Yesterday, I went out and rode 30 miles. A week and a half ago I got 18, but a week and a half is a long time. There was a stiff 10-15 mph headwind that made the trip out one and a half hours and the trip back one hour. Headwinds always amaze me like that.
I really cranked up the mileage on the idea that the body, or my body at least, responds better to less frequent longer duration rides for putting on muscle and conditioning for endurance. All the long, hard rides last summer seemed to really jump up my speed/intensity within about 3 days.
The challenge last year was one long 100 mile ride. The second day would have been nice, but it was really optional the whole time. This year it’s consecutive riding. In March, 50 miles/day all week. In July, 100 miles back to back. This would seem to require a longer outlook.
I’m hoping to integrate more commuter cycling to get miles, though low quality. There seem to be two trips at least that would be good for this. The first is to work and back. The second is to yoga. It made me nervous last year to leave my bike alone. So, I’ll have a folding bike I can keep in eyeshot. This should help with the weather too. It’s seldom fun to hop on a day long soaked bike.
When Mom and I trained all those years ago I noticed that you have a very different attitude about land you ride through. Cars blow by everything. It seems to be all about time and distance. Hills, rain, grass, etc. are all abstracted away to a picture window that streams by all sides of the car. This is a good thing, but you don’t really have a sense of what you are driving through. Bicycling seems like a good pace. Certainly, a bit slow sometimes. There’s a feeling like you actually know what you rode by. It’s kind of hard to explain. Maybe the difference between being able to say I have been there and I know about there.