August 01, 2004
No Stopping
The ride on the menu for this Sunday morning was the old "Blackjack Loop", which now features some smooth new asphalt on both Blackjack and Ridge Roads. Doug and I were maintaining a fairly hard pace and we made it over the first two hard climbs, Mt. Moriah & Flowery Branch Road, without a problem, but he threw his chain on Tuggle Road which has a long fast descent followed by a sharp steep climb. It's what I call the "Grand Slam" of gear shifts from the biggest possible gear to the smallest, even the pros blow it sometimes. No problem, we quickly got back into the rhythm and motored on.
As we approached the long climb up Blackjack I noticed our average speed was about 20 mph and that this was a fantastic ride for Doug. The long climb was into a headwind and hurt more than usual, but the turn onto Ridge Road now gave us the tailwind and new surface, so we sailed... maybe too much. Doug took a hard pull at the front and then blew-up losing everything and more that was gained from the effort.
Finally, with the end less than a half-mile away we attacked the climb up Sunny Hill Road. Still far ahead of a previous best time I figured it was "mission accomplished". Before reaching the top of the climb I looked over my shoulder and was shocked to see Doug off the bike walking up the hill with his helmet in his hand! I quickly looked him over for blood or broken bones but he appeared fine. I found out later that he stood up to attack the steep section when his cleat suddenly popped out of the pedal and scared the daylights out of him. Anyway, I made him remount and finish what had been the strongest ride I've ever seen him do. I told him to look at his clock because it was a record breaking effort. He said he had looked at it and thought the thing must have stopped or something.
All in all, it was a fine display of Doug's improving fitness and strength. Sure, we still need to refine a few skills but for goodness sakes, no stopping!
[Dan's HRM data]
[Doug's HRM data]