I'm really amazed at how much difference position on the bike makes in what muscles are being worked. This was my first day on any bike since Saturday and my first back on the Sirrus in a week. Immediately, I felt more cramped up than I had stretched out on the 55 cm Javelin. My quads were working much less hard than they had on the Saturday ride, which leads me to believe the bike affected my lack of punch.

After getting entirely decked out to commute yesterday only to walk outside and see the rain, I was happy to be back where I belong and rode fine--a good average in both speed and HR.

I rode the second leg of my first ever attempt at a three-ride-day at lunch with Thor and Keith Blinn. We rode a snappy ten miles further down the W&OD and back. After chatting a bit at the start it was a nice paceline the whole way. It was probably a bit too speedy to be doing really but it was comfortable enough. You can really open things up going from Orbital to Leesburg. There's only a few crossing to slow up for and otherwise it's straight as an arrow. I can see how wind my attack you on a bad day in the wrong direction.

I knew my legs would be garbage so I did my best to ride home with a low HR. I even did the ride up Wilson and back into the city at a slow pace--ignoring the idiot who insisted on honking and then passing at a dangerously close distance. I only laughed when I ended up ahead of him after a couple lights. I'm trying to get more mellow when dealing with idiots behind the wheel.

Today I registered for my first two road races. The season will kick off at the Stasburg Road Race up in Pennsylvania on March 18th. That will be followed by the Jefferson Cup a week later. I'm obviously at Cat 5 in both, but the Strasburg race has a 4/5 combined field. The races are 22 and 30 miles long. I'm pretty excited even now, but once I get my new bike, it's gonna be awesome.

Dist / Time / Avg / Max / Avg HR / Max HR / Odo
23.3 / 1:21:57 / 17.1 / 29.6 / 160 / 183 / 398 / 23:29
19.3 / 0:58:53 / 19.8 / 27.9 / 169 / 208 / 417 / 24:27
23.1 / 1:22:51 / 16.8 / 29.6 / 152 / 178 / 440 / 25:49