Patrick Anderson's Blog

This week we revisited a ride that I absolutely hated at the beginning of last year. Deer Creek was the first real climbing we did last year and it was the first for many on this year's team. And this year we started further up the Platte River Trail (at Overland Pond Park).

The ride down the Platte River Trail looks flat but it is actually a slight incline. It isn't too bad and with fresh legs, is just an easy ride. Once we hit Chatfield State Park, we were confronted with our first real challenge: we had to climb to the top of the dam. It is a pretty short climb, but is definitely a wakeup call. This brought back memories of last season when I fell to the pack of the group and need to lay down in the grass at the top of the dam. This year, I chugged up the climb and just kept going.

After we left Chatfield, we took a short break on the side of the road to refill our water bottles and grab a fig newton or two. We had 8 miles of climbing ahead. We kept the break short because we didn't want our legs to cool off too much and we just wanted to get the climb out of the way.

A small group of us left the SAG stop early and started the grind up Deer Creek. The weather was a cool 45 degrees or so, but we soon worked up quite a sweat. As I was trudging up the road, I once again thought about last season. The first time I did Deer Creek, I stopped 3 extra times and nearly fell over at one point because I was going so slow. Deer Creek is still tough, but I was able to go up without stops and and a decent pace.

Of course, the best part of any climb is going back down. The roads were in pretty good shape and we were able to fly. We ended up just pushing all the way back to our start point without any stopping (well, we had to stop for a flat, but that is it.)

I had this copy of my Moab Century video on my hard drive since last year, but I didn't want to upload to YouTube since I used copyrighted music. But from what I understand, You tube won't necessarily delete a video with copyrighted video, but they will show links for people to purchase the music. Just to be safe, I uploaded this with my other account.

So here it is... With better music:

Here are some highlights from today's TNT ride. This is the third week of training for America's Most Beautiful Ride around Lake Tahoe on June 3rd. The ride started at Bicycle Village in Aurora, went through Cherry Creek State Park and down to the E470 area. Total mileage was about 31. (see the complete map at MapMyRide.com)

This week, we had plans to visit friends on Friday evening in Colorado Springs. We weren't sure how late we'd get home and were worried we wouldn't be ready for an early morning bike ride. But thanks to the kindness of our friends, we stayed at their place Friday night and got the opportunity to ride with the Colorado Springs TNT group.

When we woke up Saturday morning, we had an email in our inbox. The Springs got a dusting of snow and our coach had been out to check out the roads already. He changed the start time and location of our ride to make sure we didn't have too much snow to deal with.

At 10ish, we met at the Old Town Bike Shop in downtown Colorado Springs. After checking out some gear in the shop for one of the new riders, we headed out on the streets. We made are way over to the Pikes Peak Greenway. It was still a bit chilly in the shady spots with the occasional slick spot from snow. I think the temp was right around 32 degrees.

After we got off the trail, we went up Woodmen Road. It starts off as slight incline and keeps getting steeper. By the time we made the left onto Orchard Valley Road, the climb was getting pretty steep and we were getting warm despite the near freezing temps. This climb was relatively short and not that steep compared to the training we did last year, but because it was only our second training ride of the season, it was still tough. 

Luckily it was over pretty quickly... and then it was back down the hill and the fun part of the ride. We had a nice easy ride back to our starting point and along the way I chatted with Natalie. She is a new TNT member. She told me her personal story of being diagnosed with Lymphoma just about 2 years ago. She underwent 6 months of treatment and is cancer free. That was a good way to finish the ride and be reminded the reason we are doing this in the first place.

After last week's kickoff meeting was almost snowed out, we were all hoping for good weather for the first day of training. That was not to be the case. When I loaded the bikes on our new bike rack, it was snowing again and about 15 degrees. 

Of course, our coach was prepared for this. We all met at Bicycle Village and had gear clinic and then did an hour of indoor riding using the trainers. 

This was the first time I have had an organized training session like this and it was a bit tougher than I had imagined. First of all, when you are riding on a trainer, there are no downhills or stoplights to give you a break. In addition, our coach kept us pushing ourselves to work harder. At each change in the music she brought, we were encouraged to change our cadence, gear or riding position. It made for a very good workout, but I'd still prefer to be outdoors next week.