I took my bike into work this week. I’ve only done one ride, but I have another planned for tomorrow. And by “planned,” I mean “not planned at all.” But that is for after I write this blog post.
The roads up in Salmon Creek are great. Lots of country roads with little or no traffic. The drivers seem polite — far from the homicidal maniacs I seem to encounter when I ride near my house in Clackamas county.
I found one little hill, but no sustained climbs. But I’ll keep searching. The Vancouver Bike Club seems to have several routes up in my area there, so there’s bound to be something. And if my climbing resolution doesn’t work out, well, I guess I’ll survive.
But it was so nice to ride outside! I have done maybe five outdoor training rides since I took the job at ITI. The rest of my training has been on a spin bike in a dark room, or on the trainer in the garage. While there’s a certain amount of suffering that helps my racing, it really started to lose its appeal. Now the trick will be putting together a route that can handle training intensities, but I think that should be easy in the lightly populated areas I saw on my Monday ride.
The other thing That has opened up in terms of training is that Chris and I are racing to 175 lbs. We both weigh about the same: between 195 and 200. It’s exciting and it has revealed to me that I am a fairly competitive person.
For example, I started thinking about where I carry most of my weight: my upper body. I have a gut to be sure, but I have flabby arms and a lot of fat on my chest and back. Yet my training plan was focused on my cycling needs. “Was.”
I think I am now going to emphasize, in addition to my hard riding (more on that later), push-ups, pull-ups, core, and a bit of swimming. The push-ups will be the big change: I am going to try to really squeeze them in in the morning and evening along with all the other stuff I do. When I was in ROTC, I improved my push-up score quickly with relatively short workouts in my dorm. It was just a matter of doing them. No space required. Tonight I just stripped off my dress shirt and knocked out 5 sets of 10 push-ups.
The pull ups will mostly be geared to keep my shoulders healthy. I already have started focusing on core and balance work at the gym.
Finding time to swim will be a challenge, though. I am assuming I won’t get many weekend rides. I am hoping to try to get a gym workout on the weekend if I take Lo to the daycare there. But I might need to let the New Year’s Resolution rush subside.
But honestly, if I can do three lunch rides, two gym workouts, pushups in the off hours, and eat a bit lighter, I will be so far ahead of the game.
And I’ll crush Chris.





