Friday, September 14, 2012

Spin playlist: Digging up some classics

Tomorrow (Saturday) my spin students are going to suffer the consequences of one undeniable and unfortunate fact: I was a student of the late 90s/early 2000s.

Translation: Jessica got bored Friday night and dug into the trenches of her music collection.

I pulled out a few gems, mixed in with the same old same old (because I'm a creature of habit). This is intended to be a rolling hills class, with grueling uphills and super-fun downhills :)

I will be a better blogger... soon... life has just been a little crazy lately!

Pink - Trouble: Warmup


Walk the Moon - Anna Sun: Start of a long uphill, start easy and slowly add, use all three hand positions


The Doors - Hello, I Love You: Grueling two-minute uphill in standing 3


Pat Benatar - Hit Me with your Best Shot: Speedy downhill, pickup from 1:15-1:45


Matt & Kim - Good Ol' Fashioned Nightmare: I use this song too much but it's so perfect for JUMPS!!! :)


My Chemical Romance - Welcome to the Black Parade: Another song I use way too much, but perfect for ROLLING HILLS :) :) :)


Glee Cast - Halo/Walking on Sunshine: Speedy downhill in 1 and 2!


Rolling Stones - Honky Tonk Woman: Back to the climb


Cake - The Distance: Keep climbing with 3 pickups by 5 RPMs


Gina G. -- Ooh Aaah Just a Little Bit: Quick downhill


Black Eyed Peas - I Gotta Feeling: More rolling hills, with more jumps!


Matt & Kim - Spare Change: Short recovery


MC Lars - This Gigantic Robot Kills: Quick downhill


Big & Rich - Save a Horse, Ride a Cowboy (laugh all you want, LOVED THIS SONG in college) - Uphill


Nelly - Just a Dream - Cool Down


Tuesday, September 11, 2012

Upcoming races

Now that the unplanned century is done, here's what's on my plate for upcoming races:

Sept. 30: Rochester Autumn Classic Duathlon, 2 m run, 10 m bike, 2 m run, 10 m bike, 2 m run

Nov. 3: Mendon Trail Run, a 5K, 10K or 20K, whatever I think I can do :) 

It looks like there's an indoor triathlon that goes in March that I may want to try, but this website isn't updated :( 

Monday, September 10, 2012

Race report: Highlander Cycle Tour Corkscrew Century

Best swag ever.
Observation #1 from my first organized bike ride: Cyclists kinda speak a different language. "Hey flat handlebars, nice." "I did that whole hill in the big chain ring." There was no t-shirt involved either (just a bottle of wine, which more than makes up for it!)

I asked someone there, "where's the starting line?" "The starting line?" "Yea... where we start?" "Oh, there's no line, persay, just roll out whenever you want. Go that way."

Observation #2: After waiting in long, long, long ladies room lines before MIT and running events watching men walk right in and out of an empty bathroom, I learned that distance cycling is more men than women, sweet revenge, muhahaha.... :)"

Observation #3: Once they're done bragging about their equipment (ah-hem, Mom ;) ) they are such a wonderful community! I was lucky to not get a flat, but my chain popped out (shifting too quickly) and three people stopped in the middle of this massive uphill to see if I needed help. And everybody I saw changing a flat had others helping.

I did the Highlander Cycle Tour Corkscrew Century Saturday. I rode 101 miles in 8 hours and 7 minutes at an average of 12.5 mph.

(This will be a long post, but it was a long ride. The short version.)


Saturday, September 8, 2012

First Century complete!

Well, the blogging from the road thing didn't work out so well because once I was within 10 minutes of Bristol Mountain there was no cell signal and it remained that way the few times I checked during the ride.

Here's the short of it! I'll do a full race report tomorrow and upload the few photos I took. Right now it's Netflix time.

The course: Rough! So hilly! (And my course was the easier of the two Century options.) I actually had to walk my bike up a few hills, and according to my Garmin (no clue if it's accurate) I hit speeds of 30 mph going downhill. Now that was fun.

The event: The Highlander Cycle Tour, Corkscrew Century. I highly recommend it, they did a great job from start to finish.

My time: 8:07, a 12.5 mph pace.

The weather: Miles 1-50 - cool, light rain; miles 50-70 - pouring rain, I could barely see at some points! Then at Mile 70 it cleared up and at Mile 90 the sun came out -- glorious!!

More tomorrow:)

Corkscrew century: It's go time!

Maybe ill get a new sticker for my car today :)


Friday, September 7, 2012

Follow me on my bike ride tomorrow! (maybe)

I'm going to attempt to blog/Tweet/Facebook photos and updates from my bike ride tomorrow. I'm doing the Highlander Cycle Tour starting at Bristol Mountain in Canandaigua, starting at 7 a.m. I might be riding 41, I might be riding 100, I really don't know yet :)

I say attempt because:

  • I might not get cell phone signal
  • My cell battery might not last the entire trip
  • I might get too preoccupied and forget
  • I'm not sure if I set up TwitterFeed right

So if you don't hear from me by midday tomorrow don't worry. If you don't hear from me by midday Sunday please kindly come to about mile 80 of the course and scrape my remains off the side of the road :-P

We'll see what happens!

Monday, September 3, 2012

Duathlon practice

I'm a little nervous for the Rochester Autumn Classic Duathlon Sept. 30, mostly because it's going to be my first multi-sport event. So this weekend I got a little practice in.

My mom came to visit this weekend bearing gifts! She brought me some cycling gloves, clip in shoes that fit my hybrid, and best of all -- smaller tires! Now I can go faster. If I'm pushing, I'm riding around 16 mph. If I'm taking it easy I'm going around 14. Before it was 11 and 14! This made me very happy. Thanks mom :)

I did two rides with my mom while she was here. On Saturday we rode the canal trail to Pittsford where we got dinner and gelato. Then Sunday, via my mom's suggestion we rode the duathlon route at Mendon. The hills were killer. Absolutely killer. I loved it!

The main thing I'm nervous about, though, is transitioning to running. I haven't been running much lately, so this morning on the advice of some Facebook friends I went out for another brick workout. I rode to Pittsford and back, which is 20 miles, and got off the bike 5 times to run -- 3 times running one mile, twice doing a half mile.

Running right off the bike reminded me of the last few miles of my marathons. My legs were completely numb and I had no sense of how fast I was going. I thought I was chugging along at a 12 minute mile, but when the laps on my watch reset I was running closer to a 9:30! Ooops! (At least I'm getting faster again).

But each time I feel like I'm recovering and getting into the groove of the run faster, definite plus!

I'm a little sleepy now... hello Netflix.