RIDING WITH THE BIG BOYS
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Sun, 26 Aug 2007 by Michael Pajaro
My tri-team has weekly brick workouts in Griffith Park in Los Angeles. For the bike, we break into 3 groups: Beginner, Intermediate and Advanced. I always ride comfortably (and safely) with the intermediate group. This week, another intermediate friend of mine was debating trying the Advanced Workout and I told him I would do it if he did.
We took the same course as the Intermediate group. but of course it felt very different this time. It starts with a reasonable hill cliimb at a much faster pace than what I usually do. Then it was off to the time trials. We had to race as hard as we could for 5 minutes, cruise for 2 minutes, then race for another 5. Repeat.
This was a painful new experience for me. I've felt my legs burn from climbing hills before, but not from speed. It's amazing how long 5 minutes can feel while sprinting, and how quickly 2 minutes goes by when you're resting. And it didn't help that we had to do a 4-mile run right after the ride. I was pretty sore and tight driving home, but I THINK it was a good pain.
Unfortunately, I did not end the ride on a high note. We ride along the Los Angeles River trail and there is a narrow gate in a fence which we use to exit. As I rode up to it I stopped to let others through and my foot didn't clip out. I knew exactly what was going to happen, so I announced it so everyone would know: "I'm gonna fall!". I flopped over and crashed onto the pavement for all to see.
So much for being an Advanced rider.
