HURT BOX Workout

This weekend was looking random for me, as the weather was predicted crap and only one crit Saturday in Milwaukee. After the past few weekends of traveling one or both days, a house that is full of dirty laundry and mail that needs sorting, I opted to stick around Madison.

This past week I feel like I may have had a turn-around with workouts and how I am feeling on the bike. Its funny, I look back to about a year ago, and think of how fit I was living in Tucson, availability to ride all the freaking time, but I don't necessarily think that there's benefit if you are doing junk workouts without structure. I have been dilligently trying to follow my "go hard or go home" combined with "easy means easy" workouts. Hard is hard, and easy is easy. There really shouldn't be much fluff in between. Fluff is fluff, and lets face it, no one is fluffin' on race day.

Tue night was the season opener for the Madison Tue Night Crit series. Holy hell, this has got to make one stronger!!! I rode over an easy 20min from the house, and did the 30 min effort in the B's race, feeling like a fish out of water in the first few laps. I found a group to work with that had been spit off the back, and though I was already discouraged being that I couldn't hang with the chase group, I was humbled by my ability to actually work harder than I have been all season (read: The crit that I DNF'd the week prior to..blech)

My group was about 4 deep and I sprinted hard to the finish, crossing ahead of the others. I thought to myself, "damn, I am just getting warmed up, let's do it again!" I rode a few cooldown laps solo, and this awesome gal Jane pulls up alongside (I had recognized her from Baraboo the week before) and she encouraged me to join her in the A's race that was minutes away from starting. What the hell, why not,right?!

So low and behold, Jane and I promised to stick together and work if we got dropped> Boy, did we EVER get dropped. Early on and for the next 40 min, we would hang to a wheel for 30-60 sec, and then recover til they lapped us again..we got lapped a milion times, but it was a super workout!

Today I was painfully introduced to the hurt box that is Jill Kislia. She is riding effin strong and kicking butt this year. Neither of us did the Muskego crit, so we instead took off to Observatory hill and did some hard (for ME!) hill repeats...Jill was encouraging the whole time, and though I am certain the workout didn't kick her butt nearly the way it did mine, I am uber grateful for her forcing me to be in pain during most of the 50 miles today. Ahhhhhh......and now I am tired..

Rachel won the Muskego Crit! Rock on ISCorp...and from what I can tell Kristin is hanging in the mix at Joe Martin...can't wait to read her race report!!!! Good luck to everyone else racing this weekend!!!

Other than that, life is good and I need to find a dress for a wedding of my dear friends next Fri.....So after a bit more downtime its off to TJ Maxx to bargain shop...happy training until next time!

IA CITY and BARABOO

Some recent races and a re-cap:

The past few weeks have been filled with many exciting events. I think my last blog entry was pre-IA so let's dig back deep in the vault and recap for just a minute

IA CITY RR/CRIT: (2wks ago?!)
RR-A 44mi race that included a large and in charge field of about 30 women, many from Team Kenda..ahem...who were kickin a$$ and takin' names all day. Kristin, Jill, Catherine, Mo, and Jessica were there and had the largest showing, as well as the win (Catherine). Unfortunately dear Mo didn't have such a fun time, as she took a spill on the 2nd lap (I think) and ended up with a second butt cheek that was full of red gunk and fluid. She didn't break anything but still, it was a crappy way to end the weekend and we hope to see her out again really soon.

Kaitlin (who is in Belgium with the natl team right now) had a great race and came in 4th, and I tried best that I could to chase most of the attacks so she could save herself for the finish. I hope it helped, and truthfully, I wished I could have done more, but I ended up popping in the 3rd lap and rode the last 12mi pretty much solo. A feeble attempt, and you have to walk away with at least learning from your mistakes. All and all, I worked really effin hard out there in the time I was with the pack, and I just need to dig a little deeper next time.

Sun's crit....well, let's just say I have NEVER DNF'd a race by choice, and I rode 4 laps of a 20 lap race. I pulled. I was pissed as hell. I'd like to forget it, so moving on :) (Kaitlin held on for 4/5th and Rachel was right there in the mix working all day..Great work ladies!)

BARABOO RR: last weekend was a super close and hilly RR that consisted of about 30 miles of solid climbing over a 15 mi loop course. Rachel, Kaitlin, Yvonne, Elicia and myself made a nice representation for ISCorp, in addition to the other 20-something women in the 1/2/3's. It was a large draw for the Kenda and MadCity teams, as both had as many or more riders.

This was probably the best I have felt all season up to this point, as I had recently gotten compact cranks on my bike, and my climbing was feeling more solid...Kaitie blew a spoke early and was out, Elicia giving up her wheel to Kaitie. Rachel and I hung on with 2 others for most of the race in the 4th group from the front and worked together to finish strong. Rachel had an awesome break on a hill with about 2 miles to the finish, and I was finally able to hold off the other women in our field and let Rachel get away. I think our group finished in the MOP but after talking with the others, EVERYONE seemed to have a tough race.