CalTrain needs to rethink their bicycle strategy; putting a Bombardier set with one bike car on a run, like #231, that usually has a full bike car is going to cause ripple effects for the rest of the morning. The topic of conversation on the train this morning: folding bikes. Perhaps I will be forced to go that direction.

Update: The fun continued on the way home. The train I usually catch at Hillsdale normally has Gallery equipment, with a capacity of at least 32 bikes, and runs full. Tonight it pulls in with a Bombardier set, 16 bikes max. Conductor comes out and says 3 bikes, only. And there were at least 8 folks waiting to get on.

The week started out fine with racing at the Velodrome, the first real hard intensity on over a month. Then the club’s twilight crit on Tuesday, where I did a two lap (almost 4 mile) time trial at the end. But the rest of the week was tough, and the only riding was the daily commute to the office. I woke up yesterday with legs that were stiff and dead. A feeling that held through the warmup. My original goal for this race was very modest: finish. As I warmed up yesterday morning I wondered if that would be a stretch.

I lined up with the 35+ Cat 4’s yesterday, probably near the oldest guy in the field. Deep breath and we get the start whistle after a very brief set of instructions from Chief Ref Ryan. The course is a simple rectangle with 4 right turns; one sweeper, one a bit rounded, and two tight rights. It was a big field, with 100 registered but only 80 some odd guys taking the start. I held in good for the first couple of laps, but I had lined up on the right at the start, putting me on the inside of the turns, and the field was cutting the corners tight causing a pinch off of riders on that side. I was moving up on the first and third legs (the longer legs) but slipping back in all the turns. I was ready to launch an attack, just to mix it up, on lap 3 but then the president of my club took the front position and started to push the pace; not a good time for an attack. I finally did a small attack on lap 9, following a rider I was sure was heading out up the inside and getting clear off the front going into turn 4. But then I looked back and the other rider was not full committed, my heart rate was pegged (a few beats above my previous high HR), so I knew I was going nowhere fast. Time to sit up, fall back into the middle and get some recovery. I held in mid-pack, tried to move up a couple of times, but almost got taken out a couple of times on the last lap by sketchy riders. In the end I came in with the pack, officially 61st place. I did get one apology from one the riders who almost took me out, but the only thing I got from the other was a snot rocket sent my way. Sheesh! And the unofficial photographer captured me only once, after the race ducking under the caution tape along the sideline. Oh well.

Another two and a half weeks before the next official race, my club’s Memorial Day Crit, and then another crit on the 31st of the month, the Dash for Cash with an insane amount of primes and a $250 bonus for the first person in each race to lap the field. That one will be an wild ride. But mostly it is time to head for the hills and get ready for the rather hilly Pescadero RR in 5 weeks.

Kaboom!

After returning home from the crit I decided that I would ride some more but make it utilitarian. I hooked the Burley trailer to my commuter bike and headed off to do the weekly shopping. As I was crossing a freeway overpass I heard that sound that makes every cyclist cringe: Kaboom! I had a blowout on the rear tire in one of the worst places to deal with it in our area. Not sure what took out the sidewall of the almost new tire (maybe 200 miles max), but it was a nice large slash. I did a boot job, but even with lot of good boot material I could not take the tire about 30PSI without it bulging out and threatening another blowout. It was a nice trip home, mostly a walk.

One thing that has suffered the past three weeks has been hard, disciplined riding.  I have tried to keep up with my normal commute riding, but I have not done some of the harder, longer commute rides that I did regularly before the break.  The first weekend after the incident I got out to test the waters, so to speak, and felt good.  But the following week was brief, interrupted, and ended with the three days of playing the role of support spouse at Madera.  The only ride that weekend was an easy pre-ride of the TT course.  The past weekend I got out for a hard, tempo ride from San Jose to Gilroy and back, and wanted more on Sunday but the ‘honey-do’ task of cleaning and planting the side yard got priority.  Tomorrow I need to get back into regular rides that mimic some sort of training schedule.

