Up The Creek - Saturday, 12 May

On Saturday the team rode the beautiful, well-organized Up The Creek Without a Pedal, in Rome, GA. If you will recall, last year I gave the ride rave reviews, and this year was no disappointment in that sense. In the "how did Megan feel" sense, however, I felt like poop. I rode about half of the first 23 miles by myself, because V dropped me (she should have, my legs were tight and heavy and useless), and I spent the remaining 40 miles in a paceline with V and L (and occasionally C), which made the ridiculous headwinds more bearable. The company was great, and it made for an otherwise icky ride. It's nice having friends around when you're not feeling up to snuff.  My legs showed up around mile 40, but not for long. I was tight and heavy the whole day, and at the end of the ride J ordered me to rest this week, saying "If you want to go out and really spin easy, that is probably fine, but you suck at that." (Verbatim, it was via g-chat).

And, since he's completely right, I've imposed a week off. It's hard. It will be made easier by a few things:

1. My legs need to rest
2. I need to get work done
3. My left hand (ulnar nerve) went numb again, despite continuously changing my position and spending a fair amount of time in the drops; the hand, arm, and elbow still feel funny (as does my right elbow, but to a much lesser extent)
4. If I get the work in 2 done I get to work in B&B's quilt, and that will be satisfying

So, Saturday was a long day, with 4 hours of driving and not quite 4 hours of cycling. It was still a success, looking at the numbers, but if I had taken a proper recovery anytime in the last two weeks, instead of pushing pushing pushing through the tired, stiff legs, I probably could have bested my time from last year (I'm in better shape, with a better base).

Stats:

Maximum speed: 40.3 mph (this is for real: it was an intentional effort to get there at the bottom of a descent)
Average speed: 16.2 mph
Distance: 60.70 mi
Time: 3.43.15

Details and map can be found here. (The achievements are dubious, because V was killing it -- and me -- the whole ride, but her Strava app only recorded 22 of the 60 miles and because B doesn't use Strava).


The ride was also remarkable because it's the last one I'll do with the Tahoe/Fletcher teams until Tahoe on 3 June. This weekend I'll be riding with the Vegas team at their first GTR, and the following weekend the Tahoe team's bikes will ship (and I will be on the Giant (!!!!)) with the Vegas team. Then, it's TAHOE. Here's hoping they had the same mild winter we did.