Back to Basics

Every year I spend the early spring getting back in shape. This involves doing longer and hillier rides. It always a balance of pushing myself to improve my fitness without going beyond my limits. This has been a little harder this year as I was not able to ride as much during this winter. This not only reduced my fitness but also my confidence about how hard to push myself. However the last couple of weeks has helped me regain both. 

Last week after getting rained out on Saturday I did an ad hoc ride out of Cranbury. Years ago when I first started riding I did a lot of rides out of Cranbury because it was closed to where I lived but have since expanded the places I start from to get more variety. I had not done a ride out of Cranbury in over a year but it is still a good and convenient place to start so may occasionally start here again. We did this route which was just over 46 miles and the longest ride this year. I was concerned that I would fade at the end but didn't have any problem or cramp up and finished at at a good pace. There was some construction by Englishtown so won't do this route again until that is finished. However there are a lot of other routes from Cranbury that I could do.

This Saturday I bailed on the Spring Fling as I wanted to start working on my climbing. I created this route to the Blawenburg Bistro a couple of years ago to test out my hill legs and wanted to see where my fitness was this year. Although the weather was sunny at the start it clouded up halfway through the ride but at least the wind wasn't too bad. There are no real killer climbs on this route but there are some gradual long climbs and a few short steep bumps. I was surprised that I could climb as good as I did since I hadn't done any hilly rides since early November. 

We did hit some wind later in the ride from the south but it didn't really slow us down that much. My legs were sore at the end of the ride but not to the point where I cramped which has been a problem for me on some hilly rides. These past two weeks have given me the confidence that I can push myself harder that I thought. This means that I should be fit enough to do any ride I want.