Saturday, May 13, 2006

Brick Workout.....Finally

Solid workout today...I didn't expect anything less. We rolled out at 7:30am to follow the same loop we did last week so I knew it was going to be HILLY.

H - I - L - L - Y

Talk about a ride that can rip your legs off.....Steven has put together a nice mix of hills in all their forms.....the steep kickers that you need to stand and muscle yourself over as your tachometer starts to inch its way into the red zone, the long extended seated climbs that you grind up in the saddle as your knees beg for mercy, the rollies with a mix of flats / hills. Since I have neglected the gym this season, this climb-fest can provide my "on-bike lifting".We rolled out on the tri-bikes since the weather was awesome today...blue skies and not too much wind until later in the day. We definitely dialed up the intensity today. For the whole ride, whenever we hit the flat sections we were rolling at 20mph+...often at 22-23mph+....solid day. Nice when you can work with someone to keep each other honest out there. It made it alot easier to maintain pace / intensity. Since we were riding much faster today, we looped on a few extra miles to finish out the day. Two thumbs up on the ride-o-meter!

Bike Stats
4:15 Total Time
72.7 Miles
17.05 MPH Ave
137 HR Ave

I was not looking forward to my first brick this season or actually in the last two years. I think the last time I ran off the bike was at IM Canada in 2004. The fact that I have neglected the bricks was weighing heavily on me...on top of that, I was running with Steven who is pretty darn quick! What the hell though, I would have to do it sooner or later and no better way then to test the fitness by running following such a tough ride. My running was definitely choppy from the get-go but we started going at a fairly good clip. I didn't realize until Steven mentioned that we were running a sub-7 pace at the two mile point, that we were running that fast. I was definitely suprised since, optimistically, I thought I could maybe hit some 8:30's. Of course I was breathing like a friggen locomotive while Steven was cruising along but was able to keep it in Z2 until my heart rate drifted into low Z3 in the last mile. Maybe it was just my lucky day and all the stars were aligned for this particular run. There has to be some reason for me running 6:50's because I shouldn't be running that pace off a tough bike ride. All in all, an excellent training day.THANKS Steven!

Brick Run Stats * corrected*
4.2 Miles Total?
28:53
6:52 / mile pace
165 HR Ave

*Peace*

8 Comments:

Blogger Lora said...

You obviously underestimate how very fit you are!!

2:48 PM  
Blogger Cliff said...

Good stuff. Sounds like a good day. I hate bricks but I am gradually getting use to runnign with heavy legs.

7:35 PM  
Blogger Steven said...

Thanks for the workout, Mike. I thought it was a perfect day for the ride and the run was good!
Lora is right - you underestimated yourself. I didn't think you'd be running 6:50's off the bike. Nice job!

I'm looking forward to the next one!

9:19 AM  
Blogger Chris said...

You two just aren't human running at paces like that. :P

11:34 AM  
Blogger Rachel said...

hills are like bad medicine. taste awful but so good for you. just gotta bite down and take it.

12:59 PM  
Blogger Nic said...

Hey Mike, You may need a new title for this blog. Sounds like the athlete within may be struggling to catch up with your athlete exterior! Dumb comment, but you are smokin' fast! Burn that rubber, man. Burn that rubber!

2:15 PM  
Blogger Donald said...

Holy cow, that's a badass workout. Way to go.

4:17 PM  
Blogger Mike said...

Pick your training partners wisely people - Some just love to "rain the pain"!!

11:17 PM  

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