Winter Endurance Ride

[BartonJB]

Winter Endurance Ride

In winters past a small group of us did a different sort of Sunday (sometimes Saturday!) ride. I'd like to do something similar this winter starting next Sunday, Nov 13. We would start with the regular Sunday distance, 65 k, and building thru the winter by 5 k a week up to 120 to 140 k by late spring early summer. LSD, building endurance.

The ultimate goal for me is to be somewhat prepared for next summers Big Loop Ride and maybe a long Fondo or two.

The way it would work is we would meet at the Starbucks at Uptown for a 7:30 Sunday morning start. We would head out in two by two formation and after 15 or 20 K move into a single file line. We would keep it fairly disciplined with maximum of 2 minute pulls on the front at a steady pace. It is kind of important to have a GPS devise so you can see what the speed we are moving at so you can maintain that when it is your turn on the front. The person on the front of the line maintains the pace while the last rider keeps an eye on the clock. After 2 minutes, the rider at the back calls out "Coming up!" then zips up the the front, settles into the pace, and pulls nice and steady while the new last person keeps an eye on the clock and calls out "Coming Up!" after the next two minutes.

If you are not feeling great, pull shorter! If you are feeling great, maximum 2 minutes on the front!!

This has shown to be quite effective at keeping us together and keeping us engaged and aware of what is going on. The idea in my mind is to increase the distance while also maybe slightly increasing the pace to a point that we can hold 25 to 26 K/Hr over 4 or 5 hours or longer!

Anyone and everyone is welcome to join and participate. Strong riders should be aware we will be going long and slow!

I will also post this on the TSC forum (I am after all well over 60!). The Forum, Ride Planning, will be where the rides will be posted. It will likely be the same start time and place unless there is consensus to change either.

The route will change every week. One week we'll go flattish up the Peninsula, the next week more hilly out Metchosin way. I'll post a file link for the route that folks should download to their Garmin or Wahoo or whatever devise.

With consistent riding, this has been very effective at building winter endurance. Another nice thing about riding consistently in the winter months is when the first beautiful days of spring finally arrive, it feels so incredibly good to ride in nice weather after weeks and months of rain and wind and cold and dark!!

Cheers! Barton.

[BartonJB]

The route for Sunday Nov 13:

https://connect.garmin.com/modern/course/137016809

Let me know if there are issues opening and downloading.

Leave Uptown Starbucks at 7:30.

[BartonJB]

That was great! Just 3 of us. Nice and smooth. And a great day for pre winter riding!

To give you an idea of pace and such, 65.5 K, Avg Spd 23 K/Hr, 715 m elevation gain. And that was on my summer bike!