I set a goal to row one million meters by end of the year 2011. After reaching that lofty goal (least in my standards) I began accompanying my dad once in a while for rides with his commuter bike. Fifteen miles here and there; maybe twenty a few times too, and that same realization hit again that this is not too bad. I enjoyed the challenge and the change of motion from the rowing machine; plus kids like me should get more fresh air anyways.

After getting a little dose of cycling, my dad bought me my first road bike August 4th; it's a slightly used, middle of the pack, 2011 full carbon Cannondale with 105's. Man its fast compared to the commuter rig, and she's a cool green color too; kinda reminds me of a Lamborghini. In the near month and a half I have had the new ride I have been putting 350 miles on the clock.

Before getting the road bike my buddy Alexander also joined us for few rides with a borrowed road bike. He is a natural in any sport, so he picked cycling up really fast, and ended up buying the bike he was using. Then shortly after his younger brother Nick wanted to try riding too and he ended up getting a beautiful red AG, so this only added to my interest. Since then the boys dad Mark "The Frog" (I'll explain the nick name later) and mom Johanna also got bikes, so we have a small friendly newbie peloton going on here.

Our additional normal crew members we ride with is Jari, he is the guy Alex got his bike from (maybe that’s why Alex is so fast, some of Jari's speed may have stuck on the ol' Trek). Jari got into riding a few years back with my dad, and he has never looked back since. In fact he rides at least 7000 miles a year and only knows two speeds fast and faster. Jari also doesn't have the word "recovery ride" in his vocabulary; so if your expecting him to slow down, I would recommend shooting his tires. Jari's wife Tarja also joins us.

Alexander is in more of Jari's caliber so most of the time the "flying duo" wings with the faster groups, while the rest of us dilly dally, and pant.

Sure we ride in a slower pack, but we are getting better, faster, and stronger.....

One more thing, my dad has been slacking on the riding this year some what and needed a jump start to get going again, so as a good son I had to help him of the sofa and back to the road again and off course soon as he did get back to riding routine he get's this crazy idea and starts planning a century ride for all of us! Century as in a 100 miles of bicycling in one single day!

So my first cycling goal that I was sweet talked into, is this century ride in Gainesville Oct.27th. We will meet my uncle Jim there; as they live in that area. Jim is an old ironman so if noting else works he can pull us to finish. Hopefully in one piece, with out the saddles stuck to our behinds. 

Well I better get of the keyboard and start training as we have long way to go and short time to get there......