And my racing plan for the year went into the toilet with the minor tipover that resulted in a broken thumb.  I have already missed Madera, the one opportunity for a stage race this year.  This weekend it is almost certain I will miss the Wente Road Race, one of the races best suited to my abilities.  To compensate I have signed up for the EBC crit in mid-May and the ICC Dash for Cash crit later in the month, followed by the Pescadero Road Race in mid-June.  I had not intended to do Pescadero this year; I think I could use some more off-season leg strength work before tackling that brutal course.  But it is what it is.  That gives me about 7 weeks or so to get ready, so expect to see me around some of the local hills doing repeats over the next few weeks.

Glue vs. tape update

The twin sidewall punctures at Madera has given me an opportunity to revisit the glue vs. tape for attaching tubular issue.  Just before Madera I had re-glued the front tire, and taped the rear.  Both tires were firmly attached, not likely there would have been a roll-off.  The front tire came off cleanly; on the rear there was a couple of layers of the tape matrix left that was easy enough to remove.  But, and this will be what pushes me to the glue camp, there was a very tacky, squishy, thick layer of glue material left on the rim after removing the tire and the leftover tape.   I spent last night doing the dirty work of stripping all that nasty leftover glue off the rim.  I will go back to glue for the most part, but will leave some Tufa tape in the toolkit just in case I need to attach a tire in a hurry.

The small startup for which I work just got access to the ‘gym’ in the business park where we rent office space. I thought that taking a day off the bike on Friday and doing some weight work would be a good idea. Then I got into the gym on Friday. Let’s just say I have friends with better setups in their garage than is in the so-called gym. Oh, well, at least I did a bit of weight work and some work on the abs before using the shower, the only bright spot in having access to the gym. With access to the shower I can now do training rides on my way to work and not offend my co-workers.

Saturday was supposed to be more of the same weather; our friend (and teammate of The Wife) Erika decided to host a garage trainer workout party for the team but invited some of us with Y chromosomes to participate, too. I was thinking I would take the rollers and demonstrate my skills, similar to the guys in the video (yeah, right …), but the weather was clear, calm, and warmer than the past few days, all leading to the decision to do the workout on the road. It was great out, doing hill intervals until the legs felt like mush, then a nice tempo ride on a southern loop back home. The hills to the east, which had been covered in snow and clouds all week, were clearly visible with only a couple small patches of white stuff left near the top of Mt. Hamilton. I was wishing there was something left in the tank so I could go ascend that monster, but opted for home and lunch, instead.

The rain had started again on Saturday night, so I was expecting a possible ‘pass’ on the Early Birds, especially since ‘Meet the Teams’ was delayed a week so The Wife was not obligated to go and sit for hours under the big top while handing out food and beverage to potential recruits. Sunday morning we awoke to dry roads and partly cloudy skies, with nothing of interest on the doppler. So a quick, carbo dense breakfast and we loaded up and headed to Fremont. The Wife participated in the Women’s clinic while I socialized and watched the growing gray mass to the south. The rain held off … until about 30 seconds after my group started on the road. Perfect timing! Sheesh. The shower was brief and after a couple of laps the only weather issue was the stiff 15-25MPH wind out of the southeast. By that time I was in caloric deficit mode, having left home in such a hurry that I neglected to grab any extra food items, which meant digging deep into the reserves to stay with the yellow ‘mice’ who kept punching the pace up. In the end I was able to keep integrated most of the time (one brief bit OTB) and got a pretty good workout.

Next week I plan on returning for the last Early Bird of the year, in part to do some interviewing with some of the local teams to see if I stay with Team Unattached or opt for one of the more structured groups. The requirement for a Master’s program and that training rides be in the geographic area I live and/or work in has narrowed the field to three candidates. A fourth squad, the green and whites is out as the anti-social aspect of some of the membership which has made the team a bit of a pariah in the bigger community; wearing the green and white would make some of my friends loathe to ride with me and might harm some of my advocacy work in the region. So it is down to the black/blue/whites that carry the name of the largest city in the region (and which I must join, anyway, to ride in their twilight crits), the red/yellows which has the most extensive sponsorship (and biggest track presence of the three), or the red/whites which are centered near where I work. I had crossed off the red/white group, The ratio of X chromosomes to Y’s is way too close to 1, but two of my friends have reportedly committed to the team. Decisions, decisions. All to think about while I do circles of the business park.

This morning was my first day of commuting since that stretch; I have worked from home, due to a cold, for the past two days. As we loaded onto CalTrain at Mt View one of the cyclists, a young woman, was a bit frantic. She had a flat, her second in two days and she was caught without a set of tire irons. I loaned her mine and offered to help, but she refused the assistance. A while later she came and asked me for an opinion; she showed me a 3cm gash in the sidewall of the tire and asked it I thought it was the reason she was getting the flats. Since one could stick a finger through the gash I was fairly confident there was a relationship. She did not seem to know about ‘booting’, so I dug in my bag for a piece of Tyvek (FedEx envelope) and ‘booted’ her tire sufficiently for her to get from the train to shop for a replacement.

It is the season to be prepared. Flats are going to happen, especially with the wet roads. Best to be prepared and carry all the tools and materials needed to keep yourself on the road.

Gadzooks, what a mess the weather dealt the past few days. On Thursday I endured the moderate rain on the commute to work, and hit a dry patch for the homeward bound trip. But Friday was another story; the commute from home to the Mountain View CalTrain was directly into the wind, probably constant 15-20MPH with stronger gusts, driving the rain through every exposed opening in the raingear. At one point I had to stand and push as hard as possible, for about a mile, to keep upright and moving. Not many other folks braved the rain, either. Few people were on the train, with or without bikes. On the trip home the rain was not as hard but the winds were still strong. The major task on that leg was maneuvering around obstacles. The southern end of Delaware in San Mateo was partly flooded as the water was coming up out of the storm drains onto the road. Trees and branches were down, lots of debris, a regular obstacle course.

With round 3 hitting on Saturday I decided to do the garage workout session rather than hitting the open (and wet) road. I started with 30 minutes on the rollers for a warmup, then moved to the trainer for another hour and three quarters. Talk about brain dead; the mind went numb within the first 15 minutes on the trainer! And within an hour other body parts were threatening to go numb, parts I would rather never lost sensation, so I worked hard to keep the blood flowing. Now I remember why I avoid the trainer sessions except when necessary.   Riding into 25MPH winds with driving rain is nothing compared to an hour plus on the trainer!  Unless the weather cooperates I expect I will be spending more time in the garage this winter so I need to find something to keep the old neurons between ears firing and the blood flowing into ALL the extremities.

The 2008 racing season is nigh. I plan on riding the San Bruno Mt. Hill Climb on 1 January, unless the weather is hideous, but have not had the time or inclination to get out and actually train yet. So I will race it without any expectations, just a chance to get out and socialize while burning my lungs into oblivion. After that I will have to get serious about doing some intervals, and other good training type rides. And the question arises, how do I weave that into my daily commute? The commuter is a bit of a heavy beast, and it is now a fixie. I could alternate days with the touring bike, which is also a beast. Or I could try to commute on the Colnago and put the monstrous laptop and other necessities into a messenger bag or backpack. None are ideal, all are compromises, especially during the months of interminable darkness. And what about days to rest and recover? Can I plan to work at home 1-2 days/week? I need to plan this out. Especially important as my weekend schedules are tightening up so much of what I do for ‘training’ will have to happen during the week. I do plan on spending at least one night on most weeks at Hellyer as soon as Larry Nolan’s ‘Points Race Series’ resumes.

For the rest of the winter I will be spending some time in the garage on the rollers or the trainer. Not the ideal, but then again the rollers do tend to reinforce some good habits. The Wife has even tried the rollers; she did about 5 minutes last Sunday and seemed to deem them evil. But she reports she spent an hour on them this morning. Perhaps we can get the neighbors to provide entertainment while we spin in place, at least until the evening light is sufficient for some decent rides into the hills.