Seriously Easy

Tonight I did the 2nd seriously easy run of the 2008 late summer season. Ten minutes - easy. Kept HR low, low, low. I ran in cemetery to be on grass and most importantly, not seriously embarrassed by running my slow ass on public streets. Mentally I know I've got to do something different, apart from riding my road bike - as I felt great after this 'run.' I hope to be running quite often by the end of the fall - hopefully up to an hour so I can stay fit and mentally refreshed throughout the winter.
I'll give a report out on my soreness factor tomorrow. In past when I've begun running after a purely cycling regiment I've gotten SORE for a LONG TIME. Maybe I'll put in a decent cross season this year...its an awful long road season and my hats off to those folks who race every weekend effectively. I can't seem to do this yet. While my burnout state is better this year than it was last year I vacillate from being seriously psyched up for races and not having any motivation at all to race. Whatever motivation I had (like last week) has seemed to vanish almost overnight!
I don't know if I can bring myself to drive 2+ hours to Concord on Sat. although I might go up to Bow on Sunday. A :45 minute crit is not really worth 5h in the car for me at this point this season.
I went on a seriously fun MTB in Big River last night with Mike and Lynn. We went swimming after which was a blast.

Cadel Evans

An OK outburst...
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FikzgWE3t0A

A better one:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M9St8xiaKzA&feature=related

The best one...
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-fe79ZuDKfk&feature=related

Why am I not surprised...

http://www.cnn.com/video/#/video/us/2008/07/29/dcl.cop.decks.cyclist.cnn

...everything comes out with the proliferation of video capture.

Schedule

I did Norwell yesterday. There is nothing to report about this race except I was really pissed off at the end of it.

I know this schedule will change but it gives me an idea of how to plan my training for the next few weeks. Training? Yeah, I've been actually training again instead of pretending to train.


Week 1:
8/2: Concord
8/3: Bow - maybe.

Week 2:
8/9: Nashua
*or maybe Rochester.
8/10: Tokeneke...maybe?

Week 3:
8/13: Salem (Witches Cup)
8/16: NY Capitol Region RR
8/17: Fall River (Priority Race)

Week 4:
8/21: Pittsfield
8/23: Medford, NJ or Saco, ME
8/24: Blunt Park 'Cross, Springfield, MA.

Week 6:
9/6: Topsfield
9/7: Haverhill or *Tour of the Catskills

Week 7:
9/13 and 9/14: Bob Beals

Week 8:
9/20: Norwich, CT
9/21: Portsmouth

Norwell not Hilltowns

Looks like I'm skipping Hilltowns to put a solid effort into Norwell. I'm probably doing just the Cat. 3 race. There are some teams in there so its going to have be critical to cover attacks in order to get into the breakaway if anyone is strong enough to put enough gas on. I felt good last night and was able to stay where I wanted to be most of the time. I felt as if my power was coming along properly and I was able to ride at the right intensity necessary. I probably lost 5 seconds per lap being extra lame in the corners but I've recently had a bad experience of not respecting them. I did not get sick for once which I think means I'm getting somewhat fit. Hopefully I feel good on Sun. Not doing Hilltowns because I know I'll be tired after that, probably too much so to properly race Norwell. Tomorrow I'm back out to Wilbur Rd. or Cumberland Hill to do hill repeats until failure. I might even drive up to Wachussett to do proper repeats. Saturday is easy around town stuff, maybe even go to the beach or do something lazy and fun.

Last Day of School

Last day of school is tomorrow. Cannot wait. Believe me, I cannot wait. Going to celebrate by going to Ninigret. It better not rain. If it does rain, my usual method of celebration will be initiated. Hyundai leaves PC (River Ave. @ 4:15 or so). I did 4 sprints today on the Blvd. (instead of my prescribed 5) and was going to do more but I got a flat and decided to hustle on home. I felt great the first two, OK on the third, not so much OK and the fourth. On my ride home from PC I hit the East Side hill as hard as I possibly could which I guess counts for the fifth sprint.

Pig, Pig, Pig, Pig

I went to stop and shop for groceries - I need to start eating better and I had a plan of what to get. I was picking stuff up when I went by the sushi section. I walked by it and decided to go back and investigate. I picked up one box of it and decided that would augment my planned dinner of tacos. About 20 paces away I NEEDED TO TURN AROUND and immediately grabbed a second box - a box of the good sushi. This sushi was subconsciously calling my name. I couldn't resist it. No one person should ever spend as much as I did on Stop and Shop sushi, but I would have spent 2X what I spent on shitty beer if I went out tonight so I don't feel so bad.

BTW: Powerpoint sucks. I've been plugging Millwork One/Weebike.com also at the end of every presentation I give - I'm working on putting the logo on a powerpoint slide. Much like Sesame Street is brought to you by the letter Z and the number 12 (I think I remember this from my youth), my presentations are brought to the class by Millwork 1/Weebike.com and the generous support of the Stafford Direct Loan program. No one hears this of course because its me who is giving the presentation and believe me I'm not the most "exciting" person around which means the majority of the class is either staring at me - but that glassy eyed kind of staring which begs to ask the question "When is this guy going to shut the fuck up?" I talk anyway, loudly and slowly in my attempt to drag the presentation out for as long as possible so I can get the highest grade possible. The rest of the class is doing something totally unrelated, like sitting in front of a laptop looking like they are paying attention while they surf the internet or do something else, drawing, staring out the window, leaving to answer phone calls, texting (yes, adults in grad school text), or doing whatever you do when you are bored off of your ass.