Sunday, July 22, 2018

The Mid-July Thing—Railroad Tracks of Doom—Roglich is in this group—and a Beatdown of Days of Thunder….





072218

The Mid-July Thing—Railroad Tracks of Doom—Roglich is in this group—and a Beatdown of Days of Thunder….

So…..

It is indeed mid-July and I am in that state again wherein my legs are either awesomely filled with power or completely made of dead, soft wood.  That’s what she said.  But seriously I get bewildered this time of year in regards to training because most of the base I built up in the winter and spring is withering away and all I do is hard group rides during the week for training coupled with a few of my own secret recipe vo2 intervals and sprints and that is a good way to get very fast while paradoxically losing most of your fitness.  It’s true.  Go read any number of REAL scholarly journal articles on the subject of periodization and you will soon arrive at the same dead-end road that I am on and we will meet and have a beer and talk about it.  

It is difficult to actually do real training in the middle of summer.  (by the way, I just used TWO spaces at the end of that last sentence, right up ——here^ because that is the way you should write)  During my typical week, I race on Saturday and Sunday (hopefully)—then do either a recovery ride on Monday or, if my legs are good, a very hard ride.  Tuesday is a hard group ride, usually Nebo, Wednesday could be either good or bad, depending on whether or not I remembered to pay the wizard over on that bridge at Little Eagle Creek and 146th.  Thursday and Friday I just try and eat as many M&Ms as possible while I am at work and ride usually an hour and a half each day in order to get as much recovery as possible before the weekend.  I have forsaken openers for the time being.  They are too difficult and I cannot and will not be bothered by them.  Walking around trying to find registration will serve as my openers this time of year.  Josh, Brooke, Jeff, Dave, Dom…do as I SAY and not as I DO…or, in this case, do as I write in Training Peaks and not as I write in this essay.  I am a lost soul on the road to burnout and the jimmy-legs and you should NOT attempt to do what I do this time of year.  It is a cruel and desperate time and it is about to hit its peak.  And when it does that I usually start………………………………………………………………………………running.

Now that we have that out of the way (the Mid-July Thing), we can get down to business.  First order of the night is the sad little band of misfits that gathered together to do the Village of West Clay ride, or as it is more commonly known, the Zipp Ride.  I have been doing this ride more often this year when I am not racing or working and I kind of like it.  The Zipp Ride, the VWC Ride, the Long Loop, whatever you want to call it…it is a good ride.  A ride for people who really like long stretches of very painful and sometimes worrisome pedaling.  This is not crit training.  It is straight up, just ride and rotate and go as hard as you can and make the paceline go as fast as possible up this road which is colloquially known as the Road to Hell until you get to Lebanon.  It is usually very windy and the group normally contains many strong-like-bull riders who are all too happy to drop your miserable ass and leave you in the gutter on their way up to Hell/Lebanon.  The roads are long and straight and made of chip-seal and in the spring and fall when the corn is down it is a very miserable place to ride…period.  But not today.

Today was terrific and wondrous and interesting and I liked it.  Bri met me at my house and we rode over to VWC thinking the normal group would be there and we would do the normal ride.  Justin had also committed.  I was looking forward to pedaling quickly with the Zippies and Neal and the Ortho Indy guys as per usual but that was not to happen today, no sir…not today.  Today, with the threat of potential gentle rain showers, only four brave souls came out to play.  Bri, Justin, Kyle Perry, and myself.  What were we to do?  Well, we just went and had ourselves a nice little adventure out in the wide open world where anything is possible and freedom reigns and people piss outside and the railroad crossings are evil bastards.  
We decided just to sort of cruise over to the general area of the Road to Hell and make our own route.  It was fun.  Yes, it rained on us a little bit but it wasn’t cold and the drops were more misty-like and it was actually sort of pleasant.  We just rode low tempo pace in a more or less southwesterly direction until we hit Brownsburg and then we turned north and started our way up to Lebanon/Hell.  Then I think Zeus was up in his cloud city playing with our little bike-rider statues like he did in the first Clash of the Titans movie where he could make things happen on earth just by moving pieces around on his giant magic globe thingy.  I loved that movie.  Perseus and his little gold stop-motion owl.  Speaking of Perseus, that rat bastard still owes me a lot of rent money and his goddam shield is still in the basement.  If he doesn’t pay me pretty soon I am going to sell that thing to a pawn shop.  I assume it is made of real gold as he is Zeus’ favorite.  Anyway, I have to assume that Zeus jerked the railroad tracks up just as we were crossing them because my rear wheel bounced about a foot up in the air and a foot sideways and Bri crashed.  I turned around and she was on the ground with a bloody elbow and a wonky rear brake.  No real damage or carnage so that was good but what shit luck (or was it? ;)  So we fixed up Bri and her bike and were about to start riding again and then I flatted!  I assume it was the bounce over the tracks that caused it…Kyle found a little piece of road grit in my tire.  Changed the tube and wiped all the grease off my hands with some Indiana roadside fescue and on we rode.  And then???  Kyle’s crank disintegrates while he is pedaling and he is left with two crank arms stuck to two pedals stuck to two shoes stuck to two feet…but none of them connected in the middle.  Just an empty bottom bracket shell and some dude coasting down the Road to Hell FULL SPREAD EAGLE with his thousand-dollar power cranks dangling from his feet like two little impotent clock-chimes.  It was maybe the funniest thing I have ever seen on a ride.  We all scrambled to get our phones out to film this circus act but he coasted to a stop too fast.  We snapped a few good pics though and much laughter was enjoyed by all.  Bri had an 8mm hex so Kyle put his suspect crank back together and……..on we rode.   

The rest of the ride was great.  Nothing noteworthy, just a nice, pleasant pace and no rain and we got to enjoy a decent little tailwind on the way back from Sheridan.  So… there you have it.  The Railroad Tracks of Doom tried to do us in but we persevered and turned lemons into martinis (with a twist of course) and had a genuinely fun and interesting ride which was not too difficult but long enough to call it training.  

Now on to Roglich.  All I have to say is that the group containing Roglich is bridging up to the group containing Roglich and Roglich is in that group.  This is a dangerous group; Roglich is in there.  Chris Froome better keep an eye on that group containing Roglich.  This group has twelve seconds on the group containing Primoz Roglich.  It looks like Roglich might be in this group!  Roglich.  Roglich. 

Roglich
Primoz Roglich.  ‘nuff said.

I was going to do a savage beatdown of Days of Thunder, which I have been playing on repeat at the store for the last week, but I have run out of time.  Suffice to say that this movie is so damned bad that it is great.  I mean that in the likeness of such wondrous films as Roadhouse, Rocky 4, and Point Break.  All three of which are guilty pleasures of ALL OF YOU and two of which contain the late, great Swayze and his flowing, golden locks of pure ecstasy.  


I’m off now.  Hitting the hay.  Eyes getting heavy.  I bet we wouldn’t have had such bad luck today if Roglich were in our group…

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