Hard Pedalling

I definately 'Hammer'ed it on saturday at a 50k time trial held near Iowa City. In fact, I am sort of injured and questioning my future in the discipline. 50k is about 31 miles and takes well over an hour to complete. That is a long time to be in the tucked areo position, at least it was for me, since I have never ridden my TT bike longer than 40k.

I am still paying for that effort as I have a 'saddle' issue, sore neck and limited rotational movement in my left leg. I was able to top end a very nice speed using the 53/11 gearing of my bike on the tailwind section of the course. Actually, I didn't realize I was 'spun out' of gears until I got to a downhill part and tried to shift to a harder gear.

So, now I see why some TT bikes have 56 tooth front chain rings. I guess the pros can actually use more gearing in certain conditions. I am sure I will be perfect with a 53/11 but what fun it would be to actually 'need' a bigger chain ring next year. This all depends on what cadence you pedal at. I don't have a cadence reading on my spedometer, so I will probably never know.

Anway, I will admit to not really having anything to focus to my training at the moment. I will have to come up with some sort of goal event and try for another fitness peak later in the summer.

For now, I have yet to go on a bike ride longer than 56 miles this year, so I am going to try and clear some time for a century ride. That always seems to jumpstart my fitness. The plan is to take off time from work today. I will either have a great ride, or I will make my injury worse... I will report back later in the week to let you know.

The sensible thing would be to rest more, but I am sure you can relate to how hard it is to stay off the bike when everyone else is logging serious summer mileage.