Training Camp

Since being accepted to ride in the Police Unity Tour, I've been focusing my training to be able to complete the entire ride, which consists of 4 days of riding. The mileage breakdown by day is about 60, 100, 100 and 40. I started with a fair aerobic base and strive to increase my mileage by about 10% per week, gradually getting my body used to long hours in the saddle. Over the winter I used the trainer a lot on weeknights when it was too dark and too cold to ride outside. Not a fun way to increase hours, but pretty effective at intervals and sustained efforts over shorter periods.

The front range winter was fairly mild, but windy as ever. Rides were fun with a tail wind, but a tailwind inevitably means a headwind somewhere along the way and cross-wind gusts could be scary. So, taking a page from the pro cyclists who go someplace warm for 'training camp,' I'm on the big island of Hawai'i for a week to ride. (actually to continue with some ongoing improvement projects on property we own, but the idea of riding in Hawai'i sounds pretty good doesn't it?). As any Hawai'i IronMan athlete can tell you, the bike route is usually windy. Somehow the wind wasn't so bad on a different route in full view of the ocean. My first loop ride took me along the coast, up through some pretty pasture lands and back through the hills above Kona. I took a GPS along and turned it into a file for Google Earth. By the numbers: 69 miles, ~2600' elevation gain over 12 miles and a mostly gradual descent back.