First ride of 2011 outside

It's so nice today! I think it's the first really nice day of the year. Which makes going for the first ride of the year the perfect thing to do.

I got the orange trainer tire off no problem and was careful about getting a road tire on. All the other preparations went well, making my energy drink, fixing the brakes, getting the other bottle cages on the bike again, finding the saddlebag with the spare tubes, finding the sunscreen (yes it's that sunny) and a few other things. By ten am I was ready to go and didn't really want to wait anymore. I'd been waiting long enough. I suppose I should have worn the arm warmers I dig out of the pack of triathlon stuff. I was just a bit cool during most of the ride.

Even after I started I didn't have any idea which ride I was going to do or how long I'd be out for. There was a stiff breeze on 22x so I decided to go down Road to Nepal. While I love that ride I wasn't sure it's a good one for a first ride. Most of my readers will know it's a tough hilly ride and one never knows how trainer fitness will translate to the road. I was thinking it might be a bit much for my knee. In the end I figured I could always dial back on the effort and in the worst case call Linda to come and get me.

The first couple hills were ok, but while going up that really long one just after the road turns south my knee started to complain. It wasn't painful, more like a strong ache at one point just when my foot starts descending. I'd been trying to keep the cadence up, but it felt like this was just a bit too much effort, or would be if I pushed for too long.

I turned around and took a bit of a scenic ride home. I didn't push so much on the hills and my knee felt ok, but not so much better that I wanted to extend the ride any great amount. I ended up riding 1.75 hrs for 38Km. Ok for a first ride of the year, I suppose, especially considering how little time I spent on the bike over the winter. But it's not an encouraging start for a half IM in 8 weeks. I'm seriously considering not doing any tri races this year to avoid stressing my knee. Maybe I'll see if I can find a team that's looking for a swimmer.

After a short transition I ran 15 minutes, mainly to see what my legs would think. It wasn't bad, but not good either. I was feeling a bit heavy footed.

Weekly Summary
Swim 3.75 hrs
Bike 3.0 hrs
Run .75
Total 7.0 hrs
Cor 2.5 hrs