Windermere Ride/OIA timetrial

This past Sunday I went out and did a group ride in Clermont. It starts at the Windermere Middle School and then goes out and does all of the "big" hills that Florida has to offer, Grassy Lake, Buck Hill, Sugar Loaf, and Stair Steps. It does all the climbs that I am going to have to do this weekend at the Sugar Loaf RR. I figured it would just be a cool ride and really good training. My dad and I drove out to the ride with some friends of ours ( Mr. Kieth and Craig ) and I was totally stoked. Our motto of the day,"Attack and make other people suffer." The first 16 miles were fine. It was a decent pace and my legs felt great...it was all good until one of my friends called me and when I tried to get my phone out of my pocket..well long story short it slipped, got run over by a couple riders, and almost hit by a car. Luckily its still working and came out of the ordeal with only a few scratches, but after that I could see the group getting further and further up the hill. When I first felt my phone fall I was bummed out because my legs were feeling really good. I chased the group and was almost back on but ended up getting caught at a red light and watched the group as they crested the next hill. I ended up racing around Clermont trying to get in the big hills and also trying ot meet back up with the group. The rest of the ride went well. I plan on going back out and doing it again.

Today was the 3rd OIA timetrail. I had pole position again and was kind of bummed at the fact that I didn't have anyone to chase. I had a good start. I set off at a descent pace hugging the curb to avoid as much of the cross wind as I could. At the turn around I felt good. After driving into the head wind it was a nice change to get a tailwind. Unfortunately it was only for about a half mile before it returned to the brutal cross wind. My finishing time was basically the same as my previous 2 time trials. I did a 17:31. I am pretty sure that I have totally mastered the 17:30 on that course ;P

This weekend is the Sugar Loaf RR. The women 1,2,3 are racing with the 3 men so it should be a challenging race. I'm looking forward to it.

Also check out Craig Creeden's blog. I set up a link to it so check it out.

Ciao

GA Camp #2

The GA camp was alot of fun. The last two days had wonderful weather, but the first day was rather rainy and dreary.
When we got up to ride on the first day one look out the window told the entire story, we were on the second floor but when you looked out the window you could only see about 20 feet before everything disappeared into the thick, white wall of fog. We waited a couple hours to see if the fog would clear but we were really just delaying the inevitable. So we geared up and drove out to Blood mountain.
We started about 2 miles away to give us some time to warm up.In the distance we could see Blood Mountain, not even half way up there was a layer of fog. You couldn't even see the top. Once we reached the climb it took us about 30 minutes to reach the fog. Once we got into it I couldn't see anything over 20 meters away. It brought a new element to our climb and at first it was rather fun. About 2 miles from the top we were coming up to a right hand bend when a car missed the corner and came to a screeching halt on our side of the road. The defiantly got our heart rates up and we decided to go to a different mountain. The rest of the day was basically the same. We climbed and climbed, through ran and fog. By the end of the day the weather had lost it fun aspect and became really dreary.
I ended the day with a hot shower and an intense Wii sports tournament;)


On the second day the weather was alot better. It was sunny and warm. When we got out to Woody Gap there were a ton of cyclists out riding (I guess we were the only insane ones to go out and ride the day before). The weather was great as we started our first climb of the day. It took about 40 minutes from top to bottom and it definitely got our legs nice and warmed up. Five climbs and about two hours later we were on our way over to Brass Town Bald. It took us about an hour to get to the base of the climb. When we finally saw the sign leading to the park we had mixed emotions. Only 3 miles to the end of the ride, but those last 3 miles were the hardest. It was fun to watch the road and see the signs spray painted for the Tour de Georgia. Mile 1 and 2 slowly ticked by. I was looking around every corner for the top of the climb. When it finally came I was very happy. I was very tired and extremely happy that the ride was over.




Our last day in the mountains was alot of fun. It was also very tiring. We decided to go out and do a new loop, it went from Jacks Gap, to Unicoi Gap, then to Hog Pen. At the top of Jacks Gap is Brass Town. If you look at the mountains in the distance while you're riding up Jacks Gap you can see Brass Town in the distance. It was a much prettier sight when I knew I didn't have to climb it! Jack's descent wasn't huge but it was nice and long. I think that has to be my favorite thing about when I ride in the mountains. I love to fly down the descents. Unicoi was fun. It wasn't to long or to steep and it was nice and steady. The descent was well worth the climb. It was long, fast, and had windy turns. I think that was the best part of that ride ;) The ride from Unicoi to Hog Pen gave us a much needed break. After missing our turn and going through the scenic little town of Helen, we were finally back on track and on our way to the final climb of the day. Hog Pen was by far the hardest climb of the day. It was very long. As we neared the top we kept getting our hopes up thinking that the finish was just around this corner. Finally we saw the Appalachian Trail sign. If I had to pick my favorite thing to see on this trip it would have to be that sign. There was one about 50 meters from the top of every climb.


All in all it was a great weekend. I'll have more later! There is another OIA timetrial on Tuesday and next weekend is the Sugar Loaf Road Race.

Thanks for Reading,


Ciao

Lucky Day

Last week we adopted a 3 month old kitten from the Humane Society. We named him Lucky after the 3 Amigos "Lucky Day". He is a energetic ball of fur and will most likely be getting into plenty of mischief during the next 6 months.

This week is a recovery week. I get to hit the mountains this weekend. I'll post some pictures on Tuesday. It says it is going to be rainy so it might turn into an epic weekend! But hey, if you don't train in the rain you wont race in the rain.

Also I've added some new links so check them out. The links go to a site with info on Laura Charmeda ( my coach ), Tyler Brant's Blog ( one of my teammates ), and the Team Swift Blog.

Ciao,

Ashlyn