Eagle, ID — After last night’s race, I wanted to do a good ride today so I’d have two hard workouts within 24 hours. I was going to meet up with Ted to do some dump loops, which is a 13-mile, undulating loop going through Hidden Springs on the west and Bogus Basin Rd on the east. Since I wanted to do a longer ride today, I first rode my usual 1-hour loop by my house on the PowerCranks. Then I stopped home and switched bikes, and headed over to meet Ted. On the way out I met up with Jim from our club, who was also supposed to join us. It was a windy day and anytime we headed due east, we had a major headwind. We met Ted at the designated spot then we headed up Seaman’s Gulch Rd towards Hidden Springs. I was feeling good on the climb and kept the pace steady. There’s construction on the Dry Creek bridge, so we had to find our way through the residential area to get to the other section of Dry Creek/Cartwright.

Once on Dry Creek, we headed east into the headwind. I had switched out cogsets so I’d have a 25, but with the headwind and the steepness of the climbs on Cartwright, I was wishing for a 27! I kind of pushed the climb since I didn’t want to let my RPMs drop too low. I was feeling good on that climb so I pushed it over the top, down the hill and then up the next climb. Ted and Jim didn’t want to go that hard so they rode at their own pace. I decided that doing more dump loops with this cogset wasn’t the best workout for me so I decided that I’d do some threshold work on Bogus. I told Ted of my plans and Jim and Ted decided to ride to Lucky Peak instead. We parted ways and I headed up Bogus.

I just rode tempo up the “prologue” hill to Corrals. It felt pretty easy, but that was probably due to the tailwind on that section. I rode tempo to the bottom of the switchbacks and that’s where I started my 20-minute threshold interval. I kicked it up a few notches and started the interval. The first two minutes were hard, and I doubted whether I could do a whole 20 minutes. But after a few minutes, my body adjusted to the effort and it got better. At times I would notice my wattage was lower than my target and I’d have to pick up my pace, but overall it wasn’t too hard to keep it in my target range. I actually liked the way I was feeling. It hurt, but not in a bad way. I realized that I missed doing long climbs like this.

Since the Bogus ski area is still open, there was quite a bit of traffic on the road. I am so used to riding this road in the summer when there are no cars, that it was a little annoying. But at least there wasn’t much sand on the road. I finished my interval right before the Forest Service sign. Initially, I thought I’d do two intervals, but after finishing the first one, I bagged it. I figured I got my first interval during my pushes on Cartwright Rd. I quickly flipped a U-turn and headed down the hill. I stopped at the Chevron to get some water then enjoyed the tailwind home on Hill Rd. By the time I got home it was a 3½ hr ride with good climbing and an hour of PowerCranks…not a bad day in the saddle! I think I’m finally getting out of this overtraining funk I’ve been in.