Jen and I did our 70 mile ride today. It was great! I think we both were a little unsure of where we were in terms of training on the bike since we have done the bulk of our riding at spin class & not actually on our bikes. However, we realized that we are actually right on track in terms of mileage--and much faster than we were when I trained 2 years ago!
Our loop today is the one we pretty much always do starting on the Green River Trail and down to Auburn, then over to Black Diamond with it's crazy-amazing bakery (mmm...pink donuts! mmmm....frosted cookies! mmmm....nainamo bars!). From there we go down thru the Green River Gorge, which is awesome and unexpected (http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/getaways/286519_gorge28.html). Then we climb up out of the gorge, only to descend back down to the Green River Valley. Then it is through farmlands, back to Auburn, hop on the trail and head home.
It was 70 miles even and we did it in 4hrs & 23 minutes. The elevation gain was not a lot--- just around 1400-1500ft-- a few rollers and a few steep (13%)short climbs and a lot of flat and some fun downhills (38mph! Weeeeee!).
We tried to eat more like we would on race day and that seemed to work well. Training for Ironman '06 on this ride I have had a little dumb problem of forgetting to eat breakfast and dragging myself to the bakery 1/2 way in to ride and not understanding why I felt terrible. Then fueled the rest of ride by cinnamon rolls. :) While tasty, not super effective! This time we both used Nuun in our water in our camelbacks. I tried Clif Blocks- margarita w/ salt flavor which I really liked and cut up pieces of landjager sausage and a cherry pomegrante flavored Clif Nectar bar. The combo seemed to work and just eating bites every 15 min. or so. I also had hardboiled egg for breakfast and a PB&J post ride. All in all I felt better about my nutrition than I normally do so that is great. I never felt hungry or lacking energy and I was peeing so think I was drinking enough.
Top it all off-- I got to spend most of the morning and early afternoon all alone with Jen! It is so fun to do this with her. The activities are things we love to do anyway, love to do together and have been a great way to spend time together that has nothing to do with a new baby. Some say it is crazy timing to try and do an Ironman now. And, it is. But in many ways it is perfect timing. Perfect because it forces us to make time for each other and plan time away from baby stuff to play/train. Perfect because it is doing things that feel like they are about us, where we are in our bodies being strong, and make us feel like our usual selves.
Anyhow, now I am exhausted and glad for a day off tomorrow and a short practice open water swim on sunday!
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