Training Log, February 10, 2010

So today totally did NOT go as planned.

The reason I come to Tucson is because IT DOES NOT RAIN. It's a fucking desert, duh! I study the historic averages on the Weather Channel like over achievers study for the GREs. It rains one inch/month in Tucson in January and February. It rains four inches/month in Athens, and about 3.5 in Gainesville. That means one day of rain/month, here, typically, and one/week in Georgia and Florida. If I'm going away from home for the winter, I can't tolerate one missed day of training/week.

I dunno if it's El Niño or what, but it's been raining once/week in Tucson this winter. And on that day, it really rains. When the streets are the drainage ditches, it can not only be difficult to ride, it can be dangerous, if not impossible.

Today, it rained. Which is ok; I was expecting rain, temps in the high 50's, and I had a plastic jacket. But that's not what we got. We got freezing rain, pebble sized hail, and nasty wind. And it didn't start until I was 2.5 hours into the ride.

Things were ok at first. I've been meeting up with my teammate Toby Marzot at 10 am, and we rode out to Mt. Lemmon. He had a few 15-minute threshold intervals to do, and I had one. My teammate from last year, Logan Loader, met up with us as well, and his ride matched up with mine. We did a 5 or so-minute block of tempo just as a little warm up before we got to the mountain, and then started with 15 minutes of threshold. I was actually aiming for 20, and targeting around 315 based on what I'd done for numbers in the Shootout last weekend. I felt comfortable at first, and probably over started, spending a little too much time up around 330. Once I got about 12 minutes in I started to struggle a little, and opted to pull up 15 minutes rather than deal with the depressing fade for those final 5.

On the way down the mountain, we were overtaken by a horde of blue and white which turned out to be the United Healthcare guys. They done an hour long session up to mile 14, where it was apparently already snowing. Tim Johnson and I talked 'cross at 40 mph back down the mountain, got caught up on the state of the nation, and plans for next January. Kinda funny, now that I think about it. Singletrack minds?

At the bottom, The Team Formerly Known As Ouch stopped for coffee, Toby went back up the mountain, and Logan and I plodded on. And then it started. We were about 2:20 in when it started misting. 5 minutes later we were being sandblasted by ice pebbles from the sky, and we rushed to the closest convenience store for an early lunch. Convenience stores can be an hour or more apart once you're out of town, so we were lucky to be close.

The rain didn't let up, and we knew there was nothing tough guy about 3 more hours in potentially dangerous weather. We were about an hour from home, so we jumped back on and started a block of tempo as soon as we were clipped in. As we hit the stop lights on the edge of town, the rain let up slightly, but the damage was done. Fingers gone, toes gone, soaked to the bone in ice water. It was the kind of cold where you couldn't get in the shower right away else your extremities would hurt even more, but once you were in, you just stood there staring blankly for minutes at a time before you remembered yourself.

It looks like only one more day of winter here, though:

http://www.weather.com/outlook/health/fitness/tenday/USAZ0247

And then it'll be back to normal. I don't mean to complain, though. I know most of you are getting pounded by 6-12 inches.

Yes. I said it. How could I not?

Enjoy.

  Interval 1:

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