Digging Deep.

Sounds rough, but understand this, the “wheel rut” fairies only strike once a year – twice at most.

Rsewell19

Sorry to hear about your (mis)adventure. I’da been sitting by the road crying and calling my Bride after perhaps the second of your misfortunes. Good on you for sticking it out!

I went to bed early Friday so I could get up for a self-imposed Metric century on the W&OD, but I heard the rain at stupid o’clock and went back to sleep. I got up again on Sunday to try it again an discovered how much I hate (but can never remember the pain of) the Custis Trail (the quickest for getting to the W&OD from my starting point in Silver Spring). Once I got the onW&OD proper, it was pretty lovely and I got further than ever before (around mile marker 26) and saw throngs of polite and happy cyclists (including, I think, Dirt). Turning around, though, I found that a) I’m not actually as fast as I thought (there was indeed a tailwind), b) just because it was dark when I started didn’t mean Mr. Sun had decided to take the day off, c) my limit right now is about 50-60 miles (but I was riding 70), and d) things just weren’t as flat as I thought. Arriving home, I discovered the bliss of a shower and a nap (dozing to the sounds of my boys killing Nazi zombies in Call of Duty).

We got in a long 4 miles as a family going to church, play dates and the grocery store. It was awesome.

A vaguely remember my husband sending in some broken Neuvation wheels and getting them fixed for a fraction of the new price. And then we had a talk about how maybe those wheels should stick to the trainer and training rides (v. races), — they’ve held up well since.

Holy moly! At least it can’t get any worse, can it?

My weekend went OK, although I think the heat got to me at some point. I did a hard long run workout (5 min. threshold effort intervals), a short recovery bike ride and a hard swim workout (threshold intervals and sprints) — on Saturday. On Sunday, I did a hard long bike workout (long threshold effort intervals, 12 min. each) trying to beat the t-storms (which never came) and then a threshold effort brick run afterward. (My pace/speed wasn’t quite as fast as usual, but I chalk that up to the mid-90s temperatures. I was still pushing fairly hard during the speed workouts.) I deserve an easy day today. Maybe just an easy 15-min. swim and 10-15 min. lazing along on CaBi (just to get my daily points for the National Bike Challenge).

Seemed like a tough weekend for many on the forum…I indulged my wife’s strange Olive Garden craving on Saturday night, which thankfully did not react with the fig newtons until after my ride yesterday…that would’ve just added to the misery of the ride. In addition to the punishing heat yesterday, I arrived at a point on my ride where the map told me to turn right to go under FFX county pkwy. That road, however, did not exist and it took me about 30 minutes of circuitous riding to figure out how to get across the parkway. Shortly after that, I was on a quiet road that the map shows as the designated bike route (Hooes Rd. paralleling Franconia pkwy)…decent little ride until I hit the “road closed, follow detour” sign. Well, the detour was onto Franconia pkwy, so that was not really going to work for me. So another 30 minutes of frustrated riding trying to find the way across…then, as I was cutting through on the Fairfax Cross County Trail, I fell over when I was trying to pedal up a super steep hill that I found out had a sheen of moss. It was too steep to get unclipped and there wasn’t really an alternative, so I just had to try and make it up while my rear wheel kept slipping. I was able to lay the bike down gently on the side of the path near the top, but still banged my knee up pretty good. I then through Lake Accotink, not knowing that the hilly trails around the lake are gravel and not paved, which made using my road bike pretty much impossible. So I had to abandon that and find an alternate route again, which dumped me out in a no-mans land south of the beltway and the railroad tracks, with my only viable route being up Backlick road, which isn’t exactly bike friendly. Then I cut over on Braddock, thinking I could just ride the sidewalk. Nope, sidewalk abruptly ended in a spot where my only choice was to ride about a mile in the right lane, which was a bit terrifying. But then I got it all sorted out and found my way home, but me and Fairfax county aren’t friends anymore.