Category: Training
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The Birmingham Monsters, addendum
When I was exploring the Birmingham Monsters on Wednesday, I knew that I didn’t really have time to go out and hit up my favorite monster in Birmingham – Double Oak Way. So today the opportunity came up to ride out that way and report on the stats of three more monsters and one more…
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The Birmingham Monsters (aka 20 percenters)
Jacob Tubbs sent me a link yesterday to a climb near Trento, Italy called the Scanuppia – Malga Palazzo which averages 17% for nearly 5 miles with maximum pitches of close to 45%. Yesterday, I went out to find the steepest climbs in Birmingham for comparison purposes. I think we will call it the Scanuppia…
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January to remember…
OK, so I’ve just finished up the most insane month of training ever. It has been a great month, though, and I’m very confident now that it is going to pay off with sustained fitness to carry through the racing season when the intensity goes up and the mileage (and climbing!) goes down. The key…
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Climbing galore and red-tailed hawks
Today was awesome. I’m going to try to convey some of the ride highlights, but I think this post is going to be kinda long. First, as I was climbing up on top of Double Oak Mountain, a red-tailed hawk swooped down from a tree beside me and flew in front of me for a…
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10,000+ feet of climbing
10000 feet of climbing in one ride – the garmin edge 800 cannot display 10,000 feet because it only can display 4 digits in any one column as shown in the red circle! As a side note, the yellow circle indicates what in my opinion is one of the best new features of the Garmin…
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Bad accident narrowly avoided
Today, I narrowly avoided a really bad accident more by luck than anything else unless there was some angels keeping me from low or high-siding the bike during the sideways skid to avoid a collision with a pick-up truck. Here’s the details and a caution / warning for a particularly bad intersection in the Hoover…
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Cold and Icy Double Oak Mountain
Great ride today – very cold though! I climbed up Double Oak Mountain to see if there was more snow and ice up near the top because of the elevation difference. I was surprised to find trees sagging under the weight of a lot of ice. I think we dodged a bullet here in Birmingham…
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400 mile week, Strava online competition, a fun look back at old milestones
401 miles this week with 37,373 feet of climbing! I wasn’t sure if I was going to ride today with the winter storm warning, but the system wasn’t moving in until later in the day. So I rode 45 miles on the way to church with almost 6,000 feet of climbing. Then after church I…
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How hilly is your ride?
We just got back to Alabama after traveling up to Wisconsin for Christmas and New Year’s. On the way back home, we stopped to visit Kristine’s grandmother in northern Indiana. During the trip, I got to ride in Wisconsin and Indiana. Then yesterday I did a 54 mile ride with over 6000 feet of climbing…
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Dick’s to the Rescue
The weather forecast called for a cold rain pretty much all day today back here in Birmingham. But as I was working from home, I noticed a huge gap in the rain clouds on the radar. So I decided to go for the 60 mile climbing ride that I’ve been wanting to do after the…