What the hell is that smell?!
Ohhhhh, that’s my sad excuse for LEGS, aka sacksofshit. While they’ve never been magnificent chiseled trunks of unstoppable locomotion, they’ve usually been know to handle their own on the track or anything that required some sort of sprint (on the flats of course, because, who’s heard of anything Hella Fools!!! related moving fast uphill?!).
My riding this year has totaled a whopping 59 miles! I think that might include the few couple hundred feet I spent trying to get my Garmin to recognize my cadence monitor.. and then there was that one time I used my bike as a prop for a film short at work. Let’s round it up to a complete 60 then. 60 glorious miles since the 2009 Gran Fondo. To be fair (according to RangsiWHAAT, these are also called “excuses”), I don’t have anything planned until October 2010, and I wanted to get all my tattoo work out of the way this year so I can properly focus on triathlon training this year and next. I’ve got one last session in mid-May, and hopefully that’ll be it until the next tattoo. That mean’s I can officially start “riding” in June, “swimming” in July, and “running” late May.
So, back to my sacksofshit legs. Yesterday’s ride included my usual loop, but at an LSD (long, slow, distance) type pace of 3 hours, or 30 miles, whichever came first. Ideally, that also meant keeping my heart rate below anywhere close to threshold. And with all that mental preparing I did, I ended up with 30 miles in a little over 2 hours, with my heart rate above threshold. W. T. F. I’m not sure what happened. I didn’t get the usual ‘that-jerk-didn’t-call-out-on-your-left-I’m-gonna-chase-him-down-and-yell-ON-YOUR-RIGHT’ feeling at all, I think it was just me not paying attention to what I should’ve been doing. The wind was heinous on Cañada, as usual, but I’m pretty sure I compensated by doing what I do best.. SLOWNESS.
The few things I did do right (or, better yet, better than I usually, but never ever right right) was recovery. I had a small bit of recovery drank in the car since I refrained from anything other than water on the ride. I’ve read a few articles on training your body to use fats instead of easy-peasy carbs flowing through the two IV’s I carry on my bike filled with CytoSport. I’m not sure if there’s even any verdict out on it, but if anything, I do want to ween myself off the sugar goods until I’m really doing work and dragging my ass up and down hills for 70 miles. After I got home, I slid on my Skins compression Sport Sox and elevated my legs. And we don’t even have to go into the food, because I did done ate it. Nothing too shitty, just some protein and carbs and a touch of vegetables. Just a touch, because anything more would’ve caused way too much gas, and I had a party to attend for this girl that.. well.. yeah. That’s a different story for a different day, maybe some day that’s greased with alcohol. I’ve been relying on the Skins Sox for recovery as of late, and I think they’re doing the trick. My legs don’t feel half as bad as they used to, and I think I’m up and about sooner than I usually am. Now don’t get that twisted in any way, because my legs are still two sacksofshit, but they’re certainly less sore sacksofshit. They felt horrible immediately after the ride, but 24 hours later, they were in respectable condition. I even planned a run today, but happily canceled when I noticed the rain. A longer term review to come once I pour the hot butter on the rides and start adding volume.
Until the next brainfart..