Century Plus

Rode from Mt. Lookout to he Augusta Ferry to Augusta, Ky then on to Maysville. From there it was back to Ohio through Aberdeen and on to Ripley and then the 50 miles back home for a total of 114 miles in just under 6 hours (5:55). WOnderful day to spend on the bike. Taking tomorrow off to enjoy my 52nd complete trip around the sun.

This Week So Far

Rode the Cleves TT on Tuesday and posted another 22:32, 355 watts avg. A little lower on the watts. Could have been the tailwind to the finish. Rode two long tempo efforts today, 30 minutes at 302 and 20 minutes at 311, entire 1:15 ride at 270 normalized power. Going for a long ride tomorrow hopefully, 100+ if all works out.

Smoky Mtn Century

Rode from Gatlinburg, TN to Cherokee, NC, via Newfound Gap, then back to Newfound Gap and on to Clingman's Dome. From there it was downhill to Sugarlands and out to Elkmont and then back to the chalet for 100 miles and 10,000' of climbing in 6.5 hours. Beautiful day to ride, but that is a tough ride.

Cleves Tonight

All of the results are posted on the Queen City Wheels Facebook page. Good group of riders, 33 total, with 14 riding new PR's. I did a 22:32, 27.4 mph, and held 360 watts. Should be able to get into the low 22's and maybe even upper 21's but the end of the summer.

This Week

Will be managing but not riding the Cleves TT tonight so I can put a little more into the Blue Streak TT on Wednesday evening. have actually had a small taper the last few days. The winter and spring training was really adding up. Time to put all of these intervals to use. Would like to average 360+ on the watts tomorrow night.

Mega-Hike

this is a post from a facebook friend. He does solo hikes in Great Smoky national Park. Pretty amazing journey a few weeks back especially given how little he carries with him for 6 days and 150+ miles. He also did a solo bike ride across Alaska a couple of years ago. He was gone for 30+ days on that one. A few weeks ago, during my spring break, I completed my longest solo backpacking trip to date: 157.3 miles with 38,286 ft of elevation gain in an elapse time of 145 hours (about 6.1 days). Temperatures ranged from 20 F at night to 80 F during the day with crazy creek crossings and amazing ridge line views. These mountains are certainly some of the most spectacular found in the Eastern United States, and I am fortunate to have had the opportunity to explore them over the past six years. As usual, I took no stove, no water filtration, no water purification, nor tent; just a tarp. Food consisted of homemade jerky and homemade dried fruits with nuts of various kinds. Base weight for my pack was 8.3 pounds. I'm already looking forward to getting back on those trails this coming fall/winter, but only after busting out some sweet miles on bicycles with good friends.

Interval Friday and Saturday

Did 6x5 minute steady states on Friday with power in the upper 340's to low 330's. Today, given the rain, I rode some inside this morning and then went out to get in 10x1 minute power intervals (444, 468, 490, 493, 493, 511, 506, 496, 513, 513) averaging 493. Then I rode a little more inside. Todays graph is below. Shows how steady the power can be inside. Bought a Giro Selector TT helmet but I don't think there is anyway that I'll be able to use it. Have the L size and it is much too tight. I really like the helmet design. Can't understand why the L is so S. I have four of their helmets and L fits fine on them.

Clients Having Great Spring Racing Seasons!

I have a number of clients who are putting together great spring seasons from Robin Z in ST. Louis, Katrina S in her first season here in Cincinnati, The UC Cycling team making its first ever appearance at collegiate nationals, Andy J hitting the local tt races, Chuck S placing in several of the OSRS events along with those riders just looking to ride centuries, tours, etc. Finally some nice weather to get outside after a long winter training indoors.

First Cleves Time Trial

Nice evening but a slow time at 22:55, just under 26.9 mph. Not too motivated after the races over the weekend and riding the early shift with just a few others. Pretty much on my own after mile 3. Used the Stages crank arm and held 355 watts, about as expected. Need to up that to 360+. Riding the Blue Streak this upcoming Wednesday.

Spring Series Omnium TT

I rode just the tt portion of todays events. Short course at 3.83 miles. Rode it in 8:47, average power at 378, cadence at 98, 4.9 watts/kg. Overall pleased with that effort. Still a little too cold and too windy for me with temps in the upper 40's to low 50's. Won the 45-54 category and in the top ten overall.

Cleves Time Trial Series Starts Next Week

originally posted to the QCW google group: The 2014 Cleves Time Trial Series will start next Tuesday, May the 6th, and continue through the last Tuesday in September, the 30th. This will be the 41st consecutive year the series has been held and for that matter held on the same road all of those years. This has allowed us to accumulate an amazing amount of information including the best times by everyone who has ever ridden the course to the best times for every year to most podium placements to the riders who have been least likely to call out his/her number at the finish. Visit our website to browse through and marvel at the stats. Thanks to Jonathan Spicker for having the patience to keep things in order and for having the sense to not trust me to do it. Some general rules and regulations are worth noting: We do not sell QCW memberships on site so please take care of this as noted on the website. The QCW membership is required to ride the event. Its quite a bargain when you prorate the $20 cost over 22 time trials. https://www.bikereg.com/21682 Please park at the finish line by the Wm Henry Harrison Tomb. We want to keep the neighborhood where we start open for the residents to park and it never hurts to spend some time in the presence of our 9th president who only spent a little over 30 days in office before falling ill and dying. There's something appropriate about him watching over us at the finish line each week. On-site registration for each Tuesday time trial will start around 6:30 pm at the start line. The first rider will go off around 7:00 pm and we go as close to "this-is-as-fast-as-I-can-go-so-cut-me-some-slack" (no one is actually slow) to "I-really-take-this-much-too-seriously-will-shaved arms-help" order as possible. Riders showing up after the start list has been announced may be placed at the end of the list or may be worked into the list. Depends where we are in the process and what kind of mood we're in. We will have a small group riding at 5:30. This is to allow the people manning the clocks at 7:00 the opportunity to still satisfy their compulsive need (ok, disorder) to ride the course. We do allow a few others to ride at that time (ideally slower so we can pass you) but we need to know ahead of time as we usually only have one person to hold and time and that person is usually riding at 7 so time is limited. Email me directly at pwimberg@aol.com if you would like to ride early on any given week. Otherwise its me chasing Dallman and Dallman holding me off. We'll review other rules at the start each Tuesday. Maps to the course along with elevation changes are on the website. Flags and smoke stacks in the area provide all we need to know about wind conditions. Hope to see many of you Tuesday and maybe even Saturday as we test the first 3.7 miles of the course. http://www.qcw.org/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=7&Itemid=9 Peter A. Wimberg