Well, they've stopped burning by now, but they were certainly on fire Saturday afternoon when Mitch and I joined our team at Yankee Springs for a pre-ride. Unless you count our Friday attempt at riding a kind of wet Anderson Park, Saturday's adventure was my first trail ride of the spring. It really was a blast; the weather was perfect, the trail was in great shape, and our teammates seem like really fun people.
My personal takeaways from the ride: I'm glad I spent so much time this winter strengthening my whole body. My bike handling skills seem just as solid as they were at the end of the season last year, and I attribute at least some of that to having a good, strong upper body and core. I remain confident in technical sections and need to continue refining those skills. Climbing will still be my biggest challenge, however. I need to spend some time riding challenging singletrack hills to build up endurance in my leg muscles and get better at choosing my lines amidst roots, rocks and gravel. One of my teammates, Nichole, suggested a grueling weekend at the Potowatami. With dread, I will probably take her up on that sooner rather than later. As the Yankee race is next weekend, though, and there's quite a bit of climbing, I'm just going to have to grit my teeth and grind through it as best I can, making up precious time by going balls-out on the downhills. Wheeeeeee!
(I also learned, much to my relief, that the back problems I've been having shouldn't hinder my riding. I've been seeing a chiropractor and it appears to be paying off. I also gave myself a good dose of ibuprofen before the Yankee ride and was feeling no pain! That was one of my greatest fears regarding the upcoming race season, and I'm glad it shouldn't be an issue.)
Mitch had a phenomenal ride at Yankee. This was one of his first trail rides with his new bike, and that combined with all his training helped him improve his previous Yankee time by 8-9 minutes. Now, he rode the trail backwards last time but he said it's still probably comparable. After the first lap, he and the rest of the guys went out for round two and Mitch was still well ahead of last year's race time. I think he's going to have a great season...he sure has worked hard!
As this weekend was Easter, we didn't spend the whole time riding. On Sunday morning, we went to Mitch's family's church for an 8 am breakfast, followed by worship service. Then we hung out at his parents' place, eating and talking, until about 3 pm. Somewhere in there, I almost dozed off in the warm sunlight streaming through the front windows! But no time for napping when we got home: I had a case analysis to finalize and submit for Operations Management. These things are supposed to be team assignments, but only two of us have made real contributions to the efforts so far. If we get a good grade on this one, though, we only have to turn in one more. Here's hoping...
In other news, the weather is just about nice enough for us to get the motorcycle out of storage and start riding! I'm thinking of taking a half day off this week so we could get the bike from my parents' and maybe go for one more mountain bike ride at Brighton or Island Lake before Sunday's race at Yankee. Maybe I'll go ask the boss right now!
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