A Tale of Two Tailwinds

My poor little Jetta needed some work done (maintanace stuff like timing belt, brakes, glow plugs, etc.) and the car needed to be in Lethbridge Monday morning by 8am. Rather than getting up at 6 and missing getting in a ride, I had Steve follow me into Lethbridge Sunday night, we dropped the car off - and then on Monday would be able to do a tailwinds ride into Lethbridge to get it!

We left Cardston a little later than planned, so it was going to have to be a quick ride in. Fortunately, the winds were co-operating. We jumped onto the Prarie Schooner and off we went. First check point was to be Magrath - 44 km away.

Up and down coulees, flying along. We hit Magrath in just over an hour (1:01) and an average speed of 42.7km/hr.

I felt strong. After a few minutes of warming up I felt like I could really go. The most dramatic moment to me on this ride was when we went through Pot Hole Coulee just East of Magrath. On the decent I'd let Steve get a couple of hundred feet on me, as we started climbing I started working my way through the gears. As I went by him I glanced down at my computer - I was pounding out a cadence of 103 (standing) and was going at 52.1km/hr. I felt like I was dancing onthe pedals and that I was "chainless" - what a thrill! What a feeling of freedom. I'm super motivated to get my weight down and my power up so that I can feel that on long climbs (this one is only half a km long.)

Then we hit the hard part - the last 23km of this ride is north, a straight cross-wind. I did most of the pulling, I was just feeling good. But holding 30km/hr was a tough slog. We hit Lethbridge in just under two hours, and made it across town to the dealership in a total of 2:13 or something like that.

It was great to be on the bike for more than an hour or hour and half. This was my longest ride of the year. This month will have some seious mileage in it - especially given our little adventure in a little over a week to Salt Lake City (back to back centuries.)

Tues morning I did a little recovery ride with Bart and Chico - NOT! Chico kept the pace high all the way out - Bart and I turned around at Leavitt, Chico hammered on to Mtn View. We had a nice little 37km/hr tailwind ride back, that was a nice recovery!

Tues evening I get the great idea of another Tailwinds ride! I call John and Steve (Bart had to work) and we get my wife to run us out to Waterton for a repeat of mine and Steve's tailwind ride a week or so ago.

I realized right away as we crossed the bridge and it wasn't singing to us that there was no way this was going to be a tailwinds ride! In fact, the wind had switched and was coming out of the South - we had a cross-wind of 35km/hr most of the way. Made for some hard sloggin'! Steve was feeling pretty good, and often mentioned feeling chainless. John was able to generate some pretty impressive power on some of the roller climbs. I just held on and hoped my legs would last long enough to stay with them. My legs felt heavy, and fighting the wind was really taking it's toll on them. Definitely not the Tailwinds ride I had envisioned! Oh well, I was on my bike - can't get any better than that!

This morning was supposed to be a hill climbing ride (South Hill repeates) but there was just no way my legs were ready for that, so I stayed in bed.

I feel like I'm getting some good miles in. I'm liking the performance of my Tarmac, but it's also taking some getting used to the new position.

The frame is considerably smaller than my last frame - and it has changed my position significantly. Muscles are working at different angles. In some ways I feel like I'm in terrible shape 'cause my legs are hurting in ways and places I'm not familiar with. However, the bike fits me better. I feel like I can handle the bike better - I have more confidence in what I can make it do. High speed decents are comfortable (I've only been up to just over 80 km/hr on it so far), and climbing is stiff and responsive. I do notice some of the road buzz more than I did on the Devinci. That's to be expected with a frame this much smaller and stiffer. (and lighter!) It would be great to be able to afford a Tarmac and a Rubaix - but given that I like to race, and I love the performance, the Tarmac is the bike for me! In a couple of years I may try to convince my wife to let me add a Rubaix to the Stable, but I'm very happy with the Tarmac!

Because I've been getting the feel of the Tarmac, my TT bike has been left hanging in the garage. I do need to make a point of getting out on it again sometime next week, but right now I'm really loving riding the Tarmac. I'd also like to put on my Zipp 404's to see how the Tarmac performs with them.