Monday, August 17, 2009

2 flats and 50

For the last few days my riding/training has been pretty relaxed. I pushed a good pace on my loop through wilderness on the mountain bike but didn't push as hard as I could and on Saturday I got up to meet the guys I usually ride with on Saturday mornings before work but when I looked outside it was not only raining but I was hearing thunder and saw some lightening flashes so I bailed on that ride. I don't mind the rain so much but when I see lightening I stay in. After I got home from the shop I hung out at home for a while and then went out for a hour and half and did a strong tempo ride with some sprints mixed in but again nothing much.

Today I had to head down to Nebraska City for a family thing with the parents but when I woke up at 7:30 I was just feeling drained so I stayed in bed and decided to take the opportunity to ride down before everything got started. The last time I tried to ride to Nebraska City I had 2 flats and only 1 tube so I this time I took both the tubes that I had and headed out. At first I wasn't feeling that good but after I warmed up for a while I started to feel great and I set a goal of making to my parents driveway in 2.5 hours. I'm not sure on exactly the distance but I'm pretty sure it's a little over 50 miles.

About 15 miles outside of Lincoln I looked up cause a car made a loud noise and I hit something that was on the shoulder and my front tire instantly went flat. So I changed it pretty quick and was back on my way. I was still feeling really good and stopped around the halfway point to refill the bottles and dump the honey stinger wrappers and the blown tube I had in my pocket. I got going again and was rolling pretty good and when I got probably around 15 miles from Neb. City I started to feel my rear tire getting a little squishy and it wasn't long before it went all the way flat so I was off the bike again and changing another tire on the side of the highway. When I was changing this tire my wife passed me and called and asked if I would need picked up and I said as long as I didn't get another flat I would be good. I couldn't believe that I had gotten two flats. I made it the rest of the way without any more problems and felt pretty good the whole time except right outside of town there are some real steep rollers and I was feeling it a little but I think a lot of that was cause I knew I was almost done.

I was getting a little close to my time goal so I pushed it a little when I got closer to town and ended up making it to my parents in 2 hours and 27 minutes getting my goal. I did stop the time when I was changing the flats and when I stopped for water but I was really happy with the time that I made and was happy with how I felt. I wasn't happy about the flat tires though. I think I need to get a little bit tougher tires for when I'm just out training. I have the thin light weight race tires on and on the shoulder of that highway there is just a lot of debris that causes the flats to happen so much more than when I'm out on the county roads around Lincoln. Even with the flats it was still a great ride and a pretty good weekend of training before a long string of races starts. Later.

Harp

4 comments:

Bluenoser said...

Yup, race tire are not for training. get yourself some heavy tough ass tires for training. No flats and you'll fly on race day with the light skins.

-B

Marc Walter said...

I flatted just west of Dunbar this weekend also. Did you throw that piece of glass back on the shoulder :)

Harp said...

Yeah I was trying to make sure everyone else had to change flats too. Ha.

BB said...

Sorry about your ass. That's no fun. Been there done that - usually on RAGBRAI. The only thing that healed it was time off the bike.

Take care not to get any infection down there. The usual routine (chamois butter, always wear a clean bib or shorts, etc...). Best of luck on getting the saddle sores under control.