The Fool On The Hill

The Hill

goFast and I are scheming. I'm jonesing for a ride like David Crosby wants just one more Ho-Ho. The requirements are that it can't be too long but should be a pretty good work out. I have to go out and about with the family later in the day and The Zombie Bill is not invited.

We finally decide on a nearby hill and an interval style workout. When I get home from work I'm so jazzed about it that I inflate the tires to 110 and hook the Garmin on the bike. Then I stay up late by the firepit telling a six-and-a-half year old girl (she was quite specific on this point, "I'm six and a HALF!") all about the interesting ways the Indians would kill the settlers. Sheesh, actually I was telling her parents while she lazed on her father's lap trying to figure out ways of getting another s'more after mom and dad said no. So after two glasses of my beloved single malt scotch and a really nice visit from goFast, goFaster (his wife :-)) and their youngest I hit the sack.

Naturally I slept a bit longer than I thought I would but managed to get to 'the hill' before there was too much traffic. The hill in its entirety is about 1.1 miles long and my first lap I did it all to warm up but then decided to do three tenths of it at the bottom of the hill. It had the steepest grade... anyway I then did that four additional times, the last one continuing up and back to my starting point.

Those three tenths of a mile were enough for me. Quite hellish. It took about a minute to descend it (I'm no great descender so I needed to make sure I could stop at the bottom of the thing or risk flying out onto a pretty busy road) and about two minutes to ascend it. It's much different than an interval workout in the gym.

You'd think I'd love the descents. HATED THEM after the second lap. Here's the thing, you've worked pretty hard lugging your (ok my) fat ass up that hill and in half the time you're gonna have to do it again. That's probably one of the reasons I over braked on the way down, though not consciously.

The ascent turns into this game with the gears, too high a gear and you go slower and suffer longer, too low and you can feel your thighs swearing vengeance if you can turn the crank at all. By the second time I got to the turn around I was a heaving, gasping wreck, my thighs quite irritated with me. I'd make my turn and try to bring my breathing under control before starting again. I was in the granny gear by the end of it.

Good times, good times.

So five ascents total, I know I can do better, so yeah I'll be doing that in the future. I followed goFast's advice and peddled home at a high cadence, slow speed and my thighs felt better for it along with the stretching afterwords.

I got home and my wife had just gotten up, I felt great and we had a cup of coffee before she decided we should bike to the library.

So 18 miles total, it was fun.