So, About This Biking Thing...

disclaimer: I really did start this the next day after my previous post! However, I'm just getting back to finishing it up now, on 5/8. In the future, I won't make any bold statements about when I'll be posting, I don't want to disappoint all you faithful readers. All 2 of you are still out there, right?

Biking is fickle. One can put in approx. 1,400 miles in 4 months, but not go anywhere. That's literally and figuratively how I've felt with my biking. Literally, because most of that has been done locked into my trainer. So while I'm getting saddle time and my ass is making a new BFF, I've been stuck in one spot looking at the same scenery (unless I've been prepared enough and stopped by a Redbox to pick up a new movie). Figuratively, because all that time in the basement spinning, spinning and more spinning I thought it would translate into Lance Armstrong-like comparisons once the rubber met the road this Spring. (not literally, but you know what I mean)

I was excited to finally get the bike outside and see/feel what all the trainer rides have done for me. I felt like I was getting stronger, was able to pedal harder for longer, used higher gears (or is it lower, i.e. harder?) and actually noticed more muscle mass in my legs. It didn't quite translate into all that once a real ride came about. My first ride I thought I'd just keep fairly simple, just get used to actually moving forward, clipping in and out of the pedals again and needing to actually pay attention to my surroundings. It was a fairly uneventful ride, but once I got done I could feel the difference in my legs between an indoor trainer ride and a real ride outside. I'm not sure I could've run a 5k at that point and here I am training to run a full marathon in the IM after just 112 miles on the bike?! This first ride was pretty flat, just getting outside miles, so it was a little disconcerting to have weak legs at the end.
Issue #2 came on ride #2. The hard thing, at least for me, with a trainer is it's hard to simulate hills. Maybe I'm not torquing enough tension onto the roller? I thought I had some pretty good workouts on the trainer, but once I got outside and actually rode up some hills I realized there's no substitution for the real thing! I went on this ride with Tim, another Ironman-wanna-be-in-training. He's younger, in better shape than I am, but still being a competitor on the inside, I thought we were fairly equivalent in our biking abilities. The route he choose had some moderate, at best, climbs. I don't know if I just attacked the hills wrong, was in the wrong gear starting out or just plain wasn't ready for my workout, but it felt like I was struggling with every single incline! Tim and I would be riding along side by side (when car traffic allowed), but as soon as a hill came along I quickly resumed my rear position, and not by choice. I realized after this ride that I need to work on hills, I need to focus on the quality of the ride (make sure hills are part of the route) and not just quantity (time). Anyone can ride on roads that are like pancakes as long as their ass can withstand it, but I'll need to be able to deal with non-pancakes.

So, that's a brief recap of my first couple of rides outdoors a couple of weeks back. I'm happy to report now that I'm not feeling quite so down about the biking thing. I've had a couple of decent rides since then, another one with Tim that had some moderate-to-hard climbs that I did better with (he still dropped me going up), and a couple of workouts that I just did hill repeats on (rode up and came right back down only to ride right back up again! Yes, on purpose). I think it'll come, just gotta give it more time.

Another #s update: I didn't blog about my weight in March because I didn't lose any. Didn't gain, but didn't lose either, a little disappointing. April saw things drop a little again so that's good - dropped 4 more lbs so I'm currently sitting around 176, down 17 after 4 months.