Day 10 Zone 3 @ GM

my first interval / HR monitor ride...

supposed to do three 12' Zone 4 efforts w/ 3' recovery in between (after warm up). that is harder to hit than i thought (on a mountain bike / trail). i guess if you had a road bike and a sustained climb it would be easier, but trying to maintain a HR while going up / across / down GM didn't work as well as expected. averages closer to Zone 3.

1 - 17.10 @ 159
2 - 12.55 @ 146
3 - 2:58 @ 120
4 - 12 @ 143
5 - 3:41 @ 116
6 - 12:31 @ 139
7 - 36:36 @ 140

> :22
= :19
< :55

aHR 143
mHR 182

time 1:36 • distance 14.3 • average 8.8
(now playing: U2)

super bowl sunday

so i had planned to spend the day cleaning the house. greg called and asked if i wanted to go out. i hemmed & hawed and said i'd call back. snow on ground, temps still a bit chilly, day planned out, no lunch yet… i was gonna bail. my wife looked at me and said "just go, greg likes the company", so like a flipped switch i was suddenly in bike mode. ;-)

i sometimes hesitate to ride w/ greg, because our riding styles are so different. my ideal ride would be an all day epic in the high country, at a leisurely pace, stopping to take pictures and have a bite to eat. greg would rather get out, race pace, for a solid 2 hours, stopping only for a flat tire, if necessary. he trains, i ride. as a result, he is inherently much faster than i am. i've come to terms w/ that, but sometimes (especially early season) it can be problematic if i'm trying to keep up and end up blowing up early. luckily that wasn't the case today on green mountain. in fact, i heard strange words from greg's mouth as i was leading up a climb, "you're making me work today". still, it wasn't long before his competitive spirit dictated he pass me, but it didn't bother me because i was feeling good and strong, not struggling as has often been the case in the past. maybe i'm getting a bit more fit after all.

oh yeah, there was a football game on TV when we got back. lesson of the day (on the trail and the field): don't underestimate the underdog.

distance 8.93 • time 1:05 • average 8.2
(now playing: godsmack)