Riding, April 6 -- Thursday night at the races

Now that it is Daylight Savings Time again, the regular Thursday night bike rides have resumed at the Baseline Trailhead. I did not get to ride much last year as I was recovering from shoulder surgery that I had in May, and never really got into the synch of riding regularly. I went out and rode.

I made the mistake of trying to hang with the A group. Apparently, a couple of them had conspired before hand to make everyone suffer, and they did this quite well. We turned a corner and started up a gradual hill when they really hit the accelerator. I had been gapped and was working as hard as I could. I looked at the computer and I was running about 27.5, except that I wasn't making up any ground. I saw a group behind me and decided that I needed to sit up. The group of 3 others caught me shortly and I latched on with them. It was a good decision.

As a group, we were running in the low 20s. I was able to maintain this pace without too much trouble. Except for the fact that my HRM was beeping that I was above my aerobic threshold level and running faster than I had intended.

On the way back, I switched to a slower group once we caught them and rode back with a friend. It was a much better pace, but the damage had been done, my heart rate was still higher than I wanted.

Here are the stats:
1:19:22
23.85 miles
18.0 avg
30.1 max (sprinting on a fairly level grade)
168 Avg. HR

Tags: training, bicycle, cycling, bike, Thursday